Not Your Mother's College Affordability Crisis. Issue Brief

Delta Cost Project at American Institutes for Research. 1000 Thomas Jefferson Street NW, Washington, DC 20007. Tel: 202-403-5410; e-mail: [email protected]; Web site: http://www.deltacostproject.org

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Student Financial Aid; Paying for College; Public Colleges; Private Colleges; Educational Finance; Student Diversity; Tuition

Like many of her classmates, the author was a first-generation student, but that meant something quite different in the late 1960s than it does now. When she attended, college, the jobs parents had with high school degrees allowed them to provide considerable support for college educations. Paying for college was difficult but not as difficult as it is today. Today's affordability crisis affects many more students and families than earlier ones. Public colleges and universities enroll three of every four undergraduates, and these institutions have suffered major cutbacks in state appropriations in recent years, forcing tuitions to increase faster than those in private schools. Hurt by stubbornly high unemployment rates, many parents can give their children only limited financial support. Some parents are even competing with their offspring for space in bulging classrooms by returning to school, particularly community colleges, to retread or sharpen their skills. Yes, students today have many more financial aid options to offset tuition, and colleges and universities are now required to feature net price calculators on their websites to help prospective students and families estimate what the actual price is likely to be. Even financial aid, including loans that can burden young workers for decades, hasn't made college affordable enough. (Contains 1 table, and 4 figures.)

As Provided

2012

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