Education Department Releases College Cost Data to Empower Families to Make Informed Investments

Press Release

The U.S. Department of Education continued to increase transparency around the cost of college by updating several lists on its College Affordability and Transparency Center today, highlighting institutions with the highest and lowest tuition and net price, and those schools where prices are rising the fastest. In addition, this year the Department is releasing full lists so consumers can see how much a specific school costs in comparison to similar institutions.

"We want to arm students and parents with the information they need to make smart educational choices," said U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. "Students need to know up front how much college will actually cost them instead of waiting to find out when the first student loan bill arrives. These lists are a major step forward in unraveling the mystery of higher education pricing."

These lists are required by the Higher Education Opportunity Act of 2008 and released as part of the Obama Administration's continuing effort to make the costs of college more transparent in order to help students and their families make informed decisions on their investment in higher education. The Department is also finalizing a model "financial aid shopping sheet," which the Department is calling for institutions to voluntarily adopt in order to provide students with easy-to-understand information about their financial aid packages. Earlier this year, the President called for a College Scorecard for all degree-granting institutions, designed to provide essential information about college costs, graduation rates, and potential earnings.

Last year, the Department published its first set of College Affordability and Transparency Lists. Three lists focus on tuition and fees, and three others look at the institution's average net price, which is the average price of attendance that is paid by full-time, first-time students after grants and scholarships are taken into account. Those colleges and universities where prices are rising the fastest will report why costs have gone up and how the institution will address rising prices, and the Department will summarize these reports into a document that it will post online. There are 1,878 institutions included in these lists, and schools are allowed to appear on more than one of the lists.

This year, in response to several requests from consumers for more comparison data, the Department is also providing tuition and net price information for all institutions, broken out by sector in order to allow students to compare costs at similar types of schools. A total of 4,165 institutions are included on the combined lists:

Lists
Highest tuition and fees (top 5 percent)
Highest average net price (top 5 percent)
Lowest tuition and fees (bottom 10 percent)
Lowest average net price (bottom 10 percent)
Highest percentage increases in tuition and fees (top 5 percent)
Highest percentage increases in average net price (top 5 percent)
All title IV institutions

Sectors
4-year public
4-year private nonprofit
4-year private for-profit
2-year public
2-year private nonprofit
2-year private for-profit
Less-than-2-year public
Less-than-2-year private nonprofit
Less than-2-year private for-profit

Source