Introduction of Documentary 

  UC Board of Regents is increasing the nonresidential student tuition (a.k.a. international student tuition) every year since 2015. While California resident tuition hike vote was postponed this year, UC Board members unanimously agreed upon nonresident tuition hike, which was already twice the amount of resident tuition. This documentary focuses on middle-class Korean international students at UCSD who are struggling to afford the tuition every month due to UC’s high tuition demand on nonresidential students. These international students, who are often viewed as lavish and wealthy in our campus, share their opinions on constant international student tuition hike and its significant impact on their finance. 
  As a Korean international student, I also had to go back to Korea after my Freshman year at UCSD due to financial issues. After I returned to UCSD and paying about $15,000 per quarter for tuition this year, I began to question myself whether such amount of tuition was worth to pay for UCSD courses. While the main reason for an annual tuition hike, according to UC San Diego Board, was a better quality of education and faculty, most of UCSD students could hardly find any improvements in courses. What’s even worse is that UCSD has actually been decreasing the number of faculties due to ‘low budget’. After hearing such issues, international students feel annual nonresident tuition hike is to fill that budget since international students don’t have a choice and but to pay for whatever the Board decides. Being an outsider of the U.S., it is not to mention that international students are not 'qualified' for a single scholarship program. I mean, literally what choice do they have if they cannot afford the tuition anymore?

Documentary Approach 

   I remember hundreds of UCSD students demonstrated in Library Walk to oppose resident tuition hike last year. On the other hand, not a single international student addresses an issue of UC Board’s unanimous decision on nonresident tuition hike over the last three years. After a thorough research on annual nonresident tuition hike, I felt it was clearly unfair and decided to take an action through my documentary course at UCSD to speak about the issue for the first time as an international student.
I chose my old Muir College roommates who had to leave UCSD for two years due to UCSD’s high tuition. After two years of leave of absence, they found out tuition has increased even more and were very disappointed with the Board's negligent decision. They were more than happy to speak their thoughts on tuition hike when I asked them for an interview. Their point of views as middle-class international students are perfect stories for an argument I'm trying to convey through my documentary. First thing first, in order to create my story's flow as natural as possible, I filmed my B-Roll with my each interviewee's daily routine at UCSD campus, such as studying at Geisel Library, deciding what to eat, or chatting with their classmates. All of my B-Rolls were taken at UCSD because the whole story is about school's impact on students. I added some extreme close-ups B-Rolls of their eyes and mouth to make viewers feel more connected with my interviewees. My ultimate goal of this documentary is to let viewers think in the stance of international students, not to convince them how unfair nonresident tuition hike is. Andd I believed building an intimate relationship between viewers and my interviewees was the key for such goal. So I let my interviewees to build up their own thoughts rather than asking one sided questions. During this process, however, I’ve learned that creating a perfect documentary story that I wanted was rather impossible because each interviewee has a different background and thus different point of views, or the views that I didn’t expect to. Moreover, three minutes duration limit held my back as well. Nevertheless, through several nights of editing, I was able learn what improvement do I need, such as using different background and leading interviewees with a more natural response and questions. Overall, I enjoyed my first solo documentary producing experience and gained both knowledge and confidence through my peers’ critics and compliments.

Overview of Aura Location and Trigger Image

I chose my trigger image with one of Thurgood Marshall College’s paintings that is located on the sidewall of UCSD's Solis Hall building. As you can see, the quote on the painting says: “The power that turns the key is not merely an understanding of individual social behavior, but a disciplined commitment to the people.” What a great word that is. However, as I was reading a quote, I’m afraid UCSD had been a school with a ‘disciplined commitment to the people (students)’ community recently. UCSD has rather been ‘busy’ with making a budget to keep their finances than served students as one of the most influential colleges in the U.S. I truly hope UCSD would be disciplined again to serve all students equally, for the sake of their commitment to not only our community, but also our whole world. I believe that’s the key for our great school like UCSD to grow on a global scale as well.

Trigger Image:

Final Video: