The way policymakers define college affordability differs from how students and families actually experience it.
Policy tends to factor in only the tuition price. But a scholarship that covers tuition and nothing else leaves students stranded. This report from Sova, which draws on 20 focus groups with 200 people in Florida, Michigan, Minnesota, Texas, and Washington, found that participants described affordability as a survival calculation: can I stay housed, fed, and employed, cover childcare and transportation, and absorb lost wages, all the way from enrollment through graduation? Two of the biggest cost drivers people named—foregone wages and keeping a household stable—aren’t counted in aid formulas at all.
The report also finds that public investments like Pell Grants and state programs (Minnesota’s North Star Promise, Michigan’s Community College Guarantee, Washington College Grant, Florida’s Bright Futures, Austin Community College’s free tuition) are critical. Many participants said they wouldn’t have enrolled without them. But there are so many ways these programs fall short: coverage usually stops at the tuition line, eligibility rules exclude some of the people the programs are meant to help, and ongoing requirements like full-time enrollment, GPA minimums, and repayment for dropped courses turn make student aid risky. Students described their aid as essential but fragile. It only takes a dropped course, one slipped grade, or a parent’s unfinished form to unravel the dream of college completion.