University of Southern California (USC) President Carol Folt has announced that the institution will eliminate tuition costs for students whose families make less than $80,000. In addition, the private university will no longer consider home equity when making financial aid calculations for students.
The changes, according to The Los Angeles Times, come as part of an effort to make the USC's tuition competitive with those offered by public universities, like the University of California system. In-state tuition for local rival University of California, Los Angeles runs at about $12,570 per year. The change applies only to undergraduate students and to those matriculating into the university directly from high school. According to reports, the university will continue to offer its existing financial aid packages for transfer and graduate students.
The change in policy mirrors recent efforts undertaken at other elite higher education institutions like Harvard University and Stanford University, where tuition is waived for students hailing from families making less than $150,000 per year. The $80,000 cut-off is viewed by the university as a first step, with additional fund raising and financial aid expansions planned for the future. USC's $5.7 billion endowment, according to The Los Angeles Times, dwarfs those of other private universities that offer a higher tuition cut-off.
Folt tells The Los Angeles Times, “We really want this to be an institution where great students can attend regardless of their financial background,” adding, “Education should be the great bridge across income that really is the equalizer and makes our talented, hardworking students able to make real contributions.”
A future goal includes offering loan-free financial aid packages for students, an effort to help stem the $1.41 trillion student debt crisis gripping recent college graduates.
9 Comments
The lack of value in paying for an Education will eventually destroy the University system. Much of the value in an Ivy League University comes from a person's commitment to affording the value of the respective school, that's likely not different at USC. Perhaps a better solution is to create better loans, storing up the payments of students in bonds for Education rather than depleting resources of expensive Universities.
By all means, please continue to explain how making sure you have to either go into life altering debt or be wealthy to begin with provides value for the profession. My less-than-ivy-but-still-gets-me-great-work degree disagrees with you.
This seems like a step in the right direction.
SneakyPete, the majority of students will likely benefit from a tuition drop, but, the institution quality will generally go down without replacing the funding. Many career salaries are rationalized by college debt, which is actually a positive asset. As a Cal Poly Pomona graduate, my master design training outside of University has not been paid for in my career, an asset that would have been more compensated for from an east coast university. In partial agreement with you, the College of Environmental Design at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona functions at an international level of regard without the funding of USC. Funding sources always costs something.
so, who will pay their tuition?
so, why do you think it matters?
Nb to editors: that's not the USC campus in that photo.
This is an aerial photo of the USC Village.
"The USC Village serves as the university’s newest extension of campus, north of the campus’ existing boundaries"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=7&v=VSE2yI2IWRI&feature=emb_logo
Thank you for that.
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