Education

‘A New Trick for Lowering College Tuition

The cost of attending college has been rising much faster than both household income and inflation for many decades — as a matter of basic math, it was bound to get too expensive for even the relatively well-to-do at some point. We seem to be at that moment now with families who make over $200,000 a year increasingly looking for discounts and weighing them heavily in choosing a school. Today, Jeffrey Selingo, who has written a number of stories for New York about college admissions, reports on the increasing importance of “merit aid,” a soft category of discounts for applicants who are ineligible for traditional financial aid. For schools facing an increasingly difficult financial landscape, it’s a win to get well-qualified students who will pay at least partial tuition, while many parents and applicants seem happy to trade a notch of prestige for a lower price tag. Think of it as a new era of value shopping in the world of higher education.

—Jebediah Reed, editor, Intelligencer

The New Trick Families Are Using to Lower College Tuition Bills Many schools are eager for paying students — and ready to offer deals.

Photo-Illustration: Intelligencer; Photos: Getty

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