Pitt tops Penn State for freshman tuition rate

Pitt might have beaten out Penn State for the title of most expensive public school in the… Pitt might have beaten out Penn State for the title of most expensive public school in the country, though it will not be official until at least next summer.

With an 8.5 percent tuition hike, Pitt students will pay more more than Penn State’s freshmen and sophomores pay this fall after their tuition jumped 4.9 percent. Penn State has a tiered tuition program, meaning that juniors and seniors pay more than underclassmen.

Earlier this summer, the Department of Education ranked Penn State and Pitt as the most expensive and second most expensive public univerisites in the country. The department based the listing off of the two schools’ tuition last year, $14,154 for Pitt and $14,416 at Penn State. Both cost more than twice the national average of $6,397.

Mandy Ross, a Pitt spokeswoman, said that people must take caution when comparing the two schools’ tuition because their tuition structures are so different. Penn State has a two-tiered tuition, meaning freshman and sophomores pay one rate, and juniors and seniors pay a higher rate. At Pitt, students pay the same rate for all four years.

Pitt is now $148 more expensive for in-state tuition than Penn State, at least for freshman and sophomores. But over a four-year period, in-state Penn State students will end up paying nearly $2,000 more in tuition, Ross said.

And for out-of-state students, Pitt is still significantly cheaper. Next year, out-of-state Pitt students will pay $24,680 whereas Penn State freshman and sophomores will pay $27,706. Tuition for Penn State’s out-of-state juniors and seniors is $28,590.

She said that the most important thing to note is Pitt’s cut in state allocations was 22 percent while Penn State’s was 19.6 percent.

“Our percentage hit was higher than Penn State. We had more ground to make up,” Ross said.

Geoff Rushton, a Penn State spokesman, said that officials at Penn State are not happy with being number one or number two.

“Number one or number two is not a very fortunate position to be in, and this certainly isn’t something new to us or the University of Pittsburgh,” Rushton said. “Our tuitions have been at that scale for a number of years now.”

Rushton said that as state-related schools, both Pitt and Penn State have only two sources of revenue: state appropriations and tuition.

“With state appropriations being the way they are, unfortunately tuition remains a little higher. At the same time, we make a very concerted effort to keep tuition as low as possible,” Rushton said.

Ross also attributed the ranking to the low level of state support and said it should not be a surprise that Pitt and Penn State are ranked so high on the national list, since state support directly affects tuition.

Sara Gast, a spokesperson for the Department of Education, said the department will update the list next summer based on this year’s tuition numbers.

The Department of Education compiled the list by gathering information from schools that participate in the department’s Title IV Student Aid Program, which includes any school that receives a type of federal funding for funding and loans. For the past few years, these schools have been required to complete a survey in which they report data such as tuition fees, graduation rates, enrollment, etc.

But cuts in state appropriations meant Pitt and Penn State had to increase their tuition for the coming year. Pitt’s rose by 8.5 percent for in-state students, while Penn State’s increased by 4.9 percent. The 14 fully state-funded universities in Pennsylvania increased tuition by 7.5 percent, but none of them made the list.

Regardless of Pitt’s new tuition increase, Ross said that the University gets “ranked exceedingly high for value in providing a first-class research institution.”

She said Pitt is more comparable to private schools that charge upwards of $40,000 than to other institutions with public-university costs.

“We should be looking at our tuition versus private schools because we’re really providing the same thing, but the difference [in tuition] is dramatic,” Ross said.