SAN BERNARDINO - The dollar amount on the computer screen is low, and Claudia Avalos, 25, looks distraught.
"I'm looking at my financial aid now,' said Avalos, a student who just transferred to Cal State San Bernardino. "It's not that much.'

After paying community college fees at Chaffey College in Rancho Cucamonga, just adjusting to Cal State's fees almost $1,000 higher is daunting.

And those fees may jump by 30 percent next year to lessen a budget gap created by state cuts to the Cal State campuses.

That's almost $500 a year for full-time undergraduate students, leaving students like Avalos scrambling to make up the difference.

Avalos doesn't want to go into debt taking out student loans, so she plans to work full time as a department manager at Wal-Mart to pay for school next year.

"I didn't want to be a department manager because it's more responsibility,' she said of her promotion. "But I needed more money.'

Still, there are other worries.

"We're here because we want a better life,' she said. "But when you work full time you can get behind in school.'

Financial aid will help many students make up the difference.

The fee increase "doesn't affect me that much because I have financial aid,' said Shawnette Thomas, 22. "When they raise fees, they raise aid.'

When fees rose for the spring quarter, students' financial aid packages were adjusted to accommodate the increase. If fees go up again, the university's financial aid office hopes to do that again.

"It was a lot of work,' said Melissa Lohmuller, Cal State San Bernardino's financial-aid processor. "But we want to help students.'

But loan limits won't change, and financial aid doesn't help everyone.

"There's this myth that financial aid takes care of all students with financial need,' said Susan Meisenhelder, a Cal State San Bernardino professor who chairs the California Faculty Association's Political Action and Legislative Committee.

In reality, she said, many students with need don't qualify. Their families may have enough money on paper for college, but that money may not be available to the student.

Age and other factors can also disqualify students, Meisenhelder said.

Cal State student Jan Holden, 35, who teaches in Beaumont, doesn't get financial aid. The increases, he said, will cut into "rent, food minor inconveniences like that.'

"It's definitely a pinch,' Holden said. "Thirty percent is a lot.' The Cal State system's Board of Trustees had been considering a 25 percent fee increase for undergraduates and a 20 percent increase for graduate students.

But at the July meeting, the university system will recommend that the board increase fees by 30 percent for all students, Cal State Chancellor Charles B. Reed stated in a memo he recently sent to campus presidents.

There is a "strong likelihood,' Reed wrote, that the Cal State system's budget will be cut by $69.5 million more than the expected $260.7 million reduction called for in the governor's budget.

The fee increase would make up for part of this cut by generating a net revenue of $25 million, he said.

Officials point out, and many students concede, that the univeristy is still inexpensive compared to other schools. But many are still fighting the increase.

Meisenhelder and a group of students protested fee increases at the last Cal State Board of Trustees meeting. They will likely present their views again at the July meeting.

"The reason I came here was the tuition,' Tiffany Mears, 21, said. "Now it keeps increasing.'

For many, the increases will mean taking out loans or making small sacrifices.

'It leaves me less money for books,' said Shawntao Bergeron, 29, of San Bernardino.

University of California undergraduate students will likely see a $795 fee increase in addition to a $405 annualized increase implemented in spring 2003.

Likewise, community college fees will likely jump from $11 to $18 per unit, costing full-time students about $210 each year.

Fee increases alone won't make up for budget cuts. Enrollment and staff cuts are expected.

Cal State San Bernardino may have to reduce the number of students it had planned to register by about 300 full-time equivalent students, campus President Al Karnig said.

Between fee increases and tighter enrollment caps at all public colleges, many educators worry that some students will be squeezed out of an already crowded system.

"We are going to have to close the doors and turn people away once we hit that limit,' said Paul Rubalcaba, spokesman for San Bernardino Valley College. "Access denied was the perfect slogan for the state budget and what it's done for higher education.'