Preschool Tuition increase 20%?!?!?

[pdxcox]

In April, enrolled our DS at a preschool we love. we love the staff, the daily rhythm, amazing garden, the philosophy, etc.
so at our enrollment meeting she mentioned they were working on the new budget plans to start Sept 2010 that would come with a standard bi-annual tuition review as well as reviewing the income brackets. They offer reduced tuition for families in qualifying brackets. which i think adds a lot to the diversity of the school something not found in many other schools in our area.
anyway, they sent out the revised rates yesterday which shows a 20.2% increase for our income bracket!!! lower brackets are going up at a more reasonable rate of 6.8%
It takes them from one of the most reasonably priced programs in the area to the most espensive by a wide margin and they require the most parent work hours around as well. Which seemed fair when tuition was in line.
Am i crazy to be so upset?
while we are ok financially, this is definitely not in the plans and i'm not sure what to do.
Our son is currently there 2 days a week and we were planning on moving to fulltime starting Sept. he loves the school, we for the most part love the school, but now have this awful mistrust of the administration.
they have done nothing but fundraise and speak about money since we started 2 months ago.
they are a non profit school so I didnt think this would be such an issue and seems really out of line with their stated philosophy.
what would you do?

[daytripper75]

Ours went up 28% for next year. I feel your pain. I spoke to our principal and asked for a tuition break. Still waiting to hear back. If we don't get the break we're just going to tighten our belts and deal with it for a year until she is done with the school.

[Momily]

Schools that use a sliding scale have been hit incredibly hard by this economy. They build their budgets based on the assumption that they'll have certain #'s of families in each category, if families are moving into lower income categories, and therefore paying less tuition, they need to make the difference up somehow.

I understand how frustrating this must be. But, sadly, it was probably the most ethical choice they could make. They're already not turning a profit, they're already saving costs by having parents volunteer, they've likely eaten through this savings this far into the recession, if they raise the tuition for the families at the low end of the scale they'll lose them, and much of the diversity that drew you there in the first place.

I'm curious what their mission and stated philosophy is that you feel wouldn't be in line with this.

[VisionaryMom]

Non-profit doesn't mean that they don't need money to run. It just means that they don't try to turn a profit on your tuition. Raising tuition isn't out of line with being non-profit. I don't understand why this makes you "distrust" the administration. They told you they were doing reviews of the tuition. They likely have an enrollment drop right now since almost all private schools are, and they need to make up some money to continue to provide services.