Students at New Jersey's four-year colleges and universities will have to dig a little deeper to pay their bills this fall as tuition and fees continue to climb faster than the rate of inflation on most campuses, according to a Star-Ledger survey of this year's hikes.

Undergraduates will pay between 0.2 percent and 6.1 percent more during the 2012-2013 school year, according to a review of rates at two dozen public and private colleges and universities.

Tuition and mandatory fees for in-state students at the state’s public colleges will range from $10,422 at New Jersey City University to $14,740 at New Jersey Institute of Technology in Newark. At the state’s private colleges, tuition and fees range from $25,050 at Bloomfield College to $43,196 at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken.

Once room, board and books are added to the tuition bill, most students will pay thousands more.

Though several schools said they made an effort to cut costs and hold down hikes this year, many students are frustrated their tuition bills continue to climb.

"My tuition is rising at a rate faster than the rate of increase in inflation, and national student debt has surpassed credit card debt in this country," Katherine Yabut, the student representative to the Rutgers Board of Trustees, said at a campus rally in New Brunswick last week.

Yabut and other students are mobilizing this month to encourage voters to approve a higher education bond question on November’s ballot. If voters pass the measure, the state would borrow up to $750 million for construction projects at the state’s public and private colleges. Students hope the money will help hold down future tuition and fee hikes.

View full size

At the public colleges, this year’s hikes ranged from 2 percent at William Paterson University in Wayne to 5.5 percent at NJIT. At private colleges, the increases ranged from less than 1 percent at Georgian Court University in Lakewood to 6.1 percent at Monmouth University.

Nearly all of the New Jersey schools raised their tuition and fees faster than the rate of inflation, which has been less than 2 percent since May, according to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics .

Among the other findings from the Star-Ledger survey:

• Georgian Court University, which is charging $28,040 this year, was the only school that tried to freeze tuition and fees. Undergraduate tuition is the same as last year and fees went up $56, for a total increase of 0.2 percent. School officials said they wanted to freeze tuition to help families still struggling in the lackluster economy.

• Tuition and fees at Seton Hall University rose 3.8 percent to $34,750 for undergraduates. But the Catholic university will continue a program introduced last year that allows freshmen with high SAT scores who graduated in the top 10 percent of their high school class to pay the equivalent of Rutgers tuition, a savings of nearly $22,000 a year.

• Tuition and fees at Rutgers, the state’s largest university, will surpass $13,000 for the first time this year for the average in-state undergraduate. Students will pay $13,073, or $318 more than last year. Students living on campus will pay a total of more than $24,000 once room and board are added to the bill.

The Star-Ledger tuition survey included all 24 of New Jersey’s traditional four-year colleges and universities. It did not include the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey or Thomas Edison State College in Trenton because their tuition rates vary based on a student’s major or course of study.

New Jersey’s for-profit colleges, including University of Phoenix, DeVry University and Berkeley College, were also not included in the survey because they often do not operate on traditional semester systems, making it difficult to compare costs.

At DeVry University in North Brunswick, the average undergraduate will pay about $15,188 during the school year, 2.4 percent than last year, a spokeswoman said. At Berkeley College’s four campuses in New Jersey, annual tuition and fees will go up to about $23,100 in January, a 2.7 percent increase, a spokeswoman said.

New Jersey’s colleges continue to be among the costliest in the nation. Last year, public colleges charged an average of $8,244 in tuition and fees, while nonprofit private colleges averaged $28,500, according to a survey by the College Board, the nonprofit organization that oversees the SAT exam.

College officials said tuition continues to climb because of decreases in state funding and increasing costs related to health care, faculty salaries and other areas. They also argue tuition rates are often just a sticker price at a college because the majority of students receive scholarships or other forms of financial aid to help reduce the total bill.

At Drew University in Madison, where tuition and fees are $42,620 this year, spokesman David Muha said college costs should be viewed as an investment in the future.

"A college education should certainly lead to a career, but it should instill a joy of learning, and help the student grow as a person and make a lasting contribution to society," Muha said. "When students receive the full impact of a college education, they receive full value for their investment."

Robyn Nadramia, a Georgian Court University junior, said she was excited to hear her bill would not be increasing by much.

"It was very positive," said Nadramia, 21, of Manalapan. "I was very relieved."

The accounting major has scholarships to cover about half of her tuition, room and board and her parents pay the rest. Georgian Court’s tuition freeze means they will probably make it through another year without borrowing, Nadramia said.

At Rutgers, where students spent the spring staging protests calling for a zero percent tuition hike, undergraduates said they will continue to press the university’s governing board to freeze tuition next year.

"It’s up to the students to make sure their voices are heard," said John Connelly, a history and political science major who serves as president of the Rutgers University Student Assembly.

Follow @starledger



• More Education news