Students and their families should expect yearly tuition hikes of about 2 percent more than annual increases in cost of living over at least the next seven years, according to University financial planning documents. Those increases are only projections, Chief Operating Officer Peter French said, adding that they are necessary for Brandeis to provide competitive facilities and faculty salaries.

"There's a whole bunch of things that relate to the economics of higher education that result in . cost pressures," French said, describing higher education as an inherently inefficient business, partly because universities must maintain their physical infrastructures even when not in session.

"We have been trying to hold the tuition cost increases below peer institutions," he added. For the most part, he said, that's been possible.

Upping tuition 2 percent more than the yearly increase in the U.S. Consumer Price Index, a measurement of changes in the retail prices of a constant basket of goods and services, resulted in a 4.5 percent increase in tuition this year.

To compare, Washington University in St. Louis increased tuition by 5.4 percent over the same period, Case Western Reserve University's tuition increased by 12.1 percent and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology increased tuition by 4 percent, according to University documents.

The financial planning documents that included the planned tuition hikes were part of an appendix to the 123-page self-study report issued this year as part of the University's reaccredidation application process.

Even as tuition rises, the University's financial situation has greatly improved. In the past 10 years, an $8.5 million deficit in the operating budget has been eliminated, the endowment has grown from $195 million to more than $550 million and the amount of tuition discounted through scholarships and financial aid has steadily fallen, from 45 percent in fiscal year 1995 to 33 percent in fiscal year 2005.

French said that even with the University's improved financial health, the current discount rate places Brandeis in the middle of the pack regarding its peer institutions. Previous discount rates were too high and "way out of whack," he said, and financial aid is now distributed more efficiently than it was 10 years ago.

"You have to pay for this somehow," French said, noting that for a university like Harvard, all discounted tuition is funded from the endowment. At Brandeis, French said, only 30 percent of the discount rate is funded from the endowment.

"The money to pay this financial aid is coming right off the top," he said. "That's foregone revenue."

French emphasized faculty salaries and student amenities as costs necessitating tuition increases.

Referring to the growing cost of those amenities, such as athletic facilities and improved housing, French added: "We're in basically an arms race these days."

"We take this very seriously in terms of not pushing a lot of these costs up," he said.