The University of Massachusetts has agreed to increase tuition, room and board next academic year, as leaders on Beacon Hill disagree over creating a “tuition lock” system and how much to invest in public higher education.

The UMass Board of Trustees voted during their quarterly meeting on Wednesday to increase tuition for in-state undergraduates by 2.5%, and increase room and board on the Amherst campus by 4.5% and on the Dartmouth and Lowell campuses by 2.7%.

Tuition for graduate students is also going up — 2.5% for in-state graduate students at the Amherst, Boston and Lowell campuses, 3.5%  for medical students at the T.H. Chan School of Medicine, Tan Chingfen Graduate School of Nursing and Morningside Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, and 2% at UMass Law.

As government aid has struggled to keep pace with demand and tuition increases, university-generated financial aid has grown to represent 69% of free aid available for students — $395 million in fiscal year 2023. Of the university-generated aid, 81% goes to in-state students.

U.S. applications for jobless benefits rose to their highest level in more than a year, but remain at relatively low levels despite efforts by the Federal Reserve to cool the economy and job market in its battle against inflation.

Jobless claims in the U.S. for the week ending April 8 rose by 11,000 to 239,000 from the previous week, the Labor Department said Thursday. That’s the most since January of 2022 when 251,000 people filed for unemployment benefits.

The four-week moving average of claims, which evens out some of the week-to-week fluctuations, rose by 2,250 to 240,000. That’s the most since November of 2021.