U of A freezes tuition for all undergrad and grad students for fall 2027

“For the fourth consecutive year, we have held the line on resident undergraduate tuition and fees, and now we are extending that commitment to nonresident undergraduates and all graduate students, because a world-class education must be within reach for every Wildcat," UA President Suresh Garimella said in making the announcement Monday. “The trust students and families place in us deserves our very best effort in return,” he said. 

Annual tuition for in-state undergraduate students and in-state graduate students for fall 2027 will stay at $12,168 and $15,500, respectively, while tuition for out-of-state undergraduates and graduates will be at $42,600 and $35,800.

The fees for all undergraduates will stay at $1,738.

The full tuition proposal will be reviewed by the Arizona Board of Regents, the governing body that oversees the state’s three public universities, at its meeting in November.

The UA’s tuition announcement for fiscal year 2027-28 comes a few days after the Princeton Review recognized the university as a “Best Value” university, after evaluating its return on investment in academics, cost or affordability, financial aid, career preparation, graduation rates and student debt.

UA’s Princeton Review score is 85 out of a possible 99 in its return on investment rating, which evaluates a university’s academic rating, financial aid services and overall cost.

In a September op-ed in The Hechinger Report, Garimella said universities should “spend tuition dollars with the same discipline families use when deciding whether they can afford college in the first place.” He said a university education should deliver far more than a diploma, and prepare graduates for meaningful careers with “judgment, resilience, adaptability and perspective to thrive in a rapidly changing world.”

UA Provost and Chief Academic Officer Patricia Prelock said freezing tuition and fees is part of the university’s overall efforts to enroll students who are “prepared for the rigor of a U of A education.”

“We are keeping tuition and fees flat as part of our commitment to make college affordable and accessible,” Prelock said in a written statement Monday. “We are equally focused on supporting student success from enrollment through graduation and ensuring our students can succeed and build strong careers with as little debt as possible.”

In The Hechinger Report, Garimella said “elite private institutions dominate the national conversation about higher education while educating only a tiny fraction of American’s students.” He said those are extraordinary institutions which deserve credit for their achievements, but they’re not places where most Americans can afford a college degree.

“That responsibility and privilege belong to flagship public universities,” Garimella wrote. “We educate millions of students from every background and create opportunities at a scale no other sector can match. Our defining strength is not exclusivity. It is excellence at scale delivered at a price families can afford.”

In an interview with the Chronicle of Higher Education in the spring, Garimella and Prelock discussed their intentional strategy to bring in fewer students and be more selective about which students they accept into the U of A. Garimella said then that the U of A has in the past received a large number of applications that “perhaps were unserious,” and the university would give those applicants generous amounts of financial aid to come here.

He said when students didn't have the scores to get in elsewhere, they’d come to Arizona universities and struggle to graduate and sometimes fail to do so.

“Maybe we shouldn’t have brought them here in the first place,” Garimella told the Chronicle of Higher Education in that interview. “I want to be careful how I say it, because some of the students are here. I don’t want to say they shouldn’t be here, but I think our new approach is much more ethically responsible in terms of bringing in the right students.”

In his September opinion piece in The Hechinger Report, Garimella said that every fall, millions of American parents and caregivers make “extraordinary sacrifices” to send their children to college, and that they “work overtime, postpone retirement, take on debt or set aside other priorities because they believe higher education can create opportunities they never had.”

He also acknowledged the sacrifices students have to make to make ends meet while pursuing a college degree, saying many of them “work nights and weekends, juggle family responsibilities or borrow against their future because they believe a college degree is worth it.”

“Those sacrifices deserve accountability. And it’s time for colleges to provide it,” Garimella wrote.