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New England Journal of Higher Education, The, Summer 1998

Lesley College ranks 14th nationally in master's degrees granted. And the number could rise. Under a new initiative, the Cambridge, Mass., college began offering a free year of master's-level courses to students who complete Lesley undergraduate degrees with a minimum grade point average of 3.4 and begin their graduate study immediately. Lesley officials say the free study amounts to about two-thirds of the typical master's program and represents $10,200 in savings.

But watch out for generalizations about trends in pricing. Six years after Worcester Polytechnic Institute took the extraordinary step of raising tuition by not one penny, the institute has decided that its under-$19,000 tuition is too low compared with peer institutions. WPI is biting the bullet, with hikes of 9 percent in fall 1998 and nearly 7 percent in 1999 to bring tuition to $22,108