The good news is that tuition at public colleges and universities is not rising as sharply as in the last few years, the College Board announced last week.
The bad news, officials said, is that financial aid is not keeping pace.
As the College Board released its annual reports on college costs and financial aid, board president Gaston Caperton said officials are concerned that, for the third year in a row, students and their families were going deeper into debt to cover costs.
The typical graduate from a four-year public college has $15,500 in debt; the typical graduate of a private, four-year college leaves with $19,400 of debt.
And University of Pennsylvania president Amy Gutmann and other higher-education leaders warned that the recent shift from need-based aid to merit grants is harming middle-income and low-income families by diverting money to wealthier students.
That is especially the case in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, which this school year have the highest average tuition and fees in the country for public four-year colleges. Pennsylvania ranks first and New Jersey second.
"We all should be focusing on need-based financial aid, rather than on what is called merit...," Gutmann said. "Merit-based aid overwhelmingly goes to high-income students who can afford our institutions. But institutions are competing for them to raise their average SAT scores."
According to the College Board, public, four-year colleges across the country raised tuition and fees by an average 7.1 percent for the current academic year, to $5,491. Last year, the rate rose by 10 percent.
Rates for public, two-year schools increased by an average 5.4 percent, to $2,191. Tuition at private, four-year colleges rose by an average 5.9 percent, to $21,235.
Although colleges and universities in Pennsylvania and New Jersey reported having similar percentage increases, college costs in the two states are far above the national norm.
The price tag for private, four-year colleges is $21,630 in Pennsylvania and $22,020 in New Jersey. The average public, four-year college in Pennsylvania costs $8,410 and $8,180 in New Jersey.
Public two-year colleges in those states are more expensive, too: $6,280 in Pennsylvania and $2,920 in New Jersey.
Donald E. Heller, senior research associate at the Center for the Study of Higher Education at Pennsylvania State University, said the region's higher public-college rates stemmed partly from the abundance of private colleges and universities.
"They have always been there, so the attitude of the legislators in the East has been: 'We don't have to fund as generously as other parts of the country because there are other alternatives,'" he said, speaking of the many private colleges.
He noted that, last year, Penn State eclipsed the University of Vermont as the most expensive public, four-year institution in the country. The typical in-state freshman is paying $11,266 in tuition and fees to attend Penn State this year.
Officials at the College Board, a New York-based nonprofit that also oversees the SATs, noted that the largest tuition increases at public colleges and universities occur during periods when state aid does not grow or is cut.
Gutmann said the recent trend among colleges to offer more merit grants to top students is widening the gap between wealthy and low-income students.
"Even if tuition rates were frozen, a college education simply would be out of reach for low-income and most middle-income families... were it not for need-based financial aid," she said.
She is urging flagship public universities and Ivy League colleges to turn away from merit grants and expand the aid for low-income and middle-income students. Gutmann said Penn awards grants based only on family income.
"If we want to be increasingly competitive as a society, we have to give the educational opportunities to our best and brightest students," she said. "It makes good competitive sense, as well as being on the side of justice."
Although Penn's tuition has increased 28 percent since the 2000-01 academic year, the university has increased its need-based financial aid by 55 percent over the same period.
William Schilling, Penn's senior director of financial aid, said the amount of need-based aid distributed by the university grew from $51.4 million to $79.8 million in the five-year period.
He said Gutmann has concentrated her fund-raising efforts on expanding need-based aid.
This year, tuition and fees at Penn total $32,364, a 5 percent increase over last year. Schilling said 3,950 undergraduates are receiving need-based grants from Penn. The average grant is $20,340.
