<p>High school noob here...
I was wondering that if after I pay tution for college, can I take as many courses as I like for free or do I have to pay for additional courses?</p>
<p>Tuition is usually paid per credit hour, not a flat fee.</p>
<p>It depends on the school. </p>
<p>Where I go you pay a variable fee based on the number of credits you take if you take any number of credits less than 12 or more than 18. If you take 12-18 you pay the same amount.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>From what I’ve seen, the latter is far more common. </p>
<p>But there are more than two systems anyway, as different schools handle part time and over time students differently. This is not something that you can generalize in any meaningful way</p>
<p>I’m pretty sure most universities are flat fee, but a lot of them have a limit before you have to pay for the extra credits (usually this is more than most average students will take).</p>
<p>I didn’t realize it varied so much from school to school. I’m pretty sure it’s per credit hour here though because the amount Bright Futures gives is adjusted based on the amount of credit hours, and if you drop a class you have to pay Bright Futures back for it. How would you be able to pay them back if it was just a flat fee and not per credit hour?</p>
<p>I know fees are flat rates but I was pretty sure tuition was per credit hour. Or else you could just take classes for free beyond a certain point, right?</p>
<p>Edit: Yeah, I checked on my school’s website and it’s $170 per credit hour for in-state undergrad students. Fees don’t depend on the number of credit hours though. I don’t really understand how tuition could be viable if it didn’t account for the number of credit hours. Some people would be overcharged and others undercharged that way, it seems.</p>
<p>Depends on the school.</p>
<p>At my school, the normal liberal arts major takes 4 course units (1 unit = 4 credits, so basically 16 credits) usually but I think they’re allowed up 4.75 units (19 credits) under regular tuition or something like that. For music majors, we’re allowed up to 5.5 units (22 credits) under the flat tuition fee. So my school has a flat fee and you’re allowed a certain amount for liberal arts majors vs music majors (and there might be a different allowance for theatre and art majors, not sure). If you go over that, then you do pay extra, but up to that, that’s what it is. Like for example, a liberal arts major who wants to just take 3 units instead of 4 some semester still pays the same tuition for 3.</p>
<p>It can be expensive to add courses though. At my school, the annual tuition is $36,392 this year. So if you divide that out for 4 units/semester (8 per year), that’s $4,549 per course unit, so like $1,137.25 per credit/semester hour (we go by units, not credits/semester hours, but when posting that on CC, I always explain it that way since most schools go by credits or semester hours so it hopefully makes more sense!)</p>
<p>Chandi, when I said “fee” I meant the bill or the total cost of attending the school, not the additional fees which are charged to all students such as a “computing fee” or something. </p>
<p>Also, do you go to a school which is heavily “non-traditional” students? I always though the standard tuition was common at schools where the student body was mostly the typical 16-24-year-old full-time college student.</p>
<p>Most community colleges charge by #s of credits taken.
Most others are a specific semesterly amount, with an upper cap (often between 21-24 credits) at which point you must pay more.</p>
<p>Most colleges I have seen you pay per credit hour, however I have seen few where you pay X and can take up to Y amount of credit hours and if you go over that then you have to pay a bit more…</p>
<p>My college does it by credit hour. There’s a certain amount of money you pay for each credit and the school multiplies that number by how many credits you’re taking. So yes, the more courses you take the more you have to pay. Its a really big concern for a lot of students because we have to make sure our financial aid/scholarships/loans will cover how many courses we want to take.</p>
<p>My college charges by credit hour for less than 12 hours. 12 hours-16 hours is a flat fee. 17+ incur an additional fee per credit hour.</p>
<p>Personally, I think colleges should allow you to take up to 18 hours without charging you extra, since they seem to think that that’s within a normal course load range for a full time student. :-/</p>
<p>As many have said, there tends to be a flat fee that includes so and so many credits, and then after that, you pay extra. But there are also colleges that charge per credit no matter how few or many you take. I’ve seen that too. </p>
<p>I think a lot of small LACs tend to have the flat fee for up to so and so many credits and then charge after that. It sounds like (from what I’ve seen) that many large universities, especially those with grad students, will charge per credit hour…anyone else want to agree with this? (that seems to be my impression of it, not sure if it’s completely correct though)</p>
<p>My school has a flat rate between 12-18/19 (depending on the major), then after that, there’s a fee somewhere around $1300-1400 per credit hour.</p>
<p>I believe we do have a fairly high proportion of non-traditional students. 17% of students here are 25 or older. About 1/4 of students here are part time and 82% of non-freshman live off campus. Additionally only about 1/4 of students here graduate within 4 years and that only bumps up to 1/2 after six years. I don’t know what any of those stats look like for other schools, though.</p>
<p>A flat rate tuition set to 15 credit hours (as my school was considering at some point to raise more funds) would probably discourage a lot of people from coming to school in the first place or might encourage them to overload themselves. It would benefit me since I usually take 17-18 credit hours, but I think more people would be hurt by it than helped.</p>
<p>My small LAC has a flat rate, period. There aren’t any credit hours: most classes are 1.0 credit with the exception of the freshman HUM 110 class which is 1.5 credits. One does not pay per credit, just tuition and room and board.</p>