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Arizona voters this November will decide whether to allow students regardless of their immigration status to obtain financial aid and cheaper in-state tuition at state universities and community colleges.
At least 18 states, including California and Virginia, as well as the District of Columbia now offer in-state tuition to all students who otherwise qualify regardless of status, according to a website that tracks higher education and immigration data.
But there has been little past voter support in Arizona for granting in-state tuition, which is about a third of the rate for out-of-state undergraduate students, to those who arrived in the United States without approval, even if they attended high school in the state for years. Voters in 2006 overwhelmingly approved a proposition that prevented students who entered the U.S. without authorization from getting in-state tuition and other financial benefits.
The current proposal known as Proposition 308, which was referred to this year’s Nov. 8 ballot by Arizona’s Legislature, would repeal some parts of the earlier initiative and allow all students including non-citizens to receive in-tuition rates as long as they graduated from and attended public or private high school or the home school equivalent for two years in Arizona.
