Since 1997 the nine-campus University of California system has reduced tuition and fees for in-state students to $3,609 from $3,700.

In an aggressive effort to remedy ills common to many of the nation's small liberal arts colleges, Bennington College is reducing tuition, trimming its staff and eliminating tenure.

Sussex County Community College will reduce tuition from $70 per credit last year to $65 this coming year.

In December 2012, Scott announced a plan to encourage students to pursue majors in engineering and science by reducing tuition for some majors.

To some students, the issue should be money today, to stabilize or even to reduce tuition, not long-range changes handed down from the president's suite of offices in Old Queens.

To attract the best and the brightest, he instituted a merit-based scholarship, reducing tuition by one-third to students in the top 10 percent of their high school class.

This reduces tuition by about 25%.

"We hope that he and the Legislature will also invest in flesh and blood, by reducing tuition and increasing financial aid."

Scholarships can reduce tuition by as much as $240, Ms. Atwater said.

That money would be used, he says, to reduce in-state tuition at Ohio's public universities, which is about 50 percent higher than at public universities in neighboring states.