College Costs Expected to Climb 6% to 8%, Top $18,000 at Some Schools

College tuitions will continue to climb faster than the inflation rate this fall, and total student expenses at some elite institutions will top $18,000, the College Board said Thursday in its annual survey of college costs.

The average annual tuition and fees for the 1987-88 school year will climb 8% from last year’s level at private four-year colleges and 6% at public institutions, the report said.

It will be the seventh straight year that the increase exceeds the rate of inflation. So far this year, the consumer price index has risen at an annual rate of 5.4%.

The most expensive school in the nation, the report said, is Bennington College in Bennington, Vt., where total estimated costs will be $19,390.

Average total estimated costs at four-year private schools will be slightly less than $12,000 and at public schools will be almost $5,800.

‘There They Go’

Education Secretary William Bennett, a frequent critic of increases in college costs, said of this latest survey: “There they go again, and again, and again. When will they ever stop?”

Still, this fall’s increases are well below the peak reached in the 1982-83 academic year, when tuitions rose an average 20% at public colleges and 13% at private schools at a time when the inflation rate was just 3.8%.

“The College Board does not collect data on why tuition and fees are rising, but other investigators point to the considerable increase in the price of goods and services purchased during the 1980s, such as books, faculty salaries and scientific equipment,” said board President Donald M. Stewart.

Using a new method of calculating average college costs, which takes each school’s enrollment into account, the board estimated that average “fixed charges” at private four-year institutions--tuition, fees, room and board--will hit $10,493 for 1987-88. Counting such incidental expenses as books, supplies and transportation, estimated annual costs rise to $11,982 for students living on campus and to $10,173 for commuting students.

At four-year public institutions, tuition, fees, room and board will average $4,104 for in-state students. Adding incidental expenses increases the estimate to $5,789 for resident students and $4,554 for commuters.

The basic annual fee at the California State University’s 19 campuses will be up 10% from last year, from $573 to $630. Adding in room and board, the total cost ranges from $3,730 at the Stanislaus campus to $4,861 at Cal State Long Beach. Students who are not California residents must pay $147 more per unit, a slight increase over the $141 charged last year.

At the nine University of California campuses, tuition has been raised 9% and ranges from a low of $1,431 at UCLA to a high of $1,615 at UC Santa Cruz. Room and board charges vary from campus to campus, with the highest apparently at UC San Diego, where the College Board said the total estimated cost for a year is $8,400 for state residents.

Non-Resident Surcharges

Besides Bennington, schools where the total estimated cost for the year for undergraduates will exceed $18,000 include Sarah Lawrence College, University of Chicago, Columbia University, Harvard University, Dartmouth College, Tufts University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Average surcharges for out-of-state students attending four-year public institutions will rise 7% to $2,367 and 10% at two-year public colleges to $1,811. Out-of-staters attending some top public universities thus face expenses rivaling those at many private colleges.

Estimated total costs at the Colorado School of Mines, for example, will be $8,274, and $13,796 for out-of-state students. UC San Diego will cost $12,690 for non-Californians, and the University of Michigan $13,098 for out-of-state students.

The New York-based College Board is a private, nonprofit organization whose members include more than 2,500 educational institutions and associations.