The University of California could turn away fewer eligible California students during another lean funding year if it admits more out-of-state students and charges them higher tuition, the system's president suggested Wednesday.

The seemingly spur-of-the-moment idea by President Richard Atkinson was among more than a dozen options laid out before the Board of Regents for coping with what is expected to be a fourth year of getting by on significantly less state funding.

Regents are looking for ways to stave off such dire possibilities as increasing annual fees by $1,800 for undergraduates next year -- which would come on top of the $1,555 in higher fees enacted since December -- and turning away anywhere from 2,500 to tens of thousands of UC-eligible students, depending on how the next state budget shakes out.

Another option that sparked debate Wednesday was delaying the opening of the system's 10th campus, UC-Merced, which the Legislature already has pushed back a year until fall 2005 in a budget-cutting move.

The board will spend the next few months plotting a strategy for how it would further cut back operations if its $2.9 billion in current state funding is reduced by as much as 20 percent. The state also has put UC and the California State University on notice that it will not fund any enrollment growth.

A 20 percent cut in state funding would be the equivalent of closing three small UC campuses, raising student fees $4,000 a year and shutting out 60,000 new students, ``and we don't even take 60,000 new students,'' said Larry Hershman, UC's vice president for budget. ``That would mean no freshman class, no transfer class, no graduate students in any program and that still wouldn't get it.''

Those options are not being considered. But among the cost-cutting possibilities suggested for future discussion are reducing staff and faculty salaries; cutting back the number of faculty members; increasing the teaching load; and further reducing research, outreach, administration and maintenance.

But faculty salaries already lag about 9 percent behind comparable universities, Hershman said. He urged caution about ``any suggestion the faculty needs to work harder and be paid less.''

Options for limiting enrollment include admitting UC-eligible students but asking them to spend their first two years at a community college; freezing the number of new freshmen; and reducing the number of transfer students accepted.

``These are all terrible ideas,'' Hershman said.

In theory, Atkinson's proposal to accept more out-of-state students and charge higher fees could significantly curtail the need to limit California student enrollment, Hershman said. That is, so long as fees weren't set so high that they drove away non-residents.

Atkinson said in Michigan and Virginia, out-of-state students -- who pay significantly higher tuition -- make up 30 to 40 percent of those admitted. At UC, non-residents account for only about 6 percent of UC's 150,000 undergraduates, but they pay about four times as much to attend. They also have to meet higher academic standards.

Hershman said using that money-making model may allow the university to serve as many or more Californians as now.

The possibility of further delaying the opening of UC-Merced prompted discussion.

Longtime regent Velma Montoya said she had heard complaints about the amount of money being spent on hiring faculty now when opening is two years away. Hershman said the faculty is involved in developing the academic program. ``We can't hire faculty the first day students are there,'' he said.

New Regent Dolores Huerta, the United Farm Workers leader, said UC-Merced is ``not only needed, it's necessary.'' She called the new Central Valley campus ``payback for the children of farmworkers,'' who currently do not have a UC school near them.

Some $350 million has been invested in the Merced campus, Hershman said, and delaying its opening another year would save about $4 million.

Several regents suggested that the best solution would be if the Legislature raised taxes, which would help fund higher education at a time of enrollment growth.

``At some point, we may need to draw a line in the sand and say this is as far as we can go because you people in the state Legislature don't want to pay for it,'' Regent Richard Blum said.