Before We're Up to Our Necks in Aggregators, Let's Get out Our Net "Value" Calculators

No sooner has the Net Price Calculator (NPC) wave crashed ashore, the next wave of college-choice transparency in the form of third-party data aggregators is threatening to engulf American colleges and universities. Since last October, NPCs have become a fact of life for American colleges and universities. Some are doing the bare minimum to comply with the federal mandate by adopting the generic, federal NPC template. Others have developed more robust, custom-designed NPC's that are more accurate in the information they present, better explain the school's financial aid policies and even serve as marketing portals with links to messages about the school's positive features and overall value, thereby framing "net price" in a larger context. In a world where aggregators will be "scraping" NPC information from every college, a Net "Value" Calculator can help recapture the high ground. In this article, the author discusses what leaders of any one college should do to make sure that these third parties don't preempt their best prospects.