Rowan to Lautenberg: Net cost not a reliable measure of students’ tuition expenses

Rowan University has responded to a letter U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg sent to Education Secretary Arne Duncan, in which Lautenberg calls for an investigation into the proposed merger of Rowan with Rutgers-Camden.

In the letter, Lautenberg expressed concerns that attending Rowan will cost students more, saying the Glassboro school costs between $5,000 and $8,000 more a year than Rutgers-Camden.

“The net cost calculator falls short,” Rowan’ interim President Ali Houshman writes in a letter to Lautenberg, Duncan and others.

Houshmand says the net cost does not take into account how much financial aid students receive on an individual basis.

 

Rutgers can aware more aid under the Tuition Aid Grant program, Houshmand writes, saying, “this unfairly makes the net cost to attend one state university less than another serving the same region.”

Rowan plans to close that gap by continuing to increase its scholarship awards.