--- title: President Barack Obama Looks to Shrink College Tuition Bills description: President Barack Obama announced a wide-ranging plan to bring down the cost of a college education Thursday, including rating colleges on the bang they provide... canonical: https://time.com/archive/7181580/obama-looks-to-shrink-college-tuition-bills/ author: TIME Staff article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2013-08-22T15:33:36.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-03-18T06:46:12.801Z article:section: Politics og:title: President Barack Obama Looks to Shrink College Tuition Bills og:description: President Barack Obama announced a wide-ranging plan to bring down the cost of a college education Thursday, including rating colleges on the bang they provide... og:url: https://time.com/archive/7181580/obama-looks-to-shrink-college-tuition-bills/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt37b24033d6df28b7/698a9d5116d88452f1c45d7f/was7835097.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: US-POLITICS-OBAMA-EDUCATION og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: President Barack Obama Looks to Shrink College Tuition Bills twitter:description: President Barack Obama announced a wide-ranging plan to bring down the cost of a college education Thursday, including rating colleges on the bang they provide... twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt37b24033d6df28b7/698a9d5116d88452f1c45d7f/was7835097.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [Politics](/section/politics/) # Obama Looks to Shrink College Tuition Bills by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) Aug 22, 2013 3:33 PM UTC  US President Barack Obama speaks on education at University of Buffalo, the State University of New York, on August 22, 2013 in Buffalo, New York. Obama is on a two-day bus tour through New York and Pennsylvania to discuss his plan to make college more affordable, tackle rising costs, and improve value for students and their families. AFP Photo/Jewel SamadJEWEL SAMAD/AFP/Getty Images US President Barack Obama speaks on education at University of Buffalo, the State University of New York, on August 22, 2013 in Buffalo, New York. Obama is on a two-day bus tour through New York and Pennsylvania to discuss his plan to make college more affordable, tackle rising costs, and improve value for students and their families. AFP Photo/Jewel SamadJEWEL SAMAD/AFP/Getty ImagesAFP/Getty Images by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) Aug 22, 2013 3:33 PM UTC President [Barack Obama](http://topics.time.com/barack-obama/) announced a wide-ranging plan to bring down the cost of a college education Thursday, including rating colleges on the bang they provide for students’ bucks and tying financial aid rewards to those ratings. Seeking to “fundamentally rethink and reshape the higher education system,” as White House spokesman Josh Earnest said, Obama embarked on a two-day bus tour Thursday to [schools](http://topics.time.com/schools/) across upstate New York and Pennsylvania. While Washington spent much of the summer focused on student loans, Obama is attacking the root of the problem — the skyrocketing price tag for college tuition. Average tuition at public, four-year colleges has more than tripled over the last 30 years, the White House said. The average student today will graduate with more than $26,000 in debt. “Just tinkering around the edges won’t be enough,” Obama said in an email to supporters this week, with college students across the country returning to campus. “We’ve got to shake up the current system.” “We’ve got a crisis in term of college affordability and student debt,” he added Thursday at the University at Buffalo. The roll-out comes in the midst of a weeks-long economic push by the president focused on improving the stability of the middle class. Obama is mounting a public relations effort that builds on his 2012 campaign themes in advance of a fiscal showdown with congressional Republicans this fall over the budget and the debt limit. The White House is seeking to drive up the president’s [underwater](http://realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/president%5Fobama%5Fjob%5Fapproval-1044.html) poll numbers before that confrontation. Obama directed the Department of Education to devise and publish ratings based on criteria like the percentage of students eligible for Pell grants, the overall affordability of schools, and how well schools prepare students for post-graduate study and careers. The ratings will be released by 2015. Obama will also ask [Congress](http://topics.time.com/congress/) to tie those ratings to federal student aid by 2018, awarding larger Pell grants and more affordable loans to students attending high-performing schools. Schools that don’t measure up would presumably be at a competitive disadvantage in recruiting new students. “They’re not going to be popular with everyone — especially those who profit from the status quo,” said Cecilia Munoz, the Director of the White House Domestic Policy Council. But Munoz said the new initiatives will put the interests of students first. Additionally, Obama is asking Congress to cap payments on all federal student loans at 10 percent of monthly income, a benefit only available to some borrowers now. The president is also calling on colleges and universities to leverage the power of the Internet to reduce costs. Obama is highlighting the growth of Massive Open Online Courses, or MOOCs, as a model for what colleges and universities can provide. The full fact sheet is below: --- > “” --- ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/archive/7181580/obama-looks-to-shrink-college-tuition-bills/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/archive/7181580/obama-looks-to-shrink-college-tuition-bills/"},"headline":"Obama Looks to Shrink College Tuition Bills","datePublished":"2013-08-22T15:33:36.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-18T06:46:12.801Z","description":"President Barack Obama announced a wide-ranging plan to bring down the cost of a college education Thursday, including rating colleges on the bang they provide...","url":"https://time.com/archive/7181580/obama-looks-to-shrink-college-tuition-bills/","keywords":["tuition"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt37b24033d6df28b7/698a9d5116d88452f1c45d7f/was7835097.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt37b24033d6df28b7/698a9d5116d88452f1c45d7f/was7835097.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"US-POLITICS-OBAMA-EDUCATION","caption":"US-POLITICS-OBAMA-EDUCATION","creditText":"AFP/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/archive/7181580/obama-looks-to-shrink-college-tuition-bills/","name":"Obama Looks to Shrink College Tuition Bills"}}]}] ```