N.C. 1 of 49 states rated F on college affordability

UNC officials question use of data in U.S. report

An independent report on U.S. higher education that flunked North Carolina and 48 other states on affordability has some university officials here scratching their heads.

The biennial study by the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, which evaluates how well higher education is serving the public, handed out F's for affordability to 49 states, up from 43 two years ago. Only California received a passing grade, a C, in that category, thanks to its relatively inexpensive community colleges.

Former Gov. Jim Hunt is chairman of the center's board of directors.

The report card uses a range of measurements to grade states from A to F on the performance of their public and private colleges. The affordability grade is based on how much of the average family's income it costs to go to college.

In North Carolina, the study found that poor and working-class families must devote 32 percent of their income, even after financial aid, to pay for costs at two- or four-year public colleges, which enroll 84 percent of the state's college students.

Hannah Gage, chairwoman of the UNC system's Board of Governors, said public higher education is still a good deal in North Carolina but university leaders intend to pay attention to the challenges facing North Carolina families. This year the state is providing $117 million for need-based financial aid.

"We are a bargain compared to other institutions," Gage said. "We're the lowest of our public peers almost every year. But the area we need to examine very closely is that North Carolinians' ability to pay may have changed. If middle-class income levels have flat-lined over the last several years, it may have changed their ability to pay."

At UNC-Chapel Hill, officials are bothered by the report because it bases its grades, including the "F" for affordability, on data from both public and private institutions.

Shirley Ort, UNC-CH's director of scholarships and student aid, questions the report's methodology and points out that although tuition and fees have increased at her institution over the last several years, so too has aid -- perhaps most notably with the creation in 2004 of the Carolina Covenant program for low-income students.

"I think [the report] is vague and not particularly helpful," Ort said. "This is not Chapel Hill's story."

In other measurements, North Carolina earned a B-minus in preparing young people for college, a D-plus for college participation, a C-plus for college benefits and a B-minus on college completion.

The center's full report is available at www.highereducation.org.