A r c h i v e d  I n f o r m a t i o n

Getting There: A Report for National College Week, November 1999
Getting Beyond Sticker Shock: College Is Affordable

One of the greatest concerns that parents in America have is whether or not they will be able to pay for their children's college education. Endless accounts about the rising cost of college tuition leave many parents with the mistaken impression that they may not be able to send their children to a first-rate college. This increasing anxiety about paying for a college education has found a permanent place on America's worry list.

Too Little Knowledge Is a Dangerous Thing

According to a recent survey sponsored by the American Council on Education for a new report entitled Too Little Knowledge Is a Dangerous Thing, a "huge majority?71 percent "?of those surveyed believe that "a four-year college education is not affordable for most Americans." The central finding of the report is that "the public places an incredibly high value on higher education and plans to do whatever it takes to help their children obtain it, but that they are worried, poorly informed and not well equipped to make thoughtful choices." According to the report, the "most troubling news was the finding that first-generation college families, minority group members, and those with low incomes are the most uninformed and fearful."

There is no doubt that college tuition has been rising steadily over the last twenty years. According to the 1999 College Board report Trends in Student Aid, "Average tuition at both public and private four-year institutions more than doubled from 1980 to 1998. " However, during the same period "median income for families most likely to have children in college (parents 45-54) has been relatively stagnant, rising 22% since 1980."

Misunderstandings about the true cost of college can have a profound impact on the lives of some of our most promising students. For example, according to the 1998 report Factors Related to College Enrollment, a disproportionate number of students from low-income families, who scored high on a test administered as part of a national study (National Education Longitudinal Study), did not go on to college. Students from low-income families, according to the study, were "fives times as likely to forgo college as students from high-income families." Nearly 60 percent of low-income students who had high test scores cited the inability to afford college as a reason in their decision.

Because of this and many other instances of similar misunderstandings, one of the central purposes of National College Week is to help overcome the mistaken impression of so many families that college may be out of their financial reach. As this report notes, more than half of the students attending 4-year institutions pay less than $4,000 in tuition and fees, and almost three-quarters pay less than $8,000. In 1998, the average cost of tuition, fees, room and board at a 4-year public institution was $7,769. The average cost at a 4-year private institution was $14,709.

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Getting Beyond Sticker Shock: College is Affordable 		[ Table of Contents ]
Expanding Federal Student Financial Aid