Overview

As postsecondary education remains critical to long-term economic security, financial barriers continue to disproportionately impact the most vulnerable populations. To address this, we are committed to reducing financial obstacles to college enrollment and completion while enhancing public awareness of available resources to help students and families navigate the cost of higher education.

To quantify the state’s progress towards more affordable postsecondary education, we look at the following key performance indicators:

• Average Unmet Financial Need – The cost of attendance minus the sum of expected family contribution and all federal, state, and local government and institutionally funded scholarships or grants received by students in an academic year.
• Time to Degree – Total number of academic years enrolled prior to degree completion.
• FAFSA Completion – Percent of recent high school graduates who matriculated to a Kentucky public postsecondary institution and completed a FAFSA application.

Explore Our Interactive Dashboards

Affordability and Financial Aid Portal

Explore the affordability, cost, and available financial aid options to make informed decisions about funding your post-secondary education, and more. View dashboard.

CPE's Work on This Priority

CPE is working to increase college access and affordability for all Kentuckians. Key strategies include limiting tuition and fee increases; recommending operational efficiencies; educating students and families about college savings programs, grants, scholarships and responsible borrowing; and advocating for additional state funding.

Tuition and Fee Ceilings

CPE staff worked with Kentucky’s public universities and KCTCS to determine new tuition and fee ceilings for 2025-26 and 2026-27. Due to historic inflation levels, as well as other factors increasing the resource needs of public institutions, CPE proposed a common-dollar increase approach (as opposed to an across-the-board percentage increase used in prior years) to address growing disparities in tuition and fee rates across institutions within each sector. The final tuition and fee ceilings allow for a $675 increase at the two public research institutions, a $630 increase at comprehensive institutions and a $9.00 per credit hour increase for KCTCS in total over a two-year cycle. The new rates reflect CPE’s continued commitment to balancing affordability for students and their families with the resource needs of institutions.

Learn more about our tuition setting process

Monitoring Student Debt Levels

CPE’s Data and Advanced Analytics Unit (DAA) released the second iteration of the Student Debt Report examining trends affecting undergraduate students attending a KCTCS college or Kentucky public university. The report finds that the proportion of students graduating with loan debt fell nearly 14 percentage points over the last five years, from 54.8% in 2018-19 to 40.9% in 2023-24. The decline was even more pronounced over the decade, falling 24 percentage points. Additionally, among completers who graduated with debt, average loan balances fell from $29,072 to $26,115, a decline of $2,957 or 10.2% since 2018-19.

Financial monitoring

Staff continued to fine-tune a process for assessing the financial health of institutions. The analysis evaluates fiscal stability and sustainability, as well as gauging institutional susceptibility to market risk factors. Staff identified methods, metrics and data sources for assessing institutional viability in their respective markets and determined whether institutions are making efficient and effective use of state resources. CPE has worked with several institutions on a voluntary basis and is looking to expand this work as staff capacity allows.

FAFSA public awareness campaign

In light of substantial changes to the 2024-25 FAFSA form, GEAR UP Kentucky and KHEAA conducted a public awareness campaign to prepare students for the new application process. The promotion included statewide TV and radio commercials via the Kentucky Broadcasters’ Association Public Education Partnership program, a social media campaign, an online resource hub for students and a series of FAFSA office hours over the summer to offer hands-on assistance at more than 70 locations across the state.

Affordable Learning KY (ALKY)

This Kentucky Virtual Library (KYVL) initiative facilitates efforts to expand the availability and use of low- or no-cost, high-quality educational resources in Kentucky. In March, the Affordable Learning Open Education Week symposium assembled over 50 state and national educators to discuss topics such as Open Educational Resource (OER) publishing platforms, adoption and adaptation of existing OER and how to find the best free resources for student learning. In the spring of 2025, ALKY surveyed Kentucky students about the effect of textbook costs on their lives and academic achievement. This second annual survey was completed by more than 1,700 undergraduate and graduate students from 18 in-state postsecondary institutions.

Learn more about ALKY

Futuriti

CPE, working with KDE and KYSTATS, launched the Futuriti website to help prospective students and/or career seekers find information and resources about higher education and workforce opportunities in Kentucky. The site includes information to assist students in paying for college as well as average costs and undergraduate loan amounts for each Kentucky postsecondary institution. Financial information available on the Kentucky Students’ Right to Know website has migrated to Futuriti for greater transparency and ease. From February to May 2025, Futuriti has received more than 18,000 individual visitors.

View the Futuriti website