Postsecondary Tuition, Fees and Degrees

Between 2009-10 and 2011-12, the average tuition and required fees at 4-year public institutions (after adjusting for inflation) increased more for in-state students (9 percent increase) than for out-of-state students (6 percent increase). During that same time period, 4-year nonprofit institutions increased overall at 4 percent . However, for-profit institutions reported no increase. Findings are from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) fall 2011 data collection, which included three survey components: institutional characteristics for 2011-12 -- such as degrees offered, type of program, application information, and tuition and other costs; the number and type of degrees conferred from July 2010 through June 2011; and 12-month enrollment data for the 2010-11 academic year.
Other findings include:

• In 2011-12, of the 7,398 Title IV institutions in the United States and other jurisdictions, 3,053 were classified as 4-year institutions, 2,332 were 2-year institutions, and the remaining 2,013 were less-than-2-year institutions.

• Institutions reported a 12-month unduplicated headcount enrollment totaling about 29.5 million individual students. Of these, roughly 25.6 million were undergraduates and approximately 3.9 million were graduate students.

• Of the roughly 3.6 million degrees institutions reported conferring, about 2.9 million were awarded by 4-year institutions and approximately 650,000 were awarded by 2-year institutions.