2014-2015 Yale College Term Bill

The undergraduate term bill for 2014-2015 sets tuition at $45,800 and room and board at $14,000, for a total of $59,800, an increase of 4% over the current term bill of $57,500. Tuition in the current year is $44,000 and room and board is $13,500.

Yale College admits all students without regard to their ability to pay for their education and meets the full demonstrated financial need of all undergraduates. The cost of Yale next year for parents of current students receiving financial aid will not increase unless a change in financial circumstances has reduced their need for scholarship aid. Yale does not ask families of students with annual incomes of $65,000 or less with typical assets to make any financial contribution toward the students’ education, and aid is provided to students from families with significantly higher incomes.

In the current academic year, 52% of undergraduates are receiving aid from Yale, and the average grant for the year is $41,000. No portion of the Yale grant is a loan.

“Our goals of providing the highest quality education and making it affordable for everyone determine both the term bill and the great breadth of our financial aid commitment,” said Provost Benjamin Polak. “Thanks to Yale’s endowment, we are able to subsidize the Yale College education of every undergraduate.”

Yale’s generous financial aid program is structured so that no student needs to borrow to pay for his or her education. Eighty-five percent of students graduated with zero loan debt. Only 15% of recent graduates chose to borrow, and their average loan debt was $13,000. Nationally, 50% of college students borrow ,and they borrow an average of $26,000.

All students receiving financial aid are expected to contribute to the cost of their education. This “self-help” expectation for the upcoming academic year will increase by $50 to $2,850 for freshmen and $3,350 for upperclassmen. Students may earn the self-help contribution by working about 10 hours a week at campus jobs paying $12-$14 an hour.

Yale President Peter Salovey met in January with President Barack and Michelle Obama, higher education leaders, and other officials to discuss ways to expand college opportunity.

Salovey committed Yale College to several initiatives that will expand the number of highly talented low-income students applying to Yale and other highly competitive schools. The success of those efforts will rest in part on Yale’s longstanding commitment to make a Yale education affordable to all qualified students.

“I am pleased to work with President Obama and other college and university presidents to ensure that students from low-income families around the nation have the same access to college as others and are aware of their options,” Salovey said. “Yale’s generous financial aid and extensive admissions outreach have helped bring significant diversity to our undergraduate classes.”

As part of its effort to make a Yale education accessible to all, the university recently partnered with Say Yes to Education, the national non-profit group that helps organize and galvanize entire cities around the goals of making higher education accessible and affordable for the children in their communities.

Yale also reaches out to students who may not consider applying to Yale due to a misperception of its cost. The Office of Undergraduate Admissions has launched a campaign to inform low-income families about the affordability of a Yale College education, sending tailored mailings to 16,000 high-achieving, low-income high school seniors.