By Jill Barshay for The Hechinger Report.
Broadcast version by Suzanne Potter for California News Service reporting for The Hechinger Report-Public News Service Collaboration

The bottom line on college tuition is that there is no bottom line.

At most four-year institutions, admitted students are quoted all sorts of different prices. Often masquerading as "merit aid" or "scholarships," the discounts are aimed at persuading students to attend, much like online retailers dangle coupons to persuade you to purchase the items in your shopping cart.

The college coupons are a lot larger than what you might get at Target - sometimes knocking off $30,000 or more from the published "sticker" price. The discounts are tailored by commercial algorithms that use each prospective family's circumstances to find the right number that will tempt a student to enroll. That's why college students on today's campuses are paying different prices for their degrees, just like we pay different prices for our airplane seats.

Tuition discounts have been escalating in recent years, according to Department of Education data released in July 2023. More students are getting even more money knocked off their college bills. At the same time, colleges are distributing these tuition discounts unequally. White and Asian students were much more likely to receive this institutional aid than Black and Hispanic students, the data shows.

At private, nonprofit colleges and universities, where discounting is most prevalent, a whopping 57 percent of undergraduates received institutional aid in 2019-20, unchanged from the previous financial aid survey data in 2015-16. But the average tuition discount that each student received grew to $20,800 from $16,200 during this time period. At public four-year institutions, more than a third of all undergraduate students received institutional aid in 2019, up 3 percentage points from 30 percent in 2015. And the average discount grew to $5,200 from $4,900.

"The percentage of students who are getting discounts, grants or scholarship aid from institutions has skyrocketed." said Robert Massa, a retired college admissions and enrollment director who is now a research associate at the Center for Enrollment Research, Policy and Practice at the University of Southern California.

Colleges need to fill seats and maximize revenue. And a college can increase revenue when it discounts tuition because an enrolled student is still paying the remainder of a sticker price that keeps rising. From a college's perspective, collecting reduced tuition from an enrolled student is better than collecting nothing from an empty seat.

Filling those seats is not a problem for the most selective institutions but those elite universities represent only a tiny portion of colleges. Many other schools struggle to reach their enrollment goals. That's where the discounts come in. The less likely a student is to enroll in a college, the more discount the enrollment algorithm suggests to woo the student. "These are not-for-profit institutions, but like private businesses, they're competing against each other on price," Massa said. "If another college is giving $35,000 per student, I'm going to have to go there too to compete."

Public universities have also been aggressively discounting since the 2008 recession, when states decreased public funding for higher education. To offset the shortfall, public universities looked to out-of-state students, who pay higher tuition. Tuition discounts help lure these students to attend.

Fewer students received tuition discounts at for-profit schools, down from 25 percent in 2015-16 to 21 percent of undergraduates in 2019-20. But the size of the average discount has grown from $2,750 to over $3,300 among students who got them. Far less discounting occurs at two-year community colleges, where posted tuition prices are much lower.

This institutional aid data comes from the 2019-20 National Postsecondary Student Aid Study, which the Department of Education conducts every three to four years. More than 80,000 undergraduates and 2,000 colleges and universities were surveyed. In addition to a published report of tables, additional data was released on the National Center for Education Statistics's DataLab website and that is where I retrieved the institutional aid data for this story.

The numbers combine both need-based and merit aid granted by colleges and universities. No one is actually transferring funds to students to pay their tuition bills, but the aid does reduce a student's bill from the published sticker price. The final cost - after discounts - is often referred to as net tuition price.

Asian and white students were more likely to receive tuition discounts or be awarded larger amounts. At private non-profit four-year institutions, 62 percent of Asian, 59 percent of white, 53 percent of Hispanic and 51 percent of Black students received institutional aid. For those who received these discounts, the average amounts were $26,500 for Asian students, $20,900 for Hispanic students, $20,700 for Black students and $19,700 for white students. At public four-year institutions, 39 percent of Asian, 35 percent of white, 31 percent of Black and 30 percent of Hispanic undergraduates received institutional aid. The average amounts were about $5,400 for white students, $5,200 for Asian students, $5,000 for Black students and $4,800 for Hispanic students.

Looking at merit aid alone - subtracting out need-based aid - the sizes of the discounts rose sharply at private non-profit colleges, while the share of students getting them jumped at public colleges. "Put merit in quotation marks," USC's Massa said. "It's really not about rewarding students for their wonderful performance in high school, as much as it is trying to change that student's enrollment decision."

Explaining why merit aid has been rising is easier than explaining why there are big racial and ethnic disparities. Massa's hypothesis is that Black and Hispanic students are disproportionately lower income, while the algorithms target merit aid to students who aren't needy but have the means to pay. From a business perspective, enrolling a low-income student is riskier because they are more likely to drop out of college, and then the college has to recruit a new student to replace his or her tuition revenue. A wealthier student is more likely to pay tuition for four to five years straight. Wooing students who are more likely to graduate also raises the possibility of more state funding for some public universities whose budget is partly based on student success metrics.

The algorithms also target prestige, Massa explained. White and Asian students have historically posted higher SAT and ACT scores, which has been an important component of U.S. News & World Report's influential college rankings. High rankings attract future applicants, which bodes well for future enrollment and revenue.

Need-based aid has increased, too. This is the aid that colleges give to students whose families cannot reasonably be expected to afford tuition, even after federal and state subsidies. At private colleges, 31 percent of students received tuition discounts because of financial need and the average discount was over $17,200, sharply up from $12,500 in 2015-16. Asian students were more likely to receive it and to receive larger amounts.

Jill Desjean, a senior policy analyst at the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators, a Washington D.C.-based lobbying group, said need-based aid has climbed sharply because colleges keep hiking their sticker prices. "Say you get a $20,000 scholarship," she said. "If the tuition goes up by $2,000 the next year, it's not likely that the college is going to assume that the family can afford to spend $2,000 more. So they increase the scholarship to $22,000."

Desjean couldn't explain why there might be racial and ethnic differences in who gets need-based tuition discounts. Only a few dozen colleges are able to provide enough need-based aid so that students don't have to take out loans. Clearly, colleges have a lot of discretion on which needy students they want to support and by how much.

There's a widespread feeling that discounting has gotten out of control. But no single university can stop it without hemorrhaging students. And a collective compact to curtail discounts could run afoul of the Department of Justice's antitrust rules, said Jerry Lucido, a professor of practice and executive director of the USC Center for Enrollment Research, Policy and Practice.

The end result, according to Lucido, is that giving discounts to students who could actually pay more often means a bigger debt burden for less wealthy students. The companies that create the sophisticated algorithms, he says, pitch "revenue enhancement" to colleges while the purported mission of educating students from all walks of life can seem like an afterthought.


Jill Barshay wrote this article for The Hechinger Report.

Support for this reporting was provided by Lumina Foundation.


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Leaders of a teachers' union in Louisiana are voicing concerns about a package of bills they say would have the effect of dissolving labor unions in the state.

The list includes House Bill 571, which would prohibit public agencies from paying union workers for the time they do anything union-related, even if it's on paid leave.

If passed, said Roberto Furtado, a special-education teacher in the Jefferson Parish Public School System, the bills would end collective bargaining and prohibit payroll deductions for union dues. Furtado said all this would make it harder for new teachers to join the union, further silencing their voices.

"If they make it more difficult for the new teachers, young teachers, to get involved," he said, "then basically, it's a roadblock so they're probably more than likely going to just not do it."

House Bill 572 would prohibit public agencies from collective bargaining with unions, except for police and firefighters. Similar bills have been introduced in multiple states by conservative groups.

The teachers' union has posted petitions on its website for teachers to sign and send to their lawmakers.

Educators in Louisiana have said they're dealing with low pay, overcrowded classrooms and school safety issues. However, state lawmakers have advanced a budget proposal that would cut teacher pay, and the House Appropriations Committee forwarded a spending plan that reduces a $2,000 pay stipend teachers got this school year to $1,300 next year.

Furtado said the end result is forcing good teachers out of the profession.

"Teachers are an invaluable resource for our community, and so we need good, well-rounded educators that want to be there and continue their jobs to help these young men and women, because again, they are our future," he insisted. "That's kind of corny to say this, but yes, our children are our future. If you don't take care of them, where does our future lie?"

The legislative committee also allocated $25 million for a differential teacher compensation strategy for the second year in a row. The union opposed the strategy, because it said the raises wouldn't be permanent and could be taken away from year to year.


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By Lane Wendell Fischer for the Shasta Scout via The Daily Yonder.
Broadcast version by Suzanne Potter for California News Service for the Public News Service/Daily Yonder Collaboration

Hiring and maintaining a qualified educator workforce is often a primary concern for rural schools across the country, requiring local education leaders to create innovative solutions.

The University of Wyoming’s College of Education has recently partnered with local community colleges across the state to repair a pipeline for future Career and Technical Education (CTE) teachers at high schools and community colleges. 

CTE programs offer students an array of skills-based learning opportunities for many high-demand industries ranging from construction, to nursing, to marketing.

For decades, Wyoming has relied on traditional methods to fill out its CTE teacher workforce. After completing a two-year associate’s degree at their community college, students could either enter the trades or take another two years of teacher training. 

“It was very much a fork in the road,” said Rob Hill, a CTE consultant for the University of Wyoming and president of SkillsUSA Wyoming. Hill became a Wyoming CTE teacher through this traditional path.

“You had to take life off and go to school,” Hill said. “That limited a lot of people, especially students with families, jobs, and homes.”

As it turned out, most students never completed the final two years of teacher training and just entered the trades after the first two years at their community college, Hill said in an interview with the Daily Yonder.

This outdated pipeline has contributed to a shortage of both CTE teachers and skilled workers in the state.

According to a 2023 report from the Wyoming Professional Teaching Standards Board, the median age of CTE teachers in Wyoming schools is 52, and national numbers are similar. Compare this to the average age of all teachers in the U.S., which is just over 42. 

On average, a state employee in Wyoming retires at 62. This means that in the next 7 to 10 years, Wyoming could lose close to half of its CTE workforce to retirement.

“We’ve seen a number of things that have impacted us and that rural part is very real,” Hill said.

In rural communities, a CTE program might only consist of one or two teachers. When that school loses a teacher, the whole program is at risk until a qualified replacement is found. 

During a recent tour of Wyoming’s school districts, Jenna Shim, PhD and interim dean of the College of Education, learned that some high school CTE programs are closing down because they couldn’t find replacements.

“One CTE teacher shared with me that he has a specialty in welding, but he has to teach culinary arts,” Shim told the Daily Yonder. “I could see welding and construction, but welding and culinary arts seem like a far stretch.”

And it can be difficult to attract new talent to small schools and communities. 

“We tend to do best with people that are invested in that community previously and become teachers, as opposed to bringing in teachers into small communities,” Hill said.

The CTE Domino Effect in Rural Communities

Adding to the difficulty of attracting new teachers is a domino effect caused by current teacher shortages, Shim and Hill said.

A shortage of educators leads to a shortage of high school CTE programs, which leads to a shortage of students pursuing CTE in the state, followed by a shortage of tradespeople in the state, and a shortage of essential services, which, in turn, leads to less attractive communities.

On top of educational advancement for students, repairing CTE teacher pipelines through state and local partnerships helps assemble the next generation of rural water experts, plumbers, electricians, technicians, mechanics, and more, Hill said.

“It has a trickle-down effect into the stability of the community,” Shim said.

And in rural communities, small fluctuations in population, programs, and services can be especially catastrophic — or especially beneficial. 

“It doesn’t seem like a big deal if you don’t have one teacher,” Hill said. “But that one teacher in a town of 2000 people that teaches welding, where you have a huge welding industry, that has an extremely large impact.”

The broken pipeline has also raised economic concerns. “Without a sufficient number of teachers, it’s hard to prepare a sufficient workforce,” Shim said.

Two key industries in Wyoming are energy and tourism. Both rely heavily on skilled workers. And both are susceptible to booms and busts that give local communities economic whiplash.

“Over the last decade especially, there’s been a real desire to diversify our workforce,” Hill said. “And that means a different generation of career and technical education, like manufacturing, cybersecurity, and data analysis.”

Repairing the Pipeline

The biggest problem in the previous CTE teacher pipeline was continuity, Hill said. The pathway to teacher certification in rural communities must be both attractive and achievable.

This spring, the College of Education piloted a new course that aims to do both by exposing community college students to CTE teaching before they complete their associate’s degree and decide between trades work or teaching. 

“Creating a more seamless pathway is a real goal here,” Hill explained. 

The bridge course will be offered each semester in partnership with all eight community colleges in the state and is inherently low stakes. The course credits can be applied toward an associate’s degree at the community college, toward their teaching degree at the university, or toward any other bachelor’s degree they pursue.

In the course, students get a taste of what a career in CTE teaching is like. Coordinated by Hill, the course is one dose online learning and one dose on-site learning. Hill leads the online classroom, where students learn about different national and statewide topics. “But students will learn about how it’s implemented locally,” Hill said. 

Each community college has a community college professional and a school district professional that serve as a mentor and safety net for local students, introducing them to CTE leaders at both levels. 

One area of misconception is how much CTE teachers are paid, Shim said.

“I think wages scare them most,” Hill said. “But in Wyoming, our hourly wage is higher than many of the trades folks. We have pensions. We have healthcare. It’s a lot more competitive than folks think it is.”

The organization of the course is a masterclass in rural ingenuity. By using technology, the course eliminates long distance travel to the university campus in Laramie on the southern border of the state. It allows students to remain in their local communities, while still being connected to the state’s CTE teacher network.

“We knew we had a statewide problem and we needed to create a statewide solution, or in this case, a local solution for a statewide problem,” Hill said. “This is about connecting people in Wyoming. Because we have these vast distances between us, we have to have a way to connect people.”

Twenty-two students are currently enrolled in the pilot course. Half of the inaugural cohort are community college students. The other half includes veterans, community college instructors, K-12 instructors, and paraprofessionals who are exploring their future career options.

The course has garnered support from state legislators, the university, the colleges, local high schools, local business, and from the students themselves. 

Each of the enrolled students is taking the course tuition-free, thanks to scholarships from local businesses and private donors.

“Word is getting out,” Shim said. “I think that’s a testimony for how important this work is.”

Strong CTE programs lead to strong communities, Shim and Hill said. A lot of high school CTE programs are embedded into community culture. Organizations like FFA provide opportunities for social gathering and community service, for example. 

“We’ve come up with a mutually beneficial solution and this takes a partnership and teamwork,” Hill said. “No significant advances take place without a group of us working together in a mutually beneficial system.”


Lane Wendell Fischer wrote this article for the Shasta Scout via The Daily Yonder.


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Texas Lieutenant Gov. Dan Patrick has released 57 "interim charges," the topics he wants Senate committees to study in preparation for the 89th legislative session next year.

Four charges are for the committee overseeing public education. They include improving reading and math readiness in grade school, and redesigning the state's standardized tests.

Eli Melandrez, government relations associate for the American Federation of Teachers-Texas, said educators are surprised the list does not include pay increases for teachers or controversial school vouchers, which use public money to pay for private schooling.

"It's interesting to see both of those key issues absent from the interim charges," Melandrez observed. "Across the state we've seen school closures; we've seen teachers being let go. We've seen a greater percentage of our teacher workforce as uncertified educators."

Two unsuccessful special sessions were held in the past few months, in an attempt to pass a school voucher proposal. Other charges for public schools include examining how school districts used COVID-19 funding, and monitoring the implementation of bills passed in the last session.

Patrick also directed the Higher Education Committee to analyze faculty senates, monitor bans on DEI policies at colleges and universities and revise policies for faculty tenure.

Melandrez noted their union is now affiliated with the American Association of University Professors and members are concerned the lieutenant governor is inserting his own political views into the education system.

"That's worrisome for us," Melandrez emphasized. "In public education and higher education, we are seeing a concerted effort to minimize educator voices."

Patrick also wants senators to review university antisemitism policies and protecting the First Amendment rights of faculty, staff and students. The next legislative session convenes Jan. 14, 2025.