The National Center for Education Statistics breaks down COA by tuition & fees, books & supplies, room & board, and other. It REALLY varies and in our case, the publics are higher than the privates. Here are some colleges my D is applying to:
Stevens, Other: $900
Rochester , Other: $1,290
Northeastern, Other: $1,800
Case, Other: $1,900
Bucknell, Other: $2,000
CO Mines:, Other: $2,515
New Hampshire:, Other: $2,638
Temple, Other: $4,200
Do all colleges follow specific guidelines to determine “other”? Does anyone know how it is calculated? Or is each college allowed to wing it?
I doubt that the DOE sets guidelines for “other” expenses. Ultimately, they are your responsibility. By deciding how far from home to attend college, you control what the travel costs will be. If she goes someplace much colder than home, will you budget for new winter clothes? Etc. None of the colleges on your list claim to cover 100% of demonstrated financial need, so you’ll be lucky if they even fully cover tuition, room and board.
There has been a lot of chatter about this recently, since the “other” determines how much DI football/basketball scholarships will now in cost-of-attendance stipends. In your above example, Temple could offer Football recruits $4,200 a year, while Northeastern could only offer $1,800. Not that “other” is impacting big time college sports, it’s getting a lot of scrutiny. Some schools have setup “other” low, in an attempt to make their overall OOA appear low. Others may try to raise it, in an effort to pay athletics a higher COA stipend.
^ I imagine that the NCAA will eventually get involved and declare that “other” costs can’t exceed X amount…and may set a minimum amount.
The NCAA will likely have to set a max amount otherwise it will appear like some schools are buying athletes.
Other costs vary too much between schools. Some set them high so that students/parents can borrow those costs. some set them low so that they “look cheaper” in COA comparisons.
I think that we’re going to start seeing more COA’s broken out with “Direct Costs” and “Indirect Costs” so that people can compare Direct Costs…and then the Indirect Costs will have a notation that these costs will vary student to student.
I think other is a bit arbitrary. When I look at college costs I consider tuition, room/board, any mandatory fees like a medical plan. Books can be a lot more or a lot less than anticipated. D is freshman at Notre dame and thus far we have been pleasantly surprised that books were only about $500 with no other fees. Do pay attention to required medical insurance
You can probably make your own estimate of the following for each school:
Travel (for airline tickets, try shopping for Thanksgiving and Christmas / New Year dates as well as start and end of terms).
Medical insurance (may be offered by the school) if your family plan does not have providers near the school.
Clothing and such for cooler climates than Hawaii.
Entertainment / extracurricular expenses can also vary, but these can be harder to estimate. It may depend on what kind of stuff she likes to do. I.e. cheap activities like hiking in the nearby trails, running outside, lifting weights in the campus gym, or expensive things like joining a sorority or going to shows in the city?
All COA issues are governed by federal regulations. Schools establish the COA within the guidelines of the regulations. Yes, the “other” varies (and no, the NCAA has no say and will not have a say in establishing or limiting any component of the COA). Frankly, establishing a COA is not an easy task. It involves surveys, research, and some guess-work. Schools are free to set up their COA as they see fit, as long as it does not conflict with regulations, and as long as there is a documented reason for that particular policy/amount.
Remember, the COA is used in financial aid as the upper value for aid … that is, aid can be awarded up to, but not exceeding, that amount. It doesn’t mean that aid will be awarded in that amount (although technically it is, since the Parent PLUS/Graduate PLUS can always be included to get it to that amount). Above all, it doesn’t mean that any individual student will find that to be his/her COA … a student may spend more or may spend less. It’s just an estimate.
gator88NE, those fees listed in the OP were only “other” not total cost of attendance after billed amounts, so a school like Temple may have lumped a lot into the ‘other’ category and not so much into ‘books’; Stevens may have put a large amount into ‘books’ column because most engineering books cost a lot, and the experience of Stevens could be that their students have spent so much on books that they have no money left for toothpaste so the budget for ‘other’ is low. Some schools are also including health insurance in the ‘other’ category now.
There were big adjustments this year by many schools when Sabin had a fit that his players might only get a stipend of about $2500 for the Alabama published COA less billed costs and the almost $6000 players at Penn State were going to get. Schools also decided that there could be different costs for instate students and OOS, mostly due to adding in travel costs. It seems most every school now has a different COA for instate and OOS (excluding differences in tuition for OOS). I think Alabama bumped the COA to about $5000 over the billed costs. Most of the big schools seem to be about $4000-5000 for the stipend to athletes (if they are given), and that should exclude books as many athletic awards (and all the full ride ones) included books already.
My kids spend very little beyond the billed costs, mostly on food. They stock up on toiletries at the beginning of the semester and just make it last. They buy cheap books or even get them from older friends who took the class last year. Both are at schools where their IDs get them into athletic events and most other school activities They don’t have cars, and so their transportation costs are minimal (one takes a plane a few times per year, the other a few tanks of gas to deposit and fetch her).
Of course, another area of difference between listed COA and actual COA comes in room and board costs, particularly with off-campus housing (which is common for non-frosh at many residential schools), which can vary considerably (either higher or lower) than the estimate used in COA.
@kelsmom I worded that poorly. The NCAA will likely tell athletic depts that they can’t give athletes more than $x for “other” costs. I believe that they already were setting a limit to how much schools can give full scholarship athlete for transportation. They’re not going to want some schools (in the same region) giving $6k for “other,” to athletes while some give only $3k.
The NCAA wants to stick its nose in, but the financial aid community is working hard to keep them out of business that isn’t theirs. So glad I am at a school that doesn’t have sports!
Mom2ck, the ncaa left it up to the schools, perhaps knowing that the FA offices impose limits anyway, on what the stipend would be. Theathletic departments are stuck listening tothe fa office. The recent court ruling in the O’Bannon case was going to limit compensation to $5000, but that ruling is sort of obsolete now that the schools can pay a stipend. Travel for athletes has always been a part of the extras not covered by the full scholorship, and was a hardship for some poorer players. Travel is the difference between the instate stipend amount and OOS, usually about $1000, or 2 round trip tickets. This first year has seen a lot of schools adjusting those stipend amounts (COA minus billed amount), but there is a limitas kelsmom said oF how much the scools can increase the COA under fed regulations. All students are living with those same limits for borrowing, for paying from a 529 account, etc, And it is not only the revenue sports that get the stipend. The stipends are costing some schools $1M per year, so if the stipend amount goes from $2500 to $5000 the athletic department is going to feel the pinch.
It was a big deal last year when the ncaa started allowing unlimited food for players. Some schools were arguing that richer schools would have players dining on lobster and steak every night, and the ncaa said they weren’t going to try to control that, they weren’t going to get into the business of approving menus or budgets. It is only the biggest conferences that are paying stipends anyway, and only a few students get the whole thing. If you are a swimmer at Penn State on a 25% scholarship, the stipends is only about $500 a semester . Nice, but not steak and lobster nice.
The ncaa isn’t going to tell schools how to set the COA, and in fact it can’t.