Trustees of the State University of New York voted on Monday to raise tuition this fall by 28 percent for in-state undergraduates, the first time the system has increased the rate since 1995. Their action came one week after trustees of the City University of New York agreed to the first rate increase for that system in eight years, increasing tuition by 25 percent for in-state students at senior colleges and by 12 percent for in-state students at community colleges.

Administrators and trustees of both systems said they need the additional revenues as they try to absorb state budget cuts in 2003-4. But SUNY and CUNY students have decried the large increases, arguing that they are likely to cause some students to drop out and to prevent others from enrolling in the first place.

At SUNY, in-state undergraduates this fall will pay $4,350 annually, a $950 increase. Out-of-state undergraduates will pay $10,300, a $2,000, or 24-percent, jump. SUNY's community-college students will see no increases, but students in the university's graduate and professional programs will face a range of them.

The trustees approved the tuition increases by a vote of 13 to 1, with the student representative on the board, Stephanie A. Gross, casting the only no vote. The increase for in-state students equals the amount that state lawmakers authorized in May, though it is less than the increases SUNY officials and Gov. George E. Pataki, a Republican, proposed at the beginning of the year.

Robert L. King, SUNY's chancellor, said that even with the new tuition revenues, the university system still faces $36-million in cuts to operating funds. State lawmakers provided $883-million to SUNY for 2003-4, a 19.7-percent decrease from the previous fiscal year.

But the chancellor said that the tuition increases, along with restrictions the university has placed on travel, hiring, purchasing, and other activities, would help the institution avoid layoffs for now and would not require the cancellation of courses that students need to graduate.

Mr. King and other university officials also pointed out that tuition and fees at SUNY would still be lower than those at comparable public doctoral institutions in states in the New England and Mid-Atlantic regions. In addition, they said that increases in the state's Tuition Assistance Program would cover the costs of the tuition increases for families whose adjusted incomes are less than $49,500, or about 60 percent of the university's undergraduate students who are eligible for the state program.

Nevertheless, George H. Pape Jr., a rising senior who is president of the State University of New York at Buffalo's Student Association, said on Monday that students and families already hurt by the struggling economy were likely to still have trouble coming up with extra money for tuition. He said that the timing of the increase, coming just a couple of months before the academic year begins, and the size of the jump, after so many years of a steady tuition rate, didn't give many families much of a chance to plan for the increase.

"It's sad, quite frankly," Mr. Pape said. "It's a horrible economy out there, and I just hope this doesn't hurt students as hard as I'm afraid it's going to."

Meanwhile, at CUNY, in-state tuition for students at four-year colleges will increase by $800, or 25 percent, to $4,000 per year. Tuition at CUNY's six community colleges will go up by $300, or 12 percent, to $2,800. Out-of-state students will pay $360 per credit unit, a $75 increase, at senior colleges and $190 per credit unit, a $60 increase, at community colleges.

CUNY's Board of Trustees endorsed the increases last week at a rowdy meeting attended by loudly protesting students and others opposed to the increases. At the end of the meeting, some students threw glass vials containing ammonium sulfide, which is toxic and flammable, onto the stage where the trustees sat. A shard of glass hit one CUNY vice chancellor.

The vote for the tuition increase was 13 to 1, with Shamsul Haque, the student trustee, voting against it. CUNY students, like their SUNY counterparts, have argued that the increase will limit access to the public university.

CUNY's chancellor, Matthew Goldstein, emphasized that the university has recently begun several programs to provide information and financial assistance to students to try to help ease the pain of the tuition increases. Those efforts include providing interest-free tuition-payment plans, starting a new Web site to point students to part-time and full-time jobs, and offering more career and financial-aid counseling.

"We are focused on protecting our most vulnerable students in this period of fiscal difficulty across the city and state," Mr. Goldstein said.