Illustration by Erin Bushnell
If Lisa Richardson-Smith’s son Cooper wants to live on campus at Virginia Commonwealth University this year, he’ll have to pay for it himself.
Cooper’s first year as an in-state student cost the family about $17,600, while room and board ran an additional $16,500. To make their college savings stretch across the next three years, Cooper will have to live with his parents in Richmond. Living at home wasn’t exactly Plan A — Richardson-Smith wanted her son to live in a dormitory to form bonds and experience campus life — but it was the best financial decision.
The good news is that Cooper prefers having his own bedroom and bathroom, so he’s moved back home.
“Our hope is to be able to get him through his four years without taking out loans,” his mother says. “People are scared because of what inflation is doing, and I’m scared of what that looks like for any tuition increase.”
College is expensive. According to the College Board, students at in-state public universities pay an average of $21,000 per year for tuition, fees, room and board, even after grants and scholarships. At private nonprofit colleges, the average is about $36,000. Multiply these annual costs by four, and you’re approaching or exceeding a six-figure education. Families must decide whether to cover the cost with savings, current income or loans.
Paying for college has always been an exercise in financial planning, but due to rising costs — in Virginia, in-state tuition and fees have increased 40% since 2006, according to the Virginia Public Access Project — students and their families are working harder than ever to inform themselves on the costs of an education, compare financial aid offers and weigh lower-cost pathways to a degree. Colleges, in turn, are investing in financial literacy in new ways, expanding affordability programs and changing the way they recruit students.
Crunching the Numbers
Almost everyone pays less than the “sticker price” for a degree — the advertised cost of tuition, fees, room and board published on a school’s website — and nearly everyone needs some assistance footing the bill. Aid can take the form of merit- or need-based scholarships, grants, work study, and/or loans. Many students and families need help interpreting the aid packages they receive, as well as forecasting the financial implications of their decisions after graduation
William Bryan, associate vice president of financial aid at the University of Richmond, says that five years ago, students and their parents were asking questions about the school’s scenic campus, the academic programs or student life. “Now, it’s much more focused on the bottom line,” he says.
It’s not just the case at private four-year institutions. Justin May, chief enrollment management officer at Richard Bland College, a public two-year institution in Prince George County, says he now sees more of what he calls the “savvy strategic planner.” These students have their eyes on earning a four-year degree at schools like the College of William & Mary or the University of Virginia but spend their first year or two at RBC to save money.
According to the Federal Reserve, more than 4 in 10 adults who pursued education beyond high school borrowed to pay for it, and a recent article from U.S. News & World Report notes that most graduates from the class of 2024 owe just under $30,000. These balances can delay buying a home, saving for retirement or even retiring at all. Thanks to the compounding interest attached to loans, deferring or falling behind on payments, even briefly, can cause loan balances to grow until they outrun borrowers.
On top of tuition, students also must cover books, lab fees, housing and meal plans; others may need childcare while in class and income to support their households. But financial aid doesn’t always cover those extra expenses. GRASP, a Richmond-based nonprofit that helps students and their families understand the financial aid process and the implications of borrowing for school, has counselors in 115 public schools across the state.
Paula Buckley, a GRASP counselor, says that some financial aid can be used only for tuition, and many forms of financial aid must be repaid with interest. “By working with GRASP, [students] at least have the knowledge of what it means,” she says. If students understand the free funding available to them and the implications of borrowing, “they can make their choice.”
Students celebrate at a GRASP luncheon in 2019. (Photo courtesy Paula Buckley/GRASP)
Institutional Change
As families scrutinize every dollar, colleges are rethinking what it means to help students afford a degree and are investing in more resources. In spring 2026, VCU debuted its Student Financial Management Center, which offers guidance on financial aid, student loans, budgeting, credit and other elements of personal finance.
At Reynolds Community College, students can turn to Student Support Services for help covering noneducational expenses and can enroll in the Single Stop program, which connects them with public benefits and social service programs they may qualify for.
Reynolds also helps students access state-funded initiatives, such as FastForward and G3, which can cover the cost of training for a wide range of high-demand careers as well as federal Pell Grants, which provide money to low- and middle-income students for tuition and other education-related expenses, including living costs. Unlike loans, Pell Grants do not have to be repaid.
Even the way colleges award scholarships is changing. In fall 2025, VCU launched a pilot program that actively recruits and grants partial scholarships to out-of-state students. The effort is designed to attract high-achieving applicants in hopes of expanding the geographic diversity of its incoming class and increasing revenue for the school, which can then keep costs down for in-state students. While in-state students, who make up 90% of enrollment, continue to receive the majority of the university’s institutional aid, the two- to three-year pilot program illustrates how financial aid has become more than an affordability tool — it’s also a long-term recruitment strategy.
Hernan Bucheli, VCU’s vice president of strategic enrollment, says the school has worked to keep students’ net costs relatively flat over the past five years through modest tuition increases and institutional financial aid. Despite that effort, there’s been a change in the types of students applying for financial aid in recent years — “certainly more middle-income families,” Bucheli says. The shift is a sign that affordability concerns are extending well beyond low-income households.
VCU is also seeing more arrivals from community colleges, another indicator that students are seeking less expensive options for their first year or two of school. Fall enrollment is expected to include 3.4% more transfer students than last year; Bucheli attributes the number in part to VCU’s partnerships with local community colleges.
Competing Harder
With the number of traditional college-age students expected to decline over the next decade, Virginia’s higher education institutions are competing harder for students and using affordability as a differentiator. The University of Richmond in 2026 expanded its Richmond’s Promise to Virginia program, which now covers the cost of tuition, room and board for students whose family income is less than $75,000.
In 2024, Radford University began offering free tuition for students with a household income of less than $100,000. The University of Virginia similarly covers tuition and fees for in-state undergraduates with household income of less than $100,000 and also covers room and board for those who earn less than $50,000. And, through the Virginia College Affordability Network, students who graduated from high school within 45 miles of Virginia State University in Petersburg may qualify for free tuition.
Lindsay Robinson, vice president of institutional advancement at Reynolds Community College (Photo courtesy Reynolds Community College)
“Don’t let paying for it be the reason you don’t apply,” says Lindsay Robinson, who oversees scholarship programs at Reynolds Community College. She points out that there are some scholarships with criteria so niche — for instance, an award for a student who graduated from a specific high school currently pursuing a nursing degree — that competition is low, and the funds are ready for those who meet the requirements. She works hard to make sure those who want an education can get it. In fact, 94% of students graduate from Reynolds with no educational debt, Robinson says.
Many students are so excited about going to school that they don’t think about how loans can affect their lives afterward. Buckley, the counselor at GRASP, tells the students she advises to ask their teachers: How did you pay for college? Would you do it differently if you could?
More than anything, Buckley wants students to know they have choices. “And if you’re really set on a certain school,” she says, “it doesn’t hurt to call the financial aid office to just explain your situation and see if there might be any other financial aid.”
