<p>Most expensive: George Washington U: Tuition 2008-2009: $40,437 </p>
<p>Second place: Sarah Lawrence College, Tuition 2008-2009: $40,350 </p>
<p>Third place: Kenyon College: $40,240 </p>
<p>Fourth place: Vassar College, Tuition 2008-2009: $40,210 </p>
<p>5th: Bucknell</p>
<p>6th: Carnegie-Mellon</p>
<p>7th: Colgate
8th: Columbia</p>
<p>9th. St. Johns (Annapolis)</p>
<p>10th. Wesleyan
10</a> most expensive colleges - George Washington University (1) - CNNMoney.com</p>
<p>I'm shocked Stanford, MIT, Harvard, Yale, aren't in the top 10.</p>
<p>It's a shame that GW's price does not match up to it's prestige</p>
<p>i thought NYU would definitely be one</p>
<p>Is this just tuition? How about room, board, books etc? You have to look at them all combined. Some colleges have all-in-one fees. Some colleges have high tuition and lower room and board. This list is deceiving.</p>
<p>Wow, I am applying to 4/10 most expensive colleges...joy.</p>
<p>But I agree, this list doesn't include all expenses.</p>
<p>I would say it's more meaningless because the difference between the #1 most expensive private school and the #50 most expensive private school is probably ~ 2% of the total cost; not to mention that variances in financial aid packages would make the total comparison much different anyway.</p>
<p>These ridiculous lists are so misleading. They don't take into account the true sticker price of the schools - the price after financial aid and merit aid. (And yes, they don't include room and board). As one example, GWU was actually on Kiplinger's list of top 50 private school VALUES. GW has fixed tuition for all four years, gives half-tuition merit awards and promises to cover 91% of need. It's important to make college financial decisions AFTER you have been accepted and received your financial packages. Then and only then sit back and do an objective comparison of which are least expensive. Don't fall in love with any one school beforehand but at the same time don't exclude schools simply because of these lists.</p>
<p>Even if you don't qualify for financial aid and don't account for room & board and other expenses, it is doubtful that someone is choosing Wesleyan over Vassar because the former is only #10 at $38,934 tuition per year vs the latter at #4 and $40,210, a difference of 3.17%.</p>
<p>Do the Ivies still consult one another to maintain relatively equal tuition or did the antitrust complaint of a few years ago do away with that too?</p>
<p>I think it was finally done away with. It was also not even tuition, but maintaining relatively equal financial aid packages as well.</p>
<p>My son probably makes up in just food (sushi, Mojitos) expense the difference between his Ivy and some of the ones on the above list!</p>
<p>Some schools avoid this list by separating mandatory fees for all students from "tuition".</p>
<p>Well, all need-blind Ivies are very generous with their FinAid, so I reckon they shouldnt be on this list.. Because no one should really have problems paying to go there!</p>
<p>^^ There are plenty of full-pay students at the Ivy schools. My son is one of them. It is a difficult financial load for us, but we chose to do it.</p>
<p>^MOWC - do you pay for your son's sushi dinners and mojitos? Sincere question- no judgment either way.</p>
<p>What is your impression of the average Penn's student's sense of entitlement? Some comments I heard, was that some of the kids who had financial aid had more discretionary income than those kids paying full freight. In other words, because their family received aid, those families could give their kids more spending money, than those who had to take on the full financial load of tuition etc.</p>
<p>^I don't doubt it. I used to always kid my friends receiving financial aid that had a car on campus, while I didn't have one, that my family was paying for their car.</p>
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<p>I'm afraid this is a terribly naive comment. Consider a family earning, say, $150,000 year---just enough to make them ineligible for need-based financial aid. They're expected to pay full freight, a little over $50K/year. Easy, right? No, not at all. First, that $150K/yr income is going to be more like $100K after federal and state income taxes and payroll taxes. Add in a mortgage, property taxes, insurance (property, life, health), out-of-pocket medical expenses, utilities, transportation costs, food, and clothing, and that family is not likely to have as much as $50K/year in discretionary income. Of course, they can dip into savings and investments, college savings plans, parent loans, home equity loans (maybe), and possibly other ways to raise the cash. But some people at this income level don't have a lot of liquid assets, either because they only recently starting making this much, or because they've suffered financial reversals of one kind or another. Many have recently seen their investments badly shrunk in value, their home equity go into a tailspin, their retirement savings diminished (not that anyone's suggesting they should use retirement savings to pay for college, but this is a big hit to their net worth that leaves them a lot less secure financially). </p>
<p>I'm not saying people at this income level will necessarily get priced out of an elite private school education, but to suggest it's easy for them is cavalier, and just plain wrong. I think, in fact, it's folks in the $100K to $250K income range, who will be eligible for little or no need-based aid, who will be the most aggressive in seeking out merit scholarships and seriously weighing their public flagships as "financial safeties." For this group, it won't be easy to pay full freight (or close to it) at an elite private school, and less costly alternatives are going to be awfully tempting.</p>
<p>^^ Amen.</p>
<p>My son has a job which helps pay for sushi and vodka. (he's over 21)</p>
<p>The secondary rub is that if you don't qualify for financial aid, you can't get a job on campus because you aren't on financial aid! We have asked our D to get a part time job to offset some of our expenses (which she would gladly do), but because we didn't qualify for financial aid, she can't get one on campus. Without a car, she can't get one off campus either.</p>