Harvard, Stanford cross the $50k rubicon

By J. DeVoy

For undergrad tuition and fees.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 23rd, 2010 at 12:51 pm and is filed under Academics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

2 Responses to Harvard, Stanford cross the $50k rubicon

  1. MikeZ says:
    March 23, 2010 at 1:20 pm

    Those numbers seem really wierd. There are ~6700 students that attend Harvard http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_undergraduate_students_at_Harvard

    If the average need based scholarship is 40K then $158M/40K = 3950 need based scholarships.

    Total Tuition receipts = 10K * 3950 + 50K * 2750 = 177Million

    Real Tuition cost = 26K.

    Now I’m all for finacial aid but damn. For everybody who goes to harvard without financial aid they are paying for somebody else as well. It also seems like it makes those who can partially pay ~20K a year feel like chumps for accepting a huge amount of financial aid but in reality are completely paying their own way.

    • J DeVoy says:
      March 23, 2010 at 1:34 pm

      I don’t think it’s that odd. First, Harvard is the largest of the ultra-elite colleges.
      Yale is smaller: http://www.yale.edu/oir/factsheet.html
      So is Princeton: http://www.princeton.edu/pr/catalog/ua/08/undergraduateprogram/

      Pre-market crash, Harvard’s endowment was $30 billion, so meeting the financial need you calculated wouldn’t even consume 1% of its endowment (and, assuming a ROI equivalent with inflation – 3% – Harvard would still turn a profit on it).

      The problem is that the $40k number is an average, not a median; many more people could be paying full tuition while others receive need-based aid over and above the cost of attendance to cover books, living expenses, and the like. I understand your point, but I don’t think valid conclusions can be drawn from the $40k average award of need-based aid.

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