Amherst College - Cost of Attendance and Financial Aid

Cost of Attendance and Financial Aid

Amherst's comprehensive tuition, room, and board fee for the 2012-13 academic year is $55,510. Once miscellaneous expenses are factored in the total cost to attend for the 2012-13 academic year amounts to $60,809 - $63,259.

Despite its high cost of attendance, Amherst College meets the full demonstrated need of every admitted student. 60% of current students receive scholarship aid, and the average financial aid package award amounts to $41,150; the average net price of attendance is $13,809 per year. College expenditures exceed $85,000 per student each year.

In July 2007, Amherst announced that grants would replace loans in all financial aid packages beginning in the 2008-09 academic year. Amherst had already been the first school to eliminate loans for low-income students, and with this announcement it joined Princeton University, Cornell University and Davidson College, then the only colleges to completely eliminate loans from need-based financial aid packages. Increased rates of admission of highly qualified lower income students has resulted in greater equality of opportunity at Amherst than is usual at elite American colleges.

In the 2008-2009 academic year, Amherst College also extended its need-blind admission policy to international applicants. As of the 2010-2011 academic year, Amherst remains the only liberal arts college and one of the six higher education institutions, which include Harvard, Yale, Princeton, MIT and Dartmouth College, in the United States with need-blind admission for both domestic and international applicants.