Instructional Spending Per Student

Alexandre
Wed, 18 Oct 2017 18:03:19 +0000

Spending per student is meaningless unless we are comparing apples to apples, which is very difficult to do since many universities (mostly private) manipulate data to make themselves look better. How does UCLA spend twice as much as Cal? I wonder! Could it be because Cal has no medical school or hospital, which usually costs anywhere from 50-75% of a university’s total operating budget, and UCLA is actually including the cost of its medical complex in its calculation? That is unusual for a public university. Generally speaking, only private universities take such misleading, self-serving, and cavalier liberties with data. Some of those universities that spend more than $50k/student are likely including medical center spending. Also, larger universities in areas with a lower cost of living will do terribly in this sort of survey as it fails to capture lower costs that result from economies of scale and significantly lower costs of living.

Looking at endowment makes better sense because it is more tangible. However, the official endowment figures for the year ending June 30, 2017 have not yet been released.