A Wellesley College professor who’s an expert in higher education finance is making it easier for high school students and their families to understand college costs.
Phillip Levine, an economics professor at Wellesley and inventor of MyinTution, a popular college cost estimator, last week announced that the tool has been acquired by the College Board.
The move will make it easier for millions of students and families to figure out how much it will cost them to find the college that’s the best fit for them.
Levine – who continues to teach at Wellesley, and whose new book, Hidden Tuition: An Insider’s Guide to College Pricing and Financial Aid, will be published in September by University of Chicago Press – talked about the history and evolution of MyinTuition, the main myths and misunderstandings about paying for college, and how colleges like Wellesley can help open doors to students from all backgrounds.
Questions & Answers
How did MyinTution come about? When and why did you come up with the idea?
I’m an economist – but I’m a parent, too. About 15 years ago, when my teenage children began looking at colleges I wanted to know if I was eligible for financial aid – and that’s when I learned how hard it was to navigate that system.
This was troubling! I have a Ph.D. in economics; I’m pretty good with numbers. If I couldn’t figure out financial aid, then I knew other people would probably struggle more.
Why was this troubling to you?
If people can’t figure out how much college costs, it may influence the decisions they make, including where to go to college or perhaps not to go at all. We want people to make the best decisions possible based on accurate pricing information – and it was very difficult for me to figure it out at that time, as it is for others now.
So my goal was to make it easier – to develop a system that could forecast an individual’s financial aid award off of things that people just know. No “pull out your tax form,” no “go to your files and look things up.” I wanted a tool that would make it easy for people to answer simple questions. Then, using this simple information, I could estimate a financial aid award.
How precise is the estimate that these tools can provide?
Well, colleges’ actual financial aid applications ask dozens of questions, and we just ask a handful. So there are fluctuations between the estimated price and the actual price. But in the early phase of the college application process people don’t really need a precise estimate – a ballpark estimate is fine. Because at the end of the day, what you really want to know is can I afford this?
What do people most often misunderstand about college costs?
People tend to focus on the sticker price, and that number can be as high as $90,000 or $100,000. That’s a very scary number for a lot of people – and because of financial aid, that’s not the price that most people pay! And if that’s the only number that they know, you’ve just turned off a lot of people, instantly.
How has MyinTuition changed since it was launched at Wellesley College in 2013?
In the beginning, MyinTuition asked 6 basic financial questions, and it took a few minutes to complete. That tool still exists. But in the current world, 3 minutes is a long time! People want information immediately.
So last year we developed an Instant Net Price Estimator – a simple, interactive, graphic tool that lives on college websites. The user can just slide their mouse or finger across a screen that relates your family income to a college’s net price, which is the amount you pay after financial aid. This takes a few seconds.
Are there other things that have made it easier for people to understand how much college will actually cost?
Some colleges have taken additional strategies to get the affordability message across in as few words as possible, and that’s why free-tuition policies have become so popular. For example, we say, “Wellesley College offers free tuition to students with family incomes under $150,000 and typical assets.” That message resonates, and we need to talk about it more.
Will the new combined effort with the College Board make it easier for students and families to understand college costs?
Absolutely. The College Board is a very large organization, and they share MyinTuition’s goal of making it easier for people to find the college that’s right for them. I’ve developed a lot of ideas about things to work on, and the College Board provides an enormous opportunity to reach more students, to reach more schools, and to provide even greater social benefits.