This guide is designed to answer one question for you: How are you going to afford Ursinus College?
You probably know that planning for expenses is an important part of the college application process. What you may not know is how many different things you need to keep track of to pay tuition and apply for financial aid.
Here’s what we’ll cover:
By learning more about expenses and aid, you’re already on the right path to managing college costs. Let’s get started!
School location: Collegeville, PA
Knowing what a school costs is Step #1 in managing college costs. There’s more to think about than just the tuition—you also have to factor in where you’ll live, what you’ll eat, and more while attending Ursinus College.
The “Cost of Attendance” is the total amount of money the average student has to pay, WITHOUT any financial aid, to attend a particular school. Think of it as a school’s sticker price. It includes not just Ursinus College tuition and fees, but also room, board, textbooks, and personal expenses.
Here’s the Cost of Attendance breakdown for Ursinus College:
Typical Total Cost for On-Campus Students$58880
The Cost of Attendance listed above might be intimidating. The good news is that most students don’t end up paying that full price to attend Ursinus College. Financial aid helps make up the difference between the Cost of Attendance and what families can actually afford.
Here we’ll cover how many students get Ursinus College financial aid, what types of aid they get, and how much.
Aid comes in many forms, including:
This financial aid comes from a few different places:
Generally, it’s better for MORE students to receive HIGH amounts of financial aid—this means students pay less for college.
Let’s take a look at how Ursinus College compares to other schools.
Let’s start with the overall numbers. At Ursinus College, we know that:
This is 8% HIGHER than the average for Private not-for-profit schools, which is 92%.
This is good news – more students getting financial aid means students at Ursinus College are likely getting a pretty good deal on their education. It could also mean the school skews toward lower income students.
Next, we’ll look at actual aid amounts and student debt to dig deeper.
We’re focusing on grants and scholarships first because they’re the most important forms of financial aid. Grants and scholarships are better than loans because students don’t ever have to pay them back. The more grant/scholarship aid students receive at a particular school, the better off those students are in the long run.
At Ursinus College, we know that:
This is 9% HIGHER than the average for Private not-for-profit schools, which is 89%.
Although it’s useful to know how many students get grant aid, it’s also important to know how much grant aid people tend to receive. The bigger the average grant award, the better.
So how much grant money do students at Ursinus College tend to receive?
This is $8445 HIGHER than the average for Private not-for-profit schools, which is $16488.
Altogether, this is great news – at Ursinus College, MORE students get financial aid, and each award size is HIGHER. This means students have to rely less on loans to pay for college and will likely graduate with less debt.
The grant dollar amounts we’ve seen so far have included aid from all sources – both federal and institutional. Schools don’t have much control over how much federal aid students can qualify for (like Pell Grants), but they do their own financial aid dollars and how they’re used.
To figure out how strong Ursinus College’s own financial aid program is, we’ll look at how they award their own (non-federal) financial aid dollars. The more students receive aid directly from the school (otherwise known as institutional aid), and the bigger the award amounts, the better the financial aid program.
Let’s see how generous Ursinus College is with its students:
This is 16% HIGHER than the average for Private not-for-profit schools, which is 82%.
Because more Ursinus College students get institutional aid, it likely offers relatively competitive financial aid. This means fewer students will need to take out loans to pay for college.
The amount of money that students actually get is just as important (if not more important) than the percent of students who get grants. If you receive a grant, you’ll want it to be big enough to do you some good.
This is $9142 HIGHER than the average for Private not-for-profit schools, which is $13799.
Right away, it seems like Ursinus College offers more institutional aid than other schools. On the surface, this can mean that students who do receive institutional grants get a competitive amount, compared to other schools.
On the other hand, this can also mean that the school just costs more than the typical school of its type. If Ursinus College costs more, it makes sense for the average grant award to be higher.
Up to this point, we’ve looked entirely at grants for Ursinus College. Next, we’ll do the same analysis for student loans, which is where student debt comes from.
Aside from grants, the other major way to pay for college is with student loans. Student loans aren’t free sums of money – you borrow a certain amount to attend Ursinus College, and then pay it back with smaller monthly payments after you graduate.
The more student loan money you borrow, the more debt you’ll end up with after graduation. Ideally, you want to minimize your student debt as much as possible. Less debt means less of a financial burden once you leave school.
It’s generally a bad sign if a school has many students taking out a lot of loans. This indicates that graduates have to worry about paying back big sums of money once they leave school.
To address the amount and type of debt that students take on, this section will cover:
Let’s see what students at Ursinus College have to deal with:
First, let’s talk about how many students at Ursinus College actually have to take out any student loans at all. The ideal goal is to graduate with little to no debt.
It’s very common for college grads in the US to graduate with some debt, but high percentages of students taking on loans at a particular school is a big red flag. In contrast, low percentages of students with loans is a sign that Ursinus College tuition is affordable.
So how many students actually end up taking out loans at Ursinus College?
This is 7% higher than the average for Private not-for-profit schools, which is 66%.
High numbers of students with loans is a red flag, and Ursinus College is above average. It doesn’t necessarily mean that students end up with high amounts of debt – we’ll get to that question very shortly – but it suggests that Ursinus College is less affordable for the average student.
To break this down further, we have to understand how much actual debt the average person takes out while in school. Next, we’ll look at student debt amounts.
Now that you have a handle on the basic loan information for Ursinus College, we’ll get into some more nitty-gritty information on the types and amounts of loans that students typically have.
We’ll start with federal loans because, in general, federal loans are preferable to private loans. Federal loans tend to have low interest rates, which means they cost less in the long run. They may come with other perks (like subsidization or even options for loan forgiveness).
High percentages or amounts of federal loans still isn’t a great sign – again, you don’t want to see students burdened with too much debt. Generally, schools with strong financial aid programs will have students with more federal loans than private loans.
Let’s see how Ursinus College stacks up:
At Ursinus College, 73% of all students take out federal loans. This is 8% HIGHER than the average percent of students for Private not-for-profit schools, which is 65%.
At Ursinus College, the average annual federal loan amount is $5524. This amount is $553 LESS than the average for Private not-for-profit schools, which is $6077.
Other loans, or private loans, are the last resource students turn to when paying for college. They’re the least preferable form of financial aid because they have higher interest rates and cost students the most money in the long run.
Generally, the fewer students who take private loans, and the lower the amount of the loan, the more affordable Ursinus College is.
Let’s take a look at the percentage of students at Ursinus College with non-federal loans:
At Ursinus College, 11% of students take out private loans. This is 2% HIGHER than the average for Private not-for-profit schools, which is 9%
Just as important as the percentage of students with private loans is the average loan amount. The smaller the average loan amount, the better:
The average private loan amount at Ursinus College is $13733. This is $2289 HIGHER than the average for Private not-for-profit schools, which is $11444.
The percentage of students getting federal loans is greater than those getting private loans, which is a good sign. This means lower-interest federal loans are usually enough to pay for Ursinus College.
Finally, we get to the bottom line: what will Ursinus College actually cost YOU? Every family has a different situation, and depending on your income level, you’ll have to pay more or less to go to college.
Above, we’ve covered Ursinus College’s Cost of Attendance (tuition, room and board, books, and more). We also covered its typical financial aid in grants, loans, and scholarships.
The Net Price is the total cost minus the total aid given. In other words, this is the price you have to pay to the school out of pocket. The lower the school’s cost, and the more aid you get, the lower the Net Price.
We’ll cover two ways to get your Net Price for Ursinus College – the fast way, and the precise way.
If you want a quick, general idea of your annual Net Price at Ursinus College, here’s a handy chart showing the net price of real students. All you need is your family income.
| If your family makes between… | Your Net Price will likely be around… |
|---|---|
| $0 – $30,000 | $17751 |
| $30,001 – $48,000 | $20585 |
| $48,001 – $75,000 | $25254 |
| $75,001 – $110,000 | $26451 |
| $110,000 and up | $36370 |
Note that these values may be a few years old, and today’s prices may be a bit higher.
As we’ll discuss next, your exact Net Price will depend on other factors like the number of family members and total assets, but this represents the typical Net Price.
Most schools have an updated Net Price calculator available. To find it, just google “Ursinus College Net Price Calculator” – the official tool should be one of the top search results.
Often the school will ask for more information than just income:
This will take 10-15 minutes to complete, and you’ll get a specific net price that’s more accurate than the table above.
Once you have a Net Price estimate, you’ll want to figure out whether your family can afford to pay Ursinus College tuition and costs. Once again, the Net Price is the total cost of attending, minus the aid you can expect to get (grants and scholarships). It’s the amount you’d have to cover yourself.
The US government has come up with a standardized way to calculate how much a typical family can afford to pay without help. They call this the Expected Family Contribution, or EFC.
As an example, a family that brings home $80,000 in income before taxes, with no assets and no other children in college, has an EFC of around $7,000. This is the amount the government thinks that family can reasonably pay, and the school will have to step in and cover the rest.
Colleges use this number as a guideline to decide how much aid to give you, but it’s just a guideline. Some schools will be stingier with aid, and you’ll have to pay more than the government’s suggested EFC.
