Paying for it: scholarships and 529s

The money side has two halves: what you can find and what you've saved. Here's the plain version of both - where scholarships are actually won, and how a 529 works when you have one.

What it actually costs

The figure that matters is net price: what a family pays per year after grant aid, which is aid that is never repaid. It is the number to compare across schools, and it is generally well below the published price.

Here is the spread across every college in our finder:

Source: U.S. Department of Education, College Scorecard, most-recent-cohorts institution file released 10 June 2026 (average net price for federal aid recipients), combined with institution type from IPEDS 2024. See Where our data comes from for every dataset behind this site. Medians and quartiles computed across 800 public four-year, 1,216 private nonprofit four-year, and 810 public two-year institutions.

Private colleges run about twice public in-state, though their published tuition implies closer to four times. The difference is institutional grant aid, which most private schools award to most students. The spread within each row is wider than the gap between rows, so the specific school matters more than the category.

These are medians across every school in the country, which makes them useful for scale and useless for planning. Once you have three or four schools in mind, each one's net price calculator is the only source of a number that applies to you.

Two things move that number: what a school gives you, and what you find elsewhere. The second half is available whenever you start looking.

How to find scholarships

Scholarships aren't one big lottery; they're hundreds of small, specific awards, and the ones students actually win are usually local and narrow. Where to look, roughly in order of odds:

• The colleges themselves. Merit aid from the school is the largest source by far, often applied automatically with admission. Ask each school what it offers and whether anything requires a separate application.
• Local and community sources. Your employer, your union, community foundations, churches, the Rotary and similar clubs, and the high school counseling office. Smaller applicant pools, better odds, and almost nobody else applies.
• Reputable national databases. Free search sites list national awards. Use them, but expect long odds on the big ones.

What is a 529, and when to start one

A 529 is a tax-advantaged savings account for education. You put money in after taxes, it grows tax-free, and withdrawals for qualified education expenses aren't taxed. Many states add a tax deduction or credit for contributing.

It is not too late to be worth doing. Even if college starts next fall, families in states with a tax deduction sometimes route tuition payments through a 529 to capture that state benefit, on money that only sits there a week. The compounding is gone; the tax break may not be.

The growth is the part that rewards an early start, so if you do have years, opening one early is the whole advantage. If you don't, the account still has a job.

What a 529 covers, and what it doesn't

What is covered:

• Tuition and required fees
• Required books, supplies, and equipment
• A computer, software, and internet used for school
• Room and board, if the student is enrolled at least half-time, up to the school's published cost-of-attendance allowance

What is not covered:

• Transportation and travel home
• Health insurance and most optional fees
• Greek life dues, initiation, and social fees. If your student lives in the chapter house, the room-and-board portion can still qualify.