Hitting Home: Quality, Cost, and Access Challenges Confronting Higher Education Today - The multi-year Making Opportunity Affordable initiative aims to provide research, tools, and support to help states and institutions transform how they deliver postsecondary education to serve more students without reducing quality. This report touches on changing workforce demands, underlying problems with higher education, the degree gap and what needs to be done to improve higher education systems. (Travis Reindl, Making Opportunity Affordable, March 2007.)...

Financing Higher Education - Throughout the world, financing of higher education is immensely sensitive politically, although there has been widespread acceptance of two core objectives, both for their own sake and for reasons of national economic performance: (1) strengthening quality and diversity; and (2) improving access. According to the author, economic theory argues for a three-part strategy to better meet the needs of society and student: (1) deferred variable fees; (2) income-contingent loans; and (3) active measures to promote access. The author examines higher education finance reforms in Britain in 1998 and 2004, discussing lessons learned, possible applications to other nations and the state of higher education finance in several other nations. (Nicholas Barr, Finance & Development, June 2005)...

How Latino Students Pay for College PDF - Although the percentage of Latino students receiving financial aid for college is at an all-time high, Latinos receive the lowest average federal aid awards of any racial or ethnic group, receiving an average financial aid award of $6,250, compared to the national average of $6,890 in 2003-04. This brief argues that Latinos rely heavily on federal aid – and on grants in particular – because they are more likely to be first-generation college students and to have relatively low family incomes. The brief offers a profile of Latino undergraduates along with an overview of Latino undergraduates participating in financial aid, and has sections on: (1) grants; (2) loans; (3) federal financial aid; (4) state financial aid; and (5) institutional aid. Policy recommendations at the federal, state/local, institutional and K-12 community levels are listed, starting on page 23. (Excelencia in Education and the Institute for Higher Education Policy, August 2005)...

Trends in Student Aid 2005 - Annual data is presented in this publication on the amount of financial assistance – grants, loans and work study – available to help students pay for postsecondary education. The most recent report finds the rate of growth of private student loans was higher during the 2004-05 academic year than the rate of growth of any other type of student aid, including federal loan programs. The report also details how the number of Pell Grant recipients increased by only 3% during the same academic year, after growing at an average rate of 8% over the preceding three years. (The College Board, 2005)...

A Decade of Undergraduate Student Aid: 1989-90 to 1999-2000 - During the 1990s, tuition at colleges and universities rose faster than median household income. This study from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) describes many of the changes that took place in undergraduate student financial aid during this same period, including the re-authorization of the Higher Education Act in 1992, which increased the availability of federal student loans. In addition to the report's narrative, numerous charts, tables and data points are available for those who wish to conduct further analysis of this issue. (Christina Chang Wei, Xiaojie Li, Lutz Berkner and C. Dennis Carroll, NCES, 2004)...

Trends in College Pricing 2004 - This report, based on the College Board’s Annual Survey of Colleges, provides updated information on tuition and other expenses associated with attending public and private nonprofit institutions of postsecondary education in the United States. It finds that during the 2004-05 school year, tuition at public four-year and two-year colleges rose 10.5% and 8.7%, respectively, continuing a 20-year trend of tuition increases. It argues that while wealthy families can keep pace with the rising cost of tuition at postsecondary institutions, low-income and middle-class families increasingly struggle to afford a college education. (The College Board, 2004)...

Trends in Student Aid 2004 - Annual data is presented in this publication on the amount of financial assistance – grants, loans and work-study – available to help students pay for postsecondary education. The most recent report finds that while the amount of financial aid students received in 2004-05 actually increased, the gap between need-based and merit-based aid is growing, and loans are replacing grants as the primary form of student financial aid. (The College Board, 2004)...

When Saving Means Losing: Weighing the Benefits of College-savings Plans - In recent years college-savings plans, or "529 plans," have become a popular tool used by students and families to combat the rising costs of a college education. This report analyzes the effects of college-savings plans on four family income levels and concludes that these plans may actually decrease the affordability of a postsecondary education. Low-income students, in particular, can see a reduction in the amount of need-based aid they receive if they choose to invest in a college-savings plan. The authors argue there needs to be better alignment of the outcomes of college-savings plans with the intentions of those who created and support them. (Roberto M. Ifill and Michael S. McPherson, The Lumina Foundation, July 2004) ...

College Affordability In Jeopardy - While state spending on higher education dropped significantly in 2002, tuition and fees at postsecondary institutions rose. This report is the first to look at what has happened to public tuition and fees, state appropriations for higher education, state student financial aid, and personal income for fiscal years 2002 and 2003. Data is broken down on a state-by-state basis, giving policymakers a comprehensive view of the current state of college affordability. (The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, 2003) ...

Getting Ready to Pay for College: What Students and Their Parents Know About the Cost of College Tuition and What They Are Doing to Find Out - Families often overestimate the cost of college tuition at four-year public institutions, according to this study. The study also found that the failure of some families to research the cost of higher education can discourage students from preparing for college. (Laura J. Horn and Xianglei Chen, MPR Associates, Inc. & Chris Chapman, National Center for Education Statistics, September 2003)...

Losing Ground: A National Status Report on the Affordability of American Higher Education - This report documents the declining affordability of higher education for American families and highlights public policies that support affordable higher education. It finds that while state support of public postsecondary education has increased, tuition has increased more, making a college education less affordable than ever before. Providing state-by-state summaries as well as national findings, this report features some of the most current data regarding postsecondary affordability. (The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, 2002)...

Study of College Costs and Prices, 1988-89 to 1997-98 - This report on college costs and prices presents the findings of a study mandated by Congress as part of the 1998 Amendments to the Higher Education Act. The study examines the relationship between costs and prices at groups of public and private nonprofit institutions, and explores the potential association between financial aid and tuition. (Alisa F. Cunningham, Jane V. Wellman, Melissa E. Clinedinst and Jamie P. Merisotis, National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education, February 2002) ...

The Affordability of Higher Education: A Review of Recent Survey Research - A review of survey research conducted by Public Agenda for The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, to supplement the Losing Ground report finds that Americans are opposed to approaches that reduce access to college either by raising tuition or admitting fewer students. They are more sympathetic to approaches that emphasize greater contributions from the state or savings by colleges themselves. The report also notes that the public has not thought through the complexities of higher education financing. (John Immerwahr, Public Agenda, May 2002)...

The Policy of Choice: Expanding Student Options in Higher Education - The upcoming reauthorization of the Higher Education Act has placed the goals and effectiveness of federal Title IV student aid programs at the forefront of the higher education policy debate. Critical to the debate are the role of federal student aid in promoting access, choice and affordability despite rising college tuitions and increasing numbers of disadvantaged students. This primer updates key data and lays out the past and present issues of college choice, and discusses the goals of federal student aid and the effectiveness of federal aid programs in meeting them. (Alisa Federico Cunningham, Institute for Higher Education Policy, August 2002)...

Trends In College Pricing 2002 - This report, based on the College Board’s Annual Survey of Colleges, provides updated information on tuition and other expenses associated with attending public and private nonprofit institutions of postsecondary education in the United States. It finds that the inflation-adjusted increase of 8.4% in 2002-03 is the largest increase in college tuition in 20 years. It argues that while wealthy families can keep pace with the rising cost of tuition at postsecondary institutions, low-income and middle-class families increasingly struggle to afford a college education. (The College Board, 2002) ...

Trends in Student Aid 2002 - Annual data is presented in this publication on the amount of financial assistance – grants, loans and work-study – available to help students pay for postsecondary education. The most recent report finds that while the amount of financial aid students received in 2001-02 actually increased, the gap between need-based and merit-based aid is narrowing and loans are replacing grants as the primary form of student financial aid. (The College Board, 2002) ...

What Students Pay for College: Changes in Net Price of College Attendance Between 1992-93 and 1999-2000 - This NCES report examines the most recent trends in the net price of college attendance (price includes tuition, living expenses and other nontuition costs), analyzing changes in various measures of net price between 1992-93 and 1999-2000. Despite increases in tuition, once all grant aid combined (including federal, state and institutional aid) was subtracted from the total price of attendance, low-income students did not pay a higher price on average in 1999-2000 than they did in 1992-93. In almost all cases, however, middle- and high-income students did pay more on average to attend in 1999-2000 than in 1992-93. (Laura Horn, Christina Chang Wei, Ali Berker, NCES, 2002)...

Middle Income Undergraduates: Where They Enroll and How They Pay for Their Education - This NCES report examines the characteristics of dependent middle-income undergraduates who attended college full-time, full-year, and how they paid for their education. It also compares these undergraduates with their lower and higher income counterparts, and examines strategies that middle income undergraduates might have used to meet the gap between financial aid and financial need. The report also looks at how students filled the gap between price of attendance and the amount of financial aid they received (out-of-pocket costs). (Jennifer B. Presley and Suzanne B. Clery, National Center for Education Statistics, July 2001)...