Tuition Comparison Shopping

Inside Higher Ed today pointed to an article from the San Jose Mercury-News noting that for certain families, it’s cheaper to go to Harvard than to CSU or UC.  The issue is complicated.  Not all private universities offer the reductions in sticker price tuition that Harvard does (and not everyone gets into private universities that do).

An interesting question is what happens at lower incomes than the $130,000 family income cited in the article.  Public universities and privates (if they have the resources) can lower tuition to zero.  Publics may have more problems in giving the full ride (tuition, housing, textbooks, etc.) that well endowed privates can.  One element that gives the privates more flexibility is that they do have a higher sticker price and so can recycle more funding into tuition discounts.

…Consider a family of four -- married parents, a high-school senior and a 14-year-old child -- making $130,000 a year.  With typical aid, the family should expect to pay nearly $24,000 for a Cal State freshman's tuition, on-campus room and board, supplies and other expenses. At Harvard? Just $17,000, even though its stated annual tuition is $36,305.  The same family would pay about $33,000 for a freshman year at UC Santa Cruz.  UC Berkeley, which recently followed the lead of private colleges by boosting aid for middle-class families, would cost $19,500…

Full story at http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_20101265

The Inside Higher Ed recap is at

http://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2012/03/05/does-cal-state-cost-more-harvard