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A bipartisan House bill would add farm and ranch work to the list of jobs eligible for Public Service Loan Forgiveness. H.R. 9974, the Young Farmer Success Act, was introduced by Rep. Glenn Thompson (R-PA) alongside Reps. Joe Courtney (D-CT), Monica De La Cruz (R-TX), and Nikki Budzinski (D-IL), and referred to the House Committee on Education and Workforce.

The text of the bill amends Section 455(m)(3)(B) of the Higher Education Act to treat full-time work as an “employee or manager of a qualified farm or ranch” as a public service job. A qualified operation is one with at least $35,000 in gross revenue from agricultural product sales in 2026, indexed to inflation in later years. Borrowers would still need 120 qualifying payments, the same rule that applies to every other job category on the PSLF list.

Why It Matters

PSLF eligibility depends on who the employer is, not what you went to school for. Government agencies and 501(c)(3) nonprofits qualify. However, farm and ranch work does not.

The bill’s sponsors have framed the potential for student loan forgiveness as a recruiting tool, though the bill carries no cost estimate and no projection of how many of the borrowers chasing forgiveness would become newly eligible.

The demographic case behind that idea is real. The average age of a U.S. farm producer reached 58.1 in 2022, according to the USDA Census of Agriculture, and the country lost 142,000 farms over the prior five years. Encouraging more young adults to go into farming and ranching could be important for domestic farm production.

The Details

• To qualify, a person must be an “Employee or manager”. Self-employed borrowers and independent contractors have never qualified for PSLF, and the bill does not say whether an owner-operator running their own farm counts as a manager. This is a gap the Education Department would have to resolve in rulemaking.
• The $35,000 revenue floor screens out the smallest operations. Roughly 74% of U.S. farms sold under $50,000 in 2022 and together generated 2% of national farm sales, per the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition’s census analysis.
• Payment mechanics stay untouched. Qualifying payments would still have to come from an income-driven plan such as the new Repayment Assistance Plan or IBR.
• Prior versions stalled. The 2023 edition, H.R. 2728, drew 19 cosponsors and never received a committee vote.

How This Connects

PSLF has existed since 2007, and roughly 120,000 borrowers are becoming eligible to have their loans forgiven each year. Even with all the student loan changes that happened in the OBBBA, but the rules for PSLF haven’t changed.

The Education Department’s employer eligibility rule is attempting to narrow which organizations count, but two federal court cases are challenging it. Expanding the definition of public service in statute would run against what the administration appears to be doing, which is likely part of the reason why this bill has never moved out of committee.

What’s Next

The bill needs to make it out of committee. The cosponsor count is the near-term signal, but it’s still well short of what it needs to be considered.

The other path is attachment to a larger vehicle, either a farm bill or a Higher Education Act reauthorization. Borrowers already working toward forgiveness should keep certifying employment on the current rules rather than counting on a change.

The post New House Bill Would Make Farm And Ranch Workers Eligible For PSLF appeared first on The College Investor.

Several of the most selective colleges have adopted generous financial aid policies that provide free tuition to low- and moderate-income students. Depending on the college, the income threshold for free tuition ranges from $100,000 to $250,000.

MIT was the first to offer free tuition for families with income under $200,000 starting with the 2025-2026 academic year. Harvard matched the offer within months. Since then, other colleges have announced similar policies for the 2026-2027 academic year, including Rice at $200,000 and the University of Chicago at $250,000.

Here’s a ranked list of the top offers, why colleges are doing this, and how the gaps between these policies create a new angle for financial aid appeals. If you’re still early in the process, start with how the college admissions process and financial aid fit together.

List Of Free-Tuition Colleges For 2026-2027

This table shows the 2026-2027 free-tuition income threshold for the 33 colleges that have an income threshold of $100,000 or more. Public colleges are on the list, but most of them limit the offer to in-state residents, so out-of-state students pay full price. If you want the broader list of schools that charge no tuition at all, see our roundup of tuition-free colleges.

Cornell is the only Ivy League school without a free-tuition policy, although it does meet full demonstrated financial need.

One caveat: these policies assume typical assets. A low-income student with a $1 million trust fund (a so-called “Pellionaire”) might not qualify, even if family income is under the threshold. The income figure is the headline, but the financial aid formula still looks at the whole picture, including 529 plans and other assets reported on the FAFSA.

Avoiding The Endowment Tax

Congress raised the tax on college endowments in 2025. It’s an excise tax of up to 8% on annual net investment income.
These colleges are continuing to offer generous financial aid due to competitive pressures, even as the new college endowment tax exceeds their annual financial aid budget.

But there’s a loophole. Private nonprofit colleges are exempt from the endowment tax if they have fewer than 3,000 tuition-paying students. Public colleges are exempt entirely. That gives a small, wealthy college a direct financial reason to make more of its students tuition-free.

Princeton is the clearest example. Princeton was able to avoid the endowment tax by reducing the number of tuition-paying students below 3,000 through increased generosity in its financial aid program. Other colleges are unable to do this because they enroll more students, especially graduate students. That’s a different pressure than the one driving MIT’s decision to admit fewer graduate students, but it points in the same direction.

Other colleges that are close to the 3,000 tuition-paying student threshold include Bryn Mawr, Caltech, Davidson, Grinnell, Smith, Swarthmore, and Wellesley. It is unclear, however, whether avoiding the endowment tax was part of their motivation for offering a free-tuition policy and whether they were able to reduce the number of tuition-paying students below the 3,000 threshold. 

But the incentive is there, and it’s one more reason college pricing works like a black box.

Other Reasons Colleges Are Going Tuition-Free

The endowment tax isn’t the whole story. Other motivations for free-tuition policies include:

• Answering the affordability critics. Countering the college affordability criticism associated with the high-cost/high-aid model. A sticker price near $100,000 is hard to defend, even when few families pay it and colleges discount tuition 56% on average.
• Maintaining diversity after the 2023 affirmative action ruling. After the 2023 U.S. Supreme Court ruling banned affirmative action, colleges are using financial aid policies based on income to maintain campus diversity.
• Extending no-loan policies. Many of these colleges already had no-loans financial aid policies, so the next step is to provide more generous grants. 
• Rethinking student employment. A recognition that student employment as a source of financial aid establishes a caste system on campus, where low-income students serve food for high-income students in the cafeteria. 
• Dropping minimum student contributions. Some of these colleges had policies where even low-income students were expected to contribute a few thousand dollars toward college costs each year, corresponding to income during the academic year and summer break. 
• Winning back middle-income families who feel too wealthy for aid but too poor to pay full price, especially now that Parent PLUS loans are capped.
• Responding to public pressure to use endowments to provide sticker-price relief. 
• Fixing “admit-deny.” Need-blind admissions creates an admit-deny situation where the low-income students are admitted but cannot afford to attend. 

A New Basis For Financial Aid Appeals

The gaps between the income thresholds at these colleges are creating a new basis for financial aid appeals.

The tuition at many of these colleges is in the $60,000 to $70,000 range. So qualifying for free tuition can yield a very big reduction in the college net price calculation.

But, if family income is above the income threshold at one college and below the income threshold at another, missing out on the free-tuition generosity can yield a huge difference in financial aid. That’s one more reason to run the numbers on whether a given college is worth the investment before committing.

Even though the colleges try to avoid a cliff effect by using a sliding scale for financial aid above their income thresholds, the difference in net price can still be in the tens of thousands of dollars. Choosing one college over a more generous college might increase the four-year cost by over $100,000. That’s more than most low and middle-income families are willing to pay. 

The $100,000 Colleges

The Washington Post reported that 15 colleges have a total cost of attendance of $100,000 or more for 2026-2027. The full list: Barnard, Colgate, Claremont McKenna, Duke, Fordham, Georgetown, Harvey Mudd, Haverford, NYU, Smith, the University of Chicago, USC, Vassar, Washington University in St. Louis, and Wesleyan. Our own list of the most expensive colleges tracks the same trend.

Three of the 15 also appear on the free-tuition list above: the University of Chicago ($250,000), Smith College ($150,000), and Duke ($150,000, but only for North and South Carolina residents).

For everyone else at a $100,000 school, the average cost of college is a very different number than the price on the website, and the only way to know what you’ll pay is to run the net price calculator and, if the answer isn’t good enough, appeal. And if the appeal falls short, grants and scholarships are still the next place to look before borrowing.

The post Why Elite Colleges Are Racing To Offer Free Tuition appeared first on The College Investor.

The University of Vermont announced on September 9 a Regional Tuition Break that drops annual tuition to $30,240 for incoming undergraduates who are permanent residents of Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, or Rhode Island. UVM values the cut at more than $18,000 a year, or better than 35% off what non-residents normally pay at the school.

The new rate starts with the fall 2027 entering class and applies to first-time first-year students and transfers. It covers 31 majors (close to a third of UVM’s undergraduate catalog) spread across the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, the College of Education and Social Services, and the Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources.

Students must declare a primary major inside one of those three colleges and stay in it to hold the discounted rate, a condition that makes this less portable than the reciprocity agreements many families may be exploring.

Why It Matters

UVM is doing this through the New England Board of Higher Education, which already runs a regional Tuition Break across 66 public campuses and roughly 3,000 approved programs. Most participating schools only extend it to degrees a student’s home state does not offer, and the average benefit came to about $8,500 for 2024-25.

UVM is more than doubling that figure and dropping the home-state test for three entire colleges, which is a better proposition than the one out-of-state applicants usually face.

The math also arrives at a moment when families have less borrowing room to cover a gap. UVM’s published out-of-state tuition is $46,655 for 2026-27, with a full sticker cost of attendance of $68,878 once the $3,058 student fee, $14,654 in room and board, and indirect costs are added.

Federal parent borrowing is now capped at $20,000 a year and $65,000 per child after the July 1, 2026 loan changes, so a $68,878 price tag can no longer be covered with Parent PLUS. Cutting $16,000 or more off tuition brings UVM closer to what families may be able to afford after other aid.

The Details

• Who qualifies: permanent residents of Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island. Vermonters are not part of this program as they already pay the in-state tuition rate of $16,938.
• The price: $30,240 in tuition, which pencils out to about 179% of UVM’s in-state rate and sits right at the ceiling NEBHE typically allows.
• The reality check: measured against the current $46,655 out-of-state rate, the reduction is closer to $16,400. UVM’s “$18,000” framing implies it is benchmarking against a higher projected 2027-28 tuition figure that has not been published yet.
• Not discounted: fees, housing, and dining. All-in cost still lands somewhere near $52,000 a year before aid.
• Existing students: current NEBHE Tuition Break recipients at UVM keep their benefit as long as they remain eligible.

The Four-Year Math Still Doesn’t Shake Out Well

A discounted $30,240 is a better number than $46,655, but it is still a lot of money. UVM raised in-state tuition 2% and out-of-state tuition 4.5% for the current year, and the regional rate is pegged to the in-state figure, so the discounted price climbs with every increase a student sits through.

If annual hikes continue to be 2%, four years of tuition alone runs about $124,600. At 4% it’s roughly $128,400. Add the student fee, housing, and dining, and the four-year all-in number lands north of $217,000. That’s a huge red flag for us here at The College Investor. Remember, you don’t get paid more in the workplace because you spent an outrageous amount on college.

Our own college ROI estimates puts the net present financial value of a bachelor’s degree in the range of $40,000 to $80,000 depending on major and gender. That’s very close to what four years of UVM tuition costs in-state (without room and board), but falls apart for out-of-state students. Remember, room and board is typically what is destroying the value proposition of a bachelor’s degree.

How This Connects

Targeted regional discounting is what tuition strategy looks like when the applicant pool stops growing. Private colleges now discount 56% of gross tuition revenue on average, and publics in shrinking regions are running the same play under a different name.

New England faces among the steepest projected declines in high school graduates nationally, and campuses that miss their numbers pay for it — nine colleges are closing in 2026 alone. UVM enrolled 269 Maine students last spring, according to the Sun Journal, and the majors on this list are where it has open seats right now.

What’s Next

Watch for UVM to publish the full list of 31 qualifying majors and the fall 2027 application deadlines, since eligibility hinges on the declared major rather than the admission decision.

The second signal is whether other New England flagships answer with flexible-policy expansions of their own, since roughly half of NEBHE participants already use one and matching UVM is the cheapest response available to them.

Families weighing an offer should compare the discounted rate against what they would actually pay after aid at home. And always, please remember that cost is NOT worth it at every price point – especially if you’re borrowing student loans.

The post UVM Cuts Tuition By $18,000 For Students From Five New England States appeared first on The College Investor.

The University of Notre Dame will require SAT or ACT scores from undergraduate applicants beginning with the 2027-28 admissions cycle, the university announced on September 9. The requirement covers first-year and transfer applicants seeking to enroll in Fall 2028, which puts today’s high school juniors in the first affected class. Students applying this fall for Fall 2027 enrollment stay under the current test-optional rules.

Micki Kidder, Notre Dame’s vice president for undergraduate enrollment, described a score as one input rather than a gate: “A test score, evaluated in full context of an applicant’s circumstances, is an additional measure to aid us in that process.”

Applicants who face financial hardship, a lack of testing access, or a natural disaster can request a waiver without penalty. With the change, Notre Dame joins a growing number of selective schools that have already reversed course.

Why It Matters

Notre Dame’s stated reasoning is different than other schools ending test optional policies. The school argued that a required score helps surface prepared applicants from high schools it doesn’t know well: first-generation students, Pell-eligible applicants, and students from rural districts among them.

Volume is another factor. Colleges took in a record 10.8 million applications last cycle with a declining number of students actually seeking admission, which leaves admissions offices with more applications per seat and less time on each one.

A four-digit number is a cheap signal that can help schools weed through the stacks of applications.

The Evidence Schools Keep Citing

Brown produced the most-quoted version of the case. Provost Francis J. Doyle III, who co-chaired the university’s ad hoc committee on admissions policies, said that “SAT and ACT scores are among the key indicators that help predict a student’s ability to succeed and thrive in Brown’s demanding academic environment.”

The committee’s own summary was blunter, finding that academic outcomes: “whether measured by the fraction of grades that are high or by the fraction of students who struggle academically — are strongly correlated with test scores.” That relationship held across every demographic subgroup it studied, which is the finding driving the end of test-optional policies at peer institutions.

Other schools have run the same math and ended in the same place. Dartmouth’s faculty analysis found SAT scores explained about 22% of the variation in first-year GPA, against roughly 9% for high school GPA alone. Cornell reported that score submitters made up 24% of its applicant pool but half of its admitted students. At UT-Austin, submitters posted first-fall GPAs 0.86 grade points higher than classmates who applied without a score. That was a gap large enough that the flagship restored its requirement ahead of most of its peers.

The Reversal Is Accelerating

Holdouts are getting rarer, and every Ivy League school now requires scores:

• Dartmouth moved first in February 2024, with Brown following a month later and Harvard in April.
• Columbia’s June 2026 announcement completed the Ivy sweep, effective for Fall 2028 enrollment.
• Yale tightened its policy in May 2026, dropping the AP and IB substitutions it had allowed and narrowing the requirement to the SAT or ACT for the class of 2031.
• Princeton picked the 2027-28 cycle, the same one Notre Dame just chose.
• Public flagships including Ohio State, Auburn and Alabama have set requirements landing between 2026 and 2028.
• Vanderbilt, Claremont McKenna and Carnegie Mellon keep the private-college list growing.

How This Connects

For families applying to a selective college, taking a test should be part of the process. About 95% of colleges still don’t require scores, yet most applicants submitted them anyway last cycle for the first time since 2019, which suggests “optional” had already come to mean “expected” at competitive schools.

Notre Dame’s requirement first impacts in the 2027-28 cycle, so the earliest read on its effect comes with Fall 2028 applications. Thse students will need to take a test this year, apply next fall, and see how enrollment shakes out in fall 2028.

The bigger open question sits in California, where faculty have pushed to restore the SAT at the largest system that went test-free. Watch too whether alternatives such as the Classic Learning Test gain ground as more schools demand a number.

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