Overall Rating Gold
Overall Score 71.04
Liaison Natalie Hayes
Submission Date Oct. 19, 2023

STARS v2.2

Bentley University
PA-8: Affordability and Access

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 3.15 / 4.00 Natalie Hayes
Associate Director of Sustainability
Office of Sustainability
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Provide at least one of the following figures:

Percentage of need met, on average, for students who were awarded any need-based aid :
87

Percentage of students graduating without student loan debt:
49

Percentage of entering students that are low-income:
14

Graduation/success rate for low-income students:
87

Optional Fields

A brief description of notable policies or programs to make the institution accessible and affordable to low-income students:
First Generation Presidential Fellows is a program that offers a financial aid component that covers the full cost of attendance for all four years for approximately 15 entering students each year.

BentleyFirst offers Massachusetts first generation students whose families have a combined income of $125K or under a special award that equals the difference between Bentley tuition and the tuition at UMass Amherst (our state flagship public institution). Students may qualify for additional aid based on financial need.

A brief description of notable policies or programs to support non-traditional students:
We don’t have any notable policies regarding non-traditional students. However, students who are independent by federal guidelines can appeal for an exception to including parental data in the financial need analysis if the student can demonstrate financial self-sufficiency.

Estimated percentage of students that participate in or directly benefit from the institution’s policies and programs to support low-income and non-traditional students:
6

Website URL where information about the institution’s accessibility and affordability initiatives is available:
Additional documentation to support the submission:
---

Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
Right now the estimated percentage of students that participate in or directly benefit from the institution’s policies and programs to support low-income and non-traditional students is about 6%. This includes roughly four classes of FPFs totaling 60 and 180 students receiving BentleyFirst. The based is estimated at 4300 undergraduates. We are only in our second year of BentleyFirst, so in two more years we’ll have roughly 360 receiving BentleyFirst or closer to 10%.

The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.