COST SHARING AND PAYING CHARGED FEES AMONG UNIVERSITY UNDERGRADUATES IN ONDO STATE, NIGERIA

Most households want their children to attend university, but the rising cost of school fees may hinder the achievement of the goals. The study examined the cost sharing and ability to pay charged fees among university undergraduates in Nigeria. This study used the descriptive survey research design. The study population consisted of all university undergraduates in public universities in Ondo State. The study sample consisted of 200 undergraduate and 8 bursary officers from four public universities in Ondo State. The sample was selected using the multistage sampling procedure. Two self-designed instruments titled “Ability to Pay Questionnaire” (APQ) and Cost Sharing Inventory (CSI), were used to collect data for the study. Face and content validity was performed, and the reliability of the instrument was determined using Cronbach’s alpha, yielding a reliability coefficient of 0.82. Research questions were raised and answered using frequency count, mean, and percentage. Hypotheses were tested using Pearson’s product moment correlation and t-test at the 0.05 level of significance. The results revealed that the level of cost sharing in the universities did not follow the same pattern. The study also revealed that the level of ability to pay among university students was low. The study further revealed that the coping strategies used by students are getting financial assistance from friends, paying tuition fees, running business on campus to raise more funds, and receiving financial support through bursary payments. The study concluded that the ability to pay in a federal university is higher than that in a state-owned university. Therefore, the study recommended that the government, especially at the state level, should increase budgetary allocations and subventions to universities. State-owned universities should reduce the school fees paid by students as tuition fees and other fees to enable all students to meet the payment deadline.