When GW administrators instituted a fixed-tuition plan in 2004, part of their reasoning included the assurance that as other schools perennially increase tuition, GW’s higher initial costs would average out in comparison to those schools. By comparing the tuition prices at some of GW’s “market basket” schools, it’s not clear that this added benefit of fixed-tuition is panning out. New York University, a city school with a similar tuition-dependent financial situation to GW, would have to increase its own tuition for the 2007-2008 academic year by more than $7,800 just to break even with GW’s four-year fixed -tuition costs – an unprecedented 23 percent increase.

The graph to the right compares, over the past three years, what a GW student entering in 2004 with the start of the fixed-tuition plan would pay in tuition costs alone versus students who entered college the same year at NYU, Washington University in St. Louis, Boston University and Tulane University.

sources: GW Office of Institutional Research, Tulane University Registrar’s Office, BU Registrar’s Office, Washington Square News, NYU Office of Public Affairs, WUSTL University Communications