The Cost of College Education in Central Mass

Monday, July 02, 2012

Walter Bird Jr., GoLocalWorcester Reporter

The rising cost of a college education is creating a bubble that could soon burst, local educators say.

“It’s all about the new bubble,” said Stephen Sullivan, vice president of enrollment and student services at Quinsigamond Community College (QCC). “It’s not a housing bubble, anymore, it’s the education bubble. If your school’s great, you will manage, but there comes a time when there is a tipping point.”

David Ellis, senior vice president and chief financial officer at Becker College, believes higher education officials must be cognizant of rising costs and the struggle for families to afford them.

“As a college administrator in my 35th year, I can say we’d be naïve if we were not concerned,” Ellis said. “It’s a problem.”

Area Costs

Among the area’s private colleges, Becker has the lowest annual tuition. That cost is expected to be $28,900 for 2012-13, which is $13,000 lower than the College of the Holy Cross, the most expensive, four-year college in the city. Tuition this fall at Holy Cross will be $40,790. The second most expensive is Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI), with a 2012-13 tuition rate of $40,790, followed by Clark University at $38,100 and Assumption College at $33,390.

Each of those colleges has seen a 9-percent increase in tuition over the past three to four years. While Becker has the lowest private tuition, however, it has seen the second largest increase in tuition rates. Tuition in 2009-10 was $24,780. The $28,900 fall tuition represents an increase of $4,120. The tuition at Holy Cross, meanwhile, has risen from $38,180 in 2009-10 to $40,790, a jump of $4,620. The lowest increase in tuition has been at WPI, where the cost has gone up $2,650 in three years.

“We do a great number of things to keep tuition costs down,” Ellis said. “The challenge is how to make education affordable and accessible, while creating value for students and their families.”

Ellis said the focus at Becker is not in the increases in tuition, but the overall ranking of cost among its peer colleges. In that regard, the college fares well.

“Our relative position is more important than the absolute increase in tuition,” Ellis said, adding that unlike Holy Cross, Becker does not have a “large endowment” to help offset costs. “We are 98-percent tuition dependent. We have to be every careful with every dollar spent.”

Fees, Fees, Fees

While tuition is the larger cost at private institutions, the reverse is true for public colleges and universities. Massachusetts has not raised tuition for public colleges in a decade. However, local college boards are free to set their own fees. Among the Central Mass state schools, Fitchburg State University charges the highest fees - $7,740 for the 2012-13 year. Worcester State University will charge $7,187 in fees this fall, while QCC will charge $4,518. The fall figures for Mount Wachusett Community College were not immediately available, but the school charged $4,690 in 2010-11. Over the past three years, Worcester State had the largest percentage increase in fees – 9 percent.

Financial Services

One of the ways colleges are trying to offset the rising costs is by offering more of their own scholarships and financial aid packages. At Quinsigamond, the college will be able to offer more than $1 million in institutional financial aid this upcoming year. Becker has increased its financial aid funding by 51 percent over the last four enrollment cycles, according to Ellis.

“You retain your students at a much higher degree,” he said. “We also do an awful lot of counseling on the financial end with families.”

The same efforts are being made at other Worcester colleges, such as Worcester State University, where President Barry Maloney noted the university is continuing to fund a need-based financial aid allocation to meet the needs of its neediest students. At Clark University, Andrea Michaels, vice president for budget and planning, said the school’s total financial aid to students has increased over the last three years. During that time, tuition, fees and room and board charges have increased between 2.5 and 3.5 percent a year.

“Our annual charges balance two objectives,” Michaels said, “to remain an affordable choice for students and to provide a high quality educational experience.”

Reasons for Increase

Several factors drive tuition and fees, enrollment being among them. Public colleges have seen a steady increase in student numbers, particularly as more and more families seek affordable alternatives in a down economy. According to the Massachusetts Department of Higher Education (MDHE), there has been a 23-percent increase in enrollment in public schools.

At Quinsigamond, enrollment seven years ago was between 5,400 and 5,600. Last fall, the school enrolled 9,130 students.

“We went up almost 52 percent in head count,” Sullivan said. “Enrollment has grown huge here. That’s a wonderful thing. But we’ve had to raise our fees to keep supporting the services to all our students. We want to make sure the students here can attain their educational and career goals.”

Even private colleges are seeing an uptick in enrollment, which surprised Ellis at Becker College.

“The good news is enrollment here has been quite stable even in difficult economic times,” said Ellis. “Our enrollment has actually grown somewhat, abut 5-7 percent in the last two years.”

According to Ellis, the numbers will go up again this fall.

Student population at Holy Cross has intentionally remained level during the past four years, at about 750 for each entering class,” according to Cristal Steuer, manager of media relations and communications.”

Applications for admission, meanwhile, have been increasing over the past four years, Steuer said. About 7,000 students applied for admission to the incoming first-year class this year. Michaels said costs associated with hiring and maintaining facilities play a significant role in tuition and fee increases.

“We recruit and hire excellent faculty who have close interaction with students in and outside of the classroom, and we maintain classrooms and laboratories that are conducive to learning and research activity,” Michaels said. “Clark has residences halls that require continuous maintenance and improvement, food service facilities, a substantial library of books, academic journals, electronic access to information resources, and study spaces where students can come together to work collaboratively."

Funding Needed

Another factor, at least with public colleges and universities, is a decline in state funding. Yet, even with less funding, the state is encouraging more and more students to extend their education beyond high school – particularly in the public arena.

Senate hopeful Elizabeth Warren, responding to a GoLocalWorcester request for comment on the issue, called for more investment in public education.

“It has become more and more essential for young people to get some kind of post-high school education – whether college or advanced technical training,” Warren said in a prepared statement. “We have a choice: are we going to tell our young people that they are on their own, or are we going to invest in them – and in our own future? I believe we must invest in our future, and that means investing more in our public colleges and universities, it means supporting advanced technical training programs, and it means getting serious about strengthening grant programs and forgiving loans for those that serve their communities.”

U.S. Sen. Scott Brown’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

Public Alternative

Massachusetts is encouraging its students to take the public college route, one MDHE spokesperson said.

“In some states, students are being turned away from public colleges,” the spokesperson said, asking not to be identified. “Massachusetts is not doing that. Students are being asked to pay more.”

Michelle Tufau-Afriyie, associate dean of enrollment at Quinsigamond, noted the state is placing an emphasis on obtaining a bachelor’s degree by first earning an associate’s degree.

“They’re making it a positive choice,” said Tufau-Afriyie. “You can come here and end up at WPI.”

Two-year institutions like Quinsigamond are being seen as a “launching pad” toward a higher degree, Sullivan said.

“I would say absolutely, yes,” he said. “What we’re seeing is there has been that tipping point where people want their child to go to, say, (Boston University), but don’t wan to put them under a loan.”

Even before the recession, Quinsigamond officials were encouraging families and students to “come to Quinsig for the transferability. They can move to a four-year public or private school and save tens of thousands of dollars.”

Traditional four-year programs have grown more aware of the financial strain and in many cases are working closely with two-year schools to form a bridge for students. That has been the case at Clark University, according to Donald Honeman, dean of admissions and financial aid.

“Although the number of transfer students enrolling at Clark has ranged widely during recent years, we have detected a strengthened interest among students who attended lower cost community colleges for two years and now see the value of receiving a degree from a prestigious four-year liberal arts college,” said Honeman. “To facilitate the transition from two-year colleges to Clark, we have developed 'articulation agreements' with Quinsigamond Community College, Berkshire Community College and Dean College. These agreements ease the application process and guarantee the acceptance of two-year college credits at Clark.”

Overall Value

That does not mean four-year colleges are looking to provide only upper-level classes. Honeman said the way in which admissions personnel explain the college experience to prospective undergraduates is important.

“Clark University presents the undergraduate experience to prospective students in a manner that focuses on the value of an education that couples the liberal arts tradition with practical experiences preparing our students for a lifetime of professional success,” Honeman said. “The Liberal Arts and Effective Practice (LEEP) initiative that frames the Clark experience is constructed in a manner that offers students a ‘return on education’ ensuring an extraordinary value for the investment that students and their families make in their undergraduate education.”

Overall value of education is an important message to convey to prospective students and their families, according to Steuer.

“We encourage high school students and their families to avoid focusing only on the 'price tag' of a Holy Cross education, and consider two things: educational value and the availability of aid,” Steuer said. “We want students to understand exactly what goes into the price, why that investment yields an extraordinary liberal arts education that continues to offer dividends after graduation, and how we help deserving and qualified students attend, regardless of their ability to pay.”

Not a Crisis

Acknowledging the financial crunch that places so much stress on students and their families considering a higher education, college officials, while agreeing there is a “bubble,” were reluctant to call it a crisis.

“I think all colleges, we are very sensitive to the amount of dollars any student has to borrow for their education,” Ellis said. “Given where the economy is, I think it’s too early to say there is a crisis.”

Asked whether he thought there was a ceiling as to how high college tuitions and fees could rise, QCC spokesperson Josh Martin said, “I don’t know if you can answer the question of what the ceiling is. You can only do what you can to ensure the people who want and need a higher education get it.”

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