Crisis Point : How Enrollment Management and the Merit-Aid Arms Race Are Derailing Public Higher Education / Stephen Burd.

This report analyzes data from 2001-2017 to examine public four-year universities' spending on financial aid dollars--specifically between non-need-based and need-based aid. Our researcher found that these universities have spent nearly $32 billion of their own financial aid dollars on students...

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Bibliographic Details
Online Access: Full Text (via ERIC)
Main Author: Burd, Stephen
Corporate Author: New America
Format: eBook
Language:English
Published: [Place of publication not identified] : Distributed by ERIC Clearinghouse, 2020.
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Summary:This report analyzes data from 2001-2017 to examine public four-year universities' spending on financial aid dollars--specifically between non-need-based and need-based aid. Our researcher found that these universities have spent nearly $32 billion of their own financial aid dollars on students who lack financial need, according to an analysis New America conducted prior. About $2 out of every $5 these public universities provided went to non-needy students--those whom the federal government deems able to afford college without financial aid. For generations, public colleges and universities, with the help of the federal government and states, provided a low-cost higher education to students in their home states. By keeping their prices low, these schools offered students from low-income and moderate-income families a gateway to the middle class. The more public universities engage in these practices, the harder it gets for others to resist for fear of putting themselves at a competitive disadvantage. As a result, schools that provide generous amounts of non-need-based aid cannot rest easy. They have to keep ratcheting up their scholarships or discounts to try to stay ahead of their competition, creating an ever-expanding arms race. Our analysis shows this "merit-aid" arms race at work.
Item Description:Availability: New America. 740 15th Street NW Suite 900, Washington, DC 20005. Tel: 202-986-2700; Fax: 202-986-3696; Web site: https://www.newamerica.org.
Sponsoring Agency: Joyce Foundation.
Sponsoring Agency: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Abstractor: As Provided.
Educational level discussed: Higher Education.
Educational level discussed: Postsecondary Education.
Physical Description:1 online resource (52 pages)
Type of Computer File or Data Note:Text (Reports, Evaluative)
Preferred Citation of Described Materials Note:New America.