The University of the South, commonly known as Sewanee, will decrease tuition by 10 percent for the upcoming school year, becoming the first significant private university to do so in recent memory.
“Higher education is on the verge of pricing itself beyond the reach of more and more families,” John M. McCardell Jr., the school’s Vice Chancellor (and, incidentally, my former college professor and advisor at Middlebury) said, in a press release.
He told the New York Times, “Given the realities of higher education in the current economy, we believe that some college or university needed to step up and say, ‘Enough.’”
Students will see the college’s $46,000 annual price tag drop by 10 percent next year. The school can afford the measure, and hopes to expand its national profile and become more competitive with regional colleges that have been siphoning students away from Sewanee.
Gawker, in reporting the news, wrote “This moderate price cut at an otherwise unremarkable regional college earned stories in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post.” Pretty smart move, huh?
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