by our College Data Analytics TeamMany students will not be asked to pay the full, advertised sticker price of a school. Instead, they will be given a financial aid offer that will include a combination of scholarships, grants, loans, and work-study. The sum total of attendance at Columbia College Chicago can sound tremendous, but do not forget that almost all students get some type of financial help.
Just what financial aid solutions can Columbia deliver, and just what are you going to be eligible for? Keep reading for answers. Read on to discover how much school funding could be available to you.
The amount of financial aid you can receive varies from person to person and will depend on your family’s economic situation. Continue reading to find information to help you understand just how much assistance you can expect to receive from Columbia College Chicago.
Financial aid, in the form of loans, grants, work-study, and scholarships, is one way colleges reduce the cost of attendance so most students can actually afford to attend. Some kinds of aid are clearly preferable to others, and outcomes differ across students.
For freshmen starting at Columbia College Chicago, 100% of first-time, full-time freshmen received some form of financial aid some 1571 new students).
| Type of Aid | % of Freshmen Receiving | Average Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Grant or scholarship aid (all sources) | 100% | $22,780 |
| Institutional grants & scholarships | 100% | $16,131 |
| Federal Pell grants | 54% | $5,990 |
| State/local grants | 42% | $7,780 |
| Federal student loans | 52% | $5,424 |
Grants and scholarships are the most valuable form of aid because, unlike loans, they never have to be repaid. At Columbia, approximately 95% of the undergraduate population received grant aid that averaged $20,550 (across approximately 6032 undergraduates).
| Award | % of Undergrads Receiving | Average Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Grant or scholarship aid (all sources) | 95% | $20,550 |
| Federal Pell grants | 46% | $5,836 |
| Federal student loans | 56% | $6,617 |
For on-campus title-IV students, average grant aid came to $25,291.
Need-based aid means lower-income families typically pay far less than the sticker price suggests.
| Family Income | Average Net Price |
|---|---|
| $0 – $48,000 | $21,981 |
| $30,001 – $75,000 | $24,523 |
| Over $75,000 | $35,198 |
Remember these are net prices — what families pay after gift aid, not before.
The net price represents the average annual cost a title-IV-receiving student pays after grant aid is subtracted from the full cost of attendance.
| Cohort | Average Net Price |
|---|---|
| On-campus title-IV students | $26,598 |
| Off-campus title-IV students | $26,788 |
For a personalized estimate based on your family’s financial situation, use Columbia’s official net price calculator: colum.studentaidcalculator.com/survey.aspx.
A typical borrower at Columbia leaves with $16,500 in federal student debt.
| Metric | Amount |
|---|---|
| Median federal debt (all student-aid borrowers) | $16,500 |
| Median federal debt (graduates only) | $25,000 |
| Typical 10-year monthly payment (graduates) | $265.04/mo |
The 10-year payment estimate assumes a standard federal repayment plan and the median graduate debt amount.
A single median figure conceals how much debt outcomes differ student to student. The percentiles below describe the cumulative federal debt distribution for borrowers at Columbia.
| Percentile | Cumulative Federal Debt |
|---|---|
| 10th percentile (lowest-debt students) | $5,500 |
| 25th percentile | $9,500 |
| 75th percentile | $27,500 |
| 90th percentile (highest-debt students) | $37,215 |
Median debt varies by family income, by first-generation status, and by dependency status.
Debt by Income Tier
| Income tier | Median federal debt |
|---|---|
| Low income | $18,000 |
| Middle income | $15,548 |
| High income | $15,750 |
First-Generation Comparison
| Cohort | Median federal debt |
|---|---|
| First-generation students | $15,750 |
| Continuing-generation students | $17,750 |
By Dependency Status
| Cohort | Median federal debt |
|---|---|
| Dependent students | $15,250 |
| Independent students | $24,022 |
The figure below distills the debt data into a single burden category for Columbia.
Stafford loans are the federal government’s primary direct undergraduate lending program. These figures summarize annual Stafford program activity at Columbia:
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Stafford loan recipients | 45841 |
| Total Stafford loan amount | $977,881,721 |
GI Bill and DoD Tuition Assistance are the two federal aid programs targeted at military-affiliated students.
GI Bill volume
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| GI Bill recipients | 74 |
| Total GI Bill amount | $1,221,152 |
| Average GI Bill amount per recipient | $16,502 |
References
More about our data sources and methodologies.