AIR FYI: Net Price Calculator Will Be Required on Institutional Web Sites

Valerie Martin Conley, Chair HEDPC (air@airweb.org)

Check the online AIR FYI Web site (http://www.airweb.org/?page=1900) for information about (a) a template being developed by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) for the net price calculator that institutions will have to post on their own web sites, and (b) information about the multiyear tuition calculator that NCES will be required to post this summer.

Each Title IV, HEA postsecondary institution must post a net price calculator on its Web site starting in August 2011. An institution may use either the net price calculator developed by the NCES that will be posted in August 2009, or, alternatively, one the institution develops on its own, as long as its calculator includes "at a minimum the same data elements" found in the NCES calculator. Although institutions will have two years after the NCES calculator template is posted to develop their own calculator, they may wish to begin discussions among financial aid, admissions, finance, institutional research, and IT departments about how they wish to estimate net price.

In addition, starting in August 2009, the College Navigator Web site must display a multiyear tuition calculator that projects tuition and fees for the expected length of the typical academic program offered by each postsecondary institution. Representatives from many of these same institutional offices should be made aware of this new source of tuition information for prospective and current students.

IR officers may wish to forward the AIR FYI link to relevant individuals on their campuses. They should also watch for an AIR announcement that the NCES calculator has been made public.

Coordinated by the Higher Education Data Policy Committee. All opinions expressed herein do not necessarily reflect the official position of the Association for Institutional Research.

Valerie Martin Conley

HEDPC Committee Chair