House to Tackle Rising College Costs in Reauthorization Bill

During a Nov. 1 hearing before his committee, Rep. George Miller, D-Calif, chairman of the U.S. House Committee on Education and Labor, indicated that forthcoming proposals to reauthorize the Higher Education Act will attempt to tackle rising college costs.

“As we move closer to reauthorizing the Higher Education Act, one of our goals will be to develop strategies to help colleges rein in increases in costs,” Miller said. The chairman noted that federal efforts to bolster college access, such as the recent $20-billion increase in grant aid in the College Cost Reduction and Access Act, would be undermined if college-cost increases continue their current trends.

During the hearing on “Barriers to Equal Educational Opportunities: Addressing the Rising Costs of a College Education,” state governments came in for criticism for failing to maintain support for postsecondary education.

Jane Wellman, executive director of the Delta Cost Project, an organization that works to improve college affordability by controlling costs and improving productivity, noted that the burden of funding public postsecondary institutions has shifted from state appropriations to tuition. “In public institutions, the primary cause of tuition increases has been that state funds have not kept pace with the combination of enrollment growth and inflation, even in states that have increased funding,” Wellman said.

King Alexander, president of California State University at Long Beach, told the panel that the federal government should require states to maintain funding of postsecondary education. “A ‘maintenance of effort’ federal/state partnership would make it more difficult for states to further reduce their fiscal responsibility to public colleges and universities by shifting the increasing costs of higher education to students, and ultimately, federal tuition-based programs,” Alexander said.

John Barrett, president of Clark University in Massachusetts, reported that increases in institutional grant aid, as well as the costs of utilities, health care, other insurance premiums and in library and periodical costs are contributing to college-cost increases.

In response to congressional demands for clearer information for families about college costs and student-success rates, the witnesses also advised the panel that associations of public and private postsecondary institutions are offering or soon will provide better reporting on college costs, financial aid and indicators of student success.