News Release

Tuition for full-time undergraduates at The Johns Hopkins University's Homewood campus will increase 4.9 percent this fall, the third year in a row and the sixth in the last eight that the university has held the annual increase below 5 percent.

Tuition for 2004-2005 will be $30,140, up $1,410 from this year's $28,730. That rate applies to the more than 4,100 full-time undergraduates in the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences and Whiting School of Engineering.

Financial aid will cut the actual cost of next year's education at Johns Hopkins for many undergraduates well below the $30,140 "sticker price." In fact, said Ellen Frishberg, director of student financial services, for Homewood undergraduates who qualify for financial aid, the cost of attendance is typically half that "sticker price."

The board of trustees approved the new tuition charges at its December meeting, along with next year's tuition for all other Johns Hopkins full-time and part-time programs.

At the direction of the trustees, the university has moved in recent years away from the the higher-percentage tuition hikes of the 1970s, '80s and early '90s. Before the fall of 1997, Homewood undergraduate tuition had increased 5 percent or more for 22 straight years. The increase was 10 percent or more seven times during those years.

More recently, the Homewood increase has exceeded 5 percent only in fall 2000 and the following year, when the costs of operating two new student-focused buildings were built into the rate structure.

"The Homewood Schools remain committed to discipline in our costs, restraint in our tuition increases and active fund-raising for financial aid, all to minimize — to the extent we can — the burden on our students and their families," said Daniel Weiss, the James B. Knapp Dean of the Krieger School.

Next year's charges for most of Johns Hopkins' peer institutions have not yet been announced. But Andrew Douglas, interim dean of the Whiting School, pointed out that the recent series of conservative increases at Johns Hopkins have this year brought the university down to 10th among its peer group of 18 private research universities in total cost of attendance, tuition plus room and board. Johns Hopkins ranked eighth in total charges last year and sixth the previous year. The peer group includes the entire Ivy League, and universities such as MIT, Stanford, Chicago, Duke and Georgetown.

"For the first time since the 2000-2001 academic year," Douglas said, "Homewood undergraduates are being charged tuition and room and board below the median of our peer group. That's an accomplishment that the trustees and administration hope to extend and improve on."

This year, Frishberg said, 59 percent of Homewood undergraduates are receiving some form of need-based aid, and 46 percent receive grants from the university's own funds. This year's total financial aid package from all sources -- university funds, federal grants and loans, and private or other aid -- is $55 million.

The university also has been increasing the grant portion of financial aid packages and reducing loans. Last spring's seniors on financial aid graduated with an average student loan debt of $13,300, below that of the four prior classes and well below the private college average of $21,200. The increased emphasis on grants was made possible in part by former trustee chairman Michael R. Bloomberg, now mayor of New York City.

Next year's tuition rates for all Johns Hopkins schools are available online at webapps.jhu.edu/jhuniverse/information_about_hopkins/ facts_and_statistics/tuition_and_financial_aid/ index.cfm.