The College Board's annual survey on trends in college pricing indicates that while rates of tuition increase have lessened since skyrocketing in the past two years, they continue to surpass inflation.
At the 3,000 four-year public universities surveyed, average tuition in 2005-2006 rose to $5,491, an increase of $365, or 7.1 percent. Private universities rose to $21,235, up $1,190 (5.9 percent).
While these rates are certainly less than the ten and 13 percent increases seen in recent years, they remain a burden to students who are strapped for funding their educations. When room and board, books, supplies, fees and other expenses are taken into account, students at public institutions in their own states are now averaging costs of $15,556, while their counterparts at private institutions are facing sums averaging $31,016.
"I do think that maybe there's a couple universities out there that legitimately need to raise their tuition costs. But there is definitely a market increase in tuition cost," said sophomore Teresa Romeo, who receives financial aid.
These expenses are a result of a variety of factors, the first of which is the rising costs of energy, which themselves surpass the rate of inflation and must be absorbed by the University budget.
In addition, there's the issue of labor. "Universities are very highly labor intensive," says Provost Steven Knapp. "We don't make gains from productivity, which has to do with replacing people with machines. c9 Education c9 is not a process that can be automated."
Other major costs that the school faces are those of computerization and library acquisition, particularly for journals. Knapp pointed out that the cost of subscriptions is rising, but Hopkins must maintain these resources in order to remain competitive.
Yet one of the biggest causes of the increases in tuition is the rapidly increasing cost of healthcare for employees.
At Hopkins, the costs of offering high-quality instruction don't even come close to being covered by tuition. It is the revenue obtained through philanthropy, which allows Hopkins to maintain a competitive edge where instructional staff is concerned.
Last but not least, unlike most universities, Hopkins doesn't have a separate fee for athletics or a student union.
"It's all folded into tuition," says Knapp, "and that should be taken into account." While philanthropy can help to fund recent projects such as the O'Connor Recreation Center and the Mattin Center, the ongoing upkeep has to come from tuition, since donors don't typically give for such purposes.
Perhaps the most pressing issue universities must address is how to provide financial aid to students that matches the rise of tuition in order to attract a diverse student body.
According to the College Board, 62 percent of full-time undergraduate students received grants from the federal or state government, from their universities or private sources.
Hopkins Director of Financial Aid Ellen Frishberg noted that only 35 to 40 percent of students here are receiving financial aid grants, sharing the $32 million that was allotted this year. In addition, Frishberg's office also oversees $10 million in student loans, $1 million in work study and $4 million in private loans -- that she knows of.
There has been rising concern regarding the increase in the number of students taking out private loans, often at much high interest rates than are through the university.
Of the problem, Frishberg said, "We shop in the marketplace to make sure we're getting the best interest rates for students ... so that they're not going out and getting hurt in the long run. c9 Over 65 percent of our students go on to graduate school. We want to keep students' indebtedness down because we know they're going to have to borrow again."
Romeo expressed her concern that rising tuition will put her into debt. "It's frustrating for students who do rely on themselves to pay for their college education. c9 I'm definitely in a bind when tuition costs rise at such a high rate," she said.
But she doesn't necessarily attribute the increase in private loan-taking to the rising costs of tuition. "I've been seeing a lot of parents interested in having the student, or themselves, borrow their portion -- the family's portion -- of the tuition," says Frishberg.
"I see a lot of co-signed loans to pay for what we think is the family's ability to pay for the education. I think families are stretched, and so rather than taking on the debt personally, parents ask their children to co-sign the loan and take on that burden. ... We're often not sure who exactly is paying it off, the parent or the student."
As always, it seems that the people who can afford it the least are borrowing the most.
Frishberg points out that while low-income students can often obtain sufficient aid, the high-income students don't have to worry about it and the middle-income families are truly struggling to find the funds.
And while the number of students Frishberg saw turn down an opportunity at Hopkins because of cost used to be limited to "a handful," she now acknowledges "a shift where families are looking for the best deal they can get, as opposed to the best fit for students, and that's a reality."
How does this effect Hopkins as a whole? Frishberg insists that our applicant pool has the depth to sustain those losses and still maintain its standards. It's the diversity of the population that suffers; ethnicity aside, the majority of students are going to come from an affluent background.
Says Knapp of the worth of a college education, "It's a good bargain economically. c9 The other things that are less tangible -- learning the skills of critical thinking, lifelong friendships, things that are less tangible than the amount or money that you earn -- are certainly part of what's being provided. It's harder to put a price tag on those."
