ASU is helping make higher education affordable for all

Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich recently suggested that Arizona State University should return to the good old days of the 1980s when tuition was “low.” In fact, he is so certain that the 1980s were a better time for ASU that he has filed a lawsuit against his own clients — Arizona’s public universities — in order to bring about such an outcome at ASU, University of Arizona and Northern Arizona University.

As is common with nostalgic thinking, however, it fails to reflect or remember the reality. In the 1980s, ASU was not a mature public university because it was not yet capable of ensuring the likelihood of success for its students. The good old days were good for only a small proportion of the university’s students and relatively few Arizonans more generally.

In 1985, the freshman class was 85 percent white with only 225 Hispanic students. Fewer than 2 percent of students were from families in the lower half of family incomes. Thirty-five percent of the 1985 freshman class dropped out during the first two semesters. The four-year graduation rate was 13.8 percent. The research funding level was about $29 million, placing ASU in the non-research university category.

At that time, the low cost of tuition made little difference because the resources were insufficient for students to succeed at the university, limiting its capacity to provide a quality education and ensure student success.

In short, the university model of the 1980s was an underperforming university doing a poor job graduating a primarily middle-class white student body.

The ASU of the 1980s was also run like a government agency. Heavy government funding (more than 60 percent of the ASU budget vs. around 10 percent now), low tuition/low financial aid, low productivity, limited innovation and slow change.

In 2017 ASU, named the country’s most innovative university for three straight years, is very different:

» About 50 percent of ASU undergraduates from Arizona are from families in the lower half of family incomes (2 percent in 1985).

» About 85 percent freshmen retention rate (65 percent in 1985)

» About 50 percent minority students, including about 3,000 Hispanic students in the freshmen class in 2017 vs. 225 Hispanic students in 1985.

» About 24,000 graduates vs. about 6,200 graduates in 1985.

» About 70 percent 6-year graduation rate.

» Greater than 52 percent 4-year graduation rate (about an 85 percent increase since 2002).

» About $2,000 average net tuition paid per year by Arizona resident students in 2017 in real dollars is less than the net tuition paid by Arizona resident students in 1985. That’s tuition after grants, not loans.

» Arizona ranks fourth in the nation for the lowest student loan debt after college.

» About $530 million in research funding (ranked in the Top 10 of all U.S. universities without a medical school in the U.S.).

Our new student-centric approach has positioned ASU now to be one of the highest performing public universities in the U.S.

This new model does not mean that we want tuition to be high for in-state students. Just the opposite. The market price for ASU tuition is actually determined in the marketplace by out-of-state and international students. That price is about $30,000 per year. Thousands pay it. We successfully compete in that market.

For Arizona residents, we do not charge that market price. We charge around $10,000, one-third of the market price. But, in addition, we offer financial aid for this $10,000 tuition/price. That financial aid goes to about 75 percent of our students from Arizona for merit (academic prowess in high school) and financial need. The net result is an average net tuition for Arizona residents of about $2,000 — about one-fifteenth of the market price on an annual basis.

I can say with confidence that ASU today is delivering great value to students from Arizona at a cost of tuition as close to free as possible. Despite this level of attainment, we continue to believe in searching for new pathways and finding new approaches to earning a degree, be it at ASU or elsewhere. Let’s hope this legal debate will heighten all of our creativity to find new ways for students in Arizona to obtain a college education.