WASHINGTON (DC News Now) — Students at Georgetown University can expect to pay more for tuition next year.
On Tuesday, the university announced a 4.9% increase in tuition for the 2023-2024 school year. That puts tuition at $64,896.
According to the announcement, the total cost of attendance, which includes room and board, will also increase by about 4.8%.
“The tuition rate reflects a balanced approach to managing rising costs, as well as providing the resources needed for academic and student priorities, new programs and initiatives, and our commitment to minimizing add-on fees,” the announcement said.
Georgetown University also plans to increase the amount of financial aid it has available for students.
“I immediately was like oh, ‘God, not again,’” said sophomore Becca Haley, who received the notice by email yesterday.
“I think for me it’s one of the reasons that I would transfer,” she said. “There’s always this feeling that I’m not sure I can pay for next year, so it depends on its cost benefit. I know this is a good school and it ends up working out, but it is always this looming huge can I go here?”
“Eventually it’s going to hit a ceiling mark where it just gets so high, where higher ed is going to become unattainable,” said senior Joanna Li.
Because she is graduating this year, the tuition hike won’t affect Li. But, she worries how it’ll affect her fellow classmates.
“It stresses me out a little bit to think consistently that every single year it’s expected that there’s a tuition increase,” she said.
According to a recent study by College Board, tuition increased for private four-year schools—like Georgetown—by about 3.5% last year. For public four-year schools it was slightly less at 2.2%.
“How do I even plan for the future?” said Chris Tengey, a freshman at Georgetown.
With three years left to go, he’s concerned about how high tuition will be by his senior year. And, what that will mean for life after college.
“If the money increases and goes up that’s going to put a dent in our saving and our future endeavors. It’s something we all need to think about as students here,” he said.
Georgetown is not alone in raising tuition.
American University announced it’ll increase tuition by 5% in 2023 and 2024.
A budget fact sheet released by the university in March of 2022 said, “Over the past two years, as university operating costs significantly increased with inflation and COVID health and safety needs, we provided a 10 percent tuition discount in FY21 to support our community during the pandemic-driven economic disruption and then had no tuition increase in FY22.” The increase in tuition will help increase institutional financial aid.
Catholic University estimates the cost of tuition plus room and board for 2023-2024 is up to $74,444. Add in the estimated cost of books, transportation and personal spending, and the estimated tuition hits $80,000.
Howard University has not posted its 2023-2024 tuition rates online yet. However, last year the university raised tuition by 7.5%.
“College hasn’t been affordable for a really long time and that’s kind of where we have been and that’s where we’re going. We need to completely change how we do tuition and financial aid,” said Haley.
