We, as members of the American University community, believe that an education at our institution should be accessible to all students who meet the criteria for admission. However, AU’s tuition rate of nearly $60,000, with a substantial increase slated for the next budget cycle, makes this impossible. We cannot accept this. We do not support a policy that contributes to the country’s growing student debt crisis. The average U.S. college graduate owes $27,000 to the federal government and the banks, and the total debt has surpassed $1 trillion. At American alone, students graduate with an average of $36,000 in debt. There are not enough scholarships given to justify our high tuition rate--about half of the student body does not receive any form of financial aid, yet 60% of us graduate with debt. Many experts believe that the steadily increasing number of students saddled with unpayable loans is leading to a "student debt bubble" similar to the housing bubble that led to the subprime mortgage crisis of 2008.
In light of all this, we demand a tuition freeze.