Students at Harvard University are questioning the university’s refusal to reduce tuition costs for the upcoming academic year, when classes will be held entirely online. The cost of tuition for a year at Harvard University is $49,653.
According to a report by the New York Times, students at Harvard University are scratching their heads over the university’s refusal to reduce tuition in light of the university’s recent decision to keep Harvard’s courses online for the upcoming academic year due to the Wuhan coronavirus.
Breitbart News reported last week that Harvard had announced that all of their courses for the 2020-2021 academic year will take place online. However, 40 percent of Harvard’s undergraduate student population has been asked to return to campus this fall and conduct their courses on computer from a residence hall.
Now, a petition that has received almost 2,000 signatures calls on Harvard to drastically drop the cost of tuition. The petition cites a plan by Princeton University to reduce tuition in response to the ongoing pandemic.
We call for a tuition decrease of $17,500. At the very least, Harvard should institute a tuition freeze until the traditional Harvard College experience is made available to every student and a 10% tuition decrease (comparable to Princeton University’s procedures moving forward.). We ask for a detailed and clear financial response detailing why Harvard did not pursue a tuition reduction and why there was a smaller draw from the endowment, and we also ask for a plan that would make a tuition reduction possible.
Despite the concerns, Harvard claims that 20 percent of students enrolled received full scholarships. Since 2004, Harvard has offered full scholarships to students from families that earn less than a certain income threshold. Additionally, 55 percent of students receive some form of need-based scholarship from the university.
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