The High Cost of College – The $40K Club Gives Way to $50K
November 10th, 2009Once upon a time, the price of a year of schooling at elite private colleges matched the price of the average new car – not any more.
The news from The Chronicle of Higher Education certainly was not positive for students and families. After surveying private schools as to the charges for a year of attendance (tuition, fees, room and board), The Chronicle revealed that 58 private colleges had passed the 50K pricing milestone for 2009-2010.
Leading the way was one of the perennial front-runners, Sarah Lawrence College, at $55,788. Rounding out the top five were Landmark College, a school for students with learning disabilities ($53,900), Georgetown University ($52,161), New York University ($51,993), and George Washington University ($51,775).
Not Actually a New Barrier
While news, it is important to note that the $50K threshold had already been broken. It was just that a year ago, the Club had but five members.
And it is the calculus or rate of change for these numbers that is raising eyebrows. Ultimately, the sheer number of schools topping the threshold led The Chronicle to call $50K the new norm.
Amazingly, the $40K threshold once represented a major psychological milestone for many. But that figure has been rendered obsolete in the matter of just six years time.
In 2003, just two colleges set their tuition, fees, room, and board above $40,000. Including the members of the $50K club, 224 schools were above that threshold in 2009.
Unfortunately, reading the folks at The Chronicle, the average citizen may have even more bad news on the horizon. While some are wondering aloud if we are not on the edge of a precipice, others insist college prices are nowhere near a ceiling.
In fact, The Chronicle reports that “the most expensive institutions have seen no drop in demand.” Sadly, of these high costs, one school, Harvey Mudd, offered this assessment: “So long as we’re staying roughly in the same range, we don’t worry about it too much.”
Some Good News Exists
One positive in the midst of this data is that grants and other forms of financial aid help many students pay far less than the sticker price. Even more importantly, it seems that colleges have actually increased their financial aid at a faster rate than they have increased tuition and fees.
As one might expect, a large number of students receive need-based grants or merit-based scholarships with a significant amount of those funds come from the colleges themselves. The Chronicle was able to dissect data for 42 of the 58 colleges whose list price was more than $50,000 for 2009-10.
For 2008-2009, the average grant per full-time student was just over $13,000 – that meant that the “average bill last year for tuition, fees, room, and board, after grants, was about $36,000.”
However, the best news might be that some of these elite private schools are beginning to become concerned. Leadership at one of the schools that has become a member of the $50K club, Bryn Mawr, revealed they were “concerned because we fear the loss of access for students who deserve this education but might be priced out of it.” It should be noted that Bryn Mawr appears serious on both ends having offered an average grant package of about $30,000 last year.
$50K Too Pricey
But such figures also mask the real issue, that the costs of college are soaring at a rate that is unsustainable for the average student. And the clearest sign that $50K should flat out be considered too much is to return to the once relatively firm, age-old equivalent for private schools.
A year of college at the elite private institutions, the total costs including tuition, fees, room and board, should match the sticker price of a new Chevrolet.
And that might well be the most telling fact as to where things stand today. As at least one interviewee told The Chronicle:
“You don’t have to pay $50,000 for a new Chevy these days.”
