The cost of college is rising, but lurking beneath the obvious tuition and room and board costs are a number of fees, expenses that must be taken into consideration as students prepare to enroll in school. College costs fluctuate and are largely dependent upon student aid. However, there are many fees involved which are not negotiable, expenses such as the following which can add up:

Parking permits – Many schools do not allow freshmen to bring cars on campus. For everyone else, the option to park comes with a price, a fee that is usually charged by the semester and can cost students hundreds of dollars.

Technology – Access to modern technology comes with a price, one that colleges require students to bear. You may be able to gain online access around campus, but the cost of connecting to the world wide web is one charge you’ll have to pay for. Still, fees may be considerably less than what you pay at home, presenting a relative bargain, but a cost nonetheless.

Labs – Take a science course and you’ll be hit with a fee to cover lab costs. Those fees can vary greatly, ranging from about $50 to hundreds of dollars per class if you’ll be working with complex materials.

Health & Wellness – The college medical clinic is busy treating students for strep throat, sinus infections and a host of other ailments. Though your family’s insurance may cover the cost of your visits minus a deductible, the clinic itself needs additional funding from all students. That fee may be charged by the semester and will be added to your tuition bill.

Athletics – You chose your school for its academics, but it wasn’t lost on you that the football team is one of the best in the nation. With an 80,000 seat stadium, a year ’round practice field and a multimillion dollar coaching staff, alumni funds only go so far. You may not be paying for the football program directly, but you are helping to underwrite everything from volleyball to fencing regardless of whether you participate in sports or not.

College-Level Examination Program (CLEP) – You’ve come to college with some work experience under your belt, which means you can test to have some of your credits awarded following testing. These tests, known as CLEP, will cost you money, a fee you pay for each exam whether you receive a passing score or not.

Administrative – If you add or drop a class after the semester starts, you may be assessed a fee. If you drop out for a semester and reapply, expect to pay a reapplication fee. Administrative fees can be charged for a multitude of services from obtaining transcripts to housing application to a fee you must pay to graduate. Special fees also exist for international students and for students seeking master’s and doctorate level degrees.

Can fees be avoided? Generally not. Which means that understanding these costs and adding potential expenses in to your college budget will help you be prepared, avoiding a nasty surprise later on.

Resources

State Press; The Hidden Costs of College Are Adding Up; Katherine Torres; July 4, 2011

UCLA: Miscellaneous Fees

Real Costs

Families uncover the real costs of college when the tuition bill arrives. That bill reflects deductions for aid, scholarships and grants, but few people seem to know what college will cost until the moment the bill is in their hands. Oftentimes, families are left scrambling to cash in a CD or borrow money, undermining their household budgets in the process.

A new federal law that is already active seeks to bring transparency to the college cost conundrum, requiring colleges to offer a “ballpark figure” to include tuition, room and board, fees, books and personal expenses. Information about any school is already included on the US Department of Education’s College Navigator website.[2]

Helpful Calculator

To calculate expenses, you will want to include information about a specific school. Detailed results will be returned including the sticker price before student aid. Dig down and you can get a better idea what your real costs will be once financial aid considerations are included.

Do you think Duke University is beyond what you can afford? At $53,035 for this academic year, Duke may be out of the question. However, if your family income is between $30,001 and $48,000 per year, then those costs are greatly reduced to a more manageable $8,277. Yes, what you make determines what you pay for college with only the highest income families expected to pay the sticker price or something close to it.

School Websites

Some schools are putting net-price calculators (NPCs) on their websites now to comply with a requirement that they do so by October 2011. Use one of these calculators and within 15 minutes you should have a figure delivered that will prove to be very close to your actual costs.

Another provision of the law requires colleges to include a list of required textbooks with the course schedule. That move will allow students to shop around for the best book deals further reducing their college costs.

References

[1] SayCampusLife.com: How To Beat The High Cost Of College

[2] The Christian Science Monitor: College tuition: New law aims for more transparency in costs

Resources

US Department of Education: College Navigator

Public Ivy

The University of California system is rated as one of the best in the country, with six of its ten campuses considered to be public ivies – including UCLA – a distinction which means students at those schools receive an Ivy League equivalent education for a state university price.

The sharp rise in college costs comes as the California university system contends with an $813 million budget cut brought on by monumental cutbacks to the state budget. California, like the rest of the nation, has been working its way through a sharp economic decline. Unlike most of the rest of the nation, the state’s tax levels are astronomically high with politicians bitterly divided on how to handle the crisis.

UC Regents

A meeting by the University of California Board of Regents was protested by more than two thousand students outside of Campbell Hall, who banged on drums and skirmished with police. Three hours after the votes were cast passing along a 15% mid-year increase and the subsequent 32% increase effective next fall, the last of the board regents was able to leave the area under heavy police escort.

California’s university system has been problem plagued for years, offering free tuition to almost seventy percent of its students who qualify. About thirty percent or 53,000 students across the university system qualify, people whose families earn less than $70,000 per year. Of course, generous aid taxes the system, something the regents are not planning to change.

More Hikes

Other UC schools are expecting to pass along big increases following the UCLA move. Across the country, many other state colleges and universities are considering doing the same in a bid to make up for budget short falls and cover rising expenditures.

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In addition, actress Sally Struthers (All In The Family) was a spokesperson for the International Correspondence School (ICS) for a number of years, a home study course offered by the Pennsylvania Colliery Engineer School of Mines. Founded in 1890, the ICS was a pioneer in distant learning.

Degrees Conferred To Students Globally

Today, students can take courses from all over the world and receive bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate degrees by doing the bulk of their work away from campus. Mail order schools still exist, but the majority of the distant learning today is provided by accredited schools, colleges and universities through online computer access.

The University of Phoenix is a leader in contemporary distant learning, having gotten its start before the rise of the internet in the middle 1990s. Today, the university boasts of hundreds of thousands of students taking their courses from every state in the union and from scores of countries spanning the globe. Their business model has been emulated by tens of other colleges and universities while also forcing “brick and mortar” schools to offer the same educational options.

What You Should Personally Consider

Before choosing an online degree program, you’ll want to know if the school is accredited, how their entrance requirements compare to traditional schools, whether you’ll be required to set foot on campus to take a course or a test, and whether an online degree is considered to be different from a degree earned by taking on campus classes. With the latter, you’ll want to be certain that no distinction is made on the diploma or in the college’s promotional material.

For online learning, your education costs should be the same minus room, board, travel expenses and perhaps some fees. You won’t be able to connect with your professor or classmates face to face, but many schools now bring people together through internet groups and Facebook access.

Distant Learning And You

Is distant learning right for you? It could be, especially if learning from afar is the only way you can obtain a degree. Balancing work, family, personal responsibilities and learning is challenging enough, but at least with distant learning you can set your own schedule and study at a pace that suits your lifestyle.

This past Monday, approximately 2000 students protested across the state of California against Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s call for a 10% across-the-board reduction in state spending, an effort he says is to balance the state’s budget. With a projected deficit of $14 billion in 2009, the governor’s initiative would require that the University of California, California State University, and the California Community College system reduce their spending while increasing student fees.

The rallies were held in Sacramento at the state capitol building, in Los Angeles at Pershing Square, and in San Francisco, San Diego, and Humboldt County. With about 1500 protesters in attendance, the Sacramento rally was by far the largest, and the loudest.

Fees have nearly doubled in the past six years for students in the UC and CSU systems, with additional increases expected to cover costs. Californians have long been accustomed to paying some of the lowest rates for higher education in the country, but the state’s ability to keep increases in check have been hampered by the financial deficit. Revenue (taxes) in the state continue to fall short of projections.

Monday’s demonstrators are planning to resume their protesting on May 14 when the UC Board of Regents meets in Los Angeles to consider raising tuition. In addition, demonstrators are also planning to return to the Capitol in Sacramento on May 19th to hold a “study-in” protest.

Tuition and fees at many of California’s state-backed institutions have tripled since 1990.

(Source: SFGate.com)

The following list, which was published by Forbes magazine nearly a year ago shows how much college is costing some families. The updated list is due out in a few weeks, but for now we know the following:

1. George Washington University — The DC school finished tops with tuition alone nearing $38,000 annually. I was surprised that GW was the most expensive, let alone in the top ten. I had each of the Ivies and private schools such as Amherst and Duke up there.

2. University of Richmond — Another surprise on the list, Richmond comes in just a shade below GW. However, with tuition increasing 84% in a 7-year period, it looks like a new number one will soon be recognized.

3. Sarah Lawrence College — This private, liberal arts college in Bronxville, NY is no surprise to the list. At one time SLC was the most expensive college but tuition is now about $1800 less than GW.

4. Kenyon College — Located 45 miles outside of Columbus, OH in Gambier, this college of 1700 students finished a few dollars behind SLC.

5. Vassar College — Once one of the “seven sisters” to the Ivy Colleges, co-ed Vassar is the most expensive of the lot with tuition of $36,020 per year. The school is located in Poughkeepsie, NY.

6. Bucknell University — Lewisburg, PA is the home for Bucknell, a school where only one in ten applicants attends.

7. Bennington College — With less than 600 undergrads in attendance, Bennington offers an intimate atmosphere to go with its bucolic setting and high price.

8. Columbia University — One and only one Ivy school made the list, with Columbia students pay just over $35,000 annually. A New York City location likely adds to the cost, despite a huge endowment fund.

9. Wesleyan University — The Middletown, CT school is expanding and recruiting heavily outside of its New England base.

10. Trinity College — One one in ten applicants attends Trinity, located on a suburban type campus in Hartford, CT.

As you may have surmised, all ten colleges have one thing in common — they are located in the northeastern US. Sure, you could make a case for Richmond or George Washington not being in the northeast, but they are still in part of a high-priced geographical territory when it comes to higher education.

Oh, by the way — board and other expenses were not included, adding as much as ten thousand dollars annually to tuition costs.