Report: Universities shutting out poor students

Graduating from a selective college can help low-income students climb the economic ladder, but many of the nation’s top public universities are turning their backs on the group.

Since the late 1990s, almost two-thirds of selective public universities have reduced the share of students they enroll who come from families earning less than $37,000 a year, according to a report released Thursday by New America. Policy analysts at the think tank found that a near-identical share of these schools have increased the percentage of students they enroll who come from families earning at least $110,000.

“As states have been cutting higher education budgets and with the ever-growing emphasis on prestige and rankings, these schools are becoming much more likely to go after wealthy students,” said Stephen Burd, co-author of the report and a senior policy analyst at New America.

The report uses data from Stanford University’s Equality of Opportunity Project, an effort led by economists Raj Chetty and John Friedman to examine economic outcomes among college students based on tax and financial-aid records.

Families are paying more out of pocket for college as tuition increases surpass grant aid.

Grant aid is failing to keep pace with even modest increases in college tuition, so families are having to dig deeper, according to a series of reports this week.

The amount of money students actually pay after taking grants, scholarships and tax credits into account, known as net price, continued to rise in the 2016-17 and 2017-18 academic years.

Published tuition and fees for four-year public colleges and universities this fall average $9,970 for in-state students, a 3.1 percent increase. The average local, full-time student received enough grant aid and federal tax benefits to cover 58 percent of that cost. But that’s just tuition and fees. Net price for those students climbs to an average $14,940 when room and board are added.

And even though grant aid and federal education tax credits are more than enough to cover the average tuition and fees at community colleges, full-time students still have an average $8,070 in living expenses to worry about.