Forbes 2026 College Financial Grades: How We Calculate The GPA’s |
Forbes College Financial Grades are designed to assess a private not-for-profit college’s operational soundness and balance sheet health using the following ten measures. Our data is derived from the Department of Education’s National Center For Educational Statistics as well as higher education analytics and consulting firm Perspective Data Science. Only schools with more than 500 full-time students were included and public colleges were not graded. Some colleges fail to provide the government with the financial variables we use for analysis.
Endowment Assets Per FTE (15%): This measures schools’ endowment assets at year end per full-time equivalent student and is perhaps the most important determinant in a college’s long term financial health. Institutions with giant endowments can hire the best professors, embark on the most ambitious research projects and tend to have the most impressive facilities.
Princeton and Yale, both A graded schools, have by far the highest endowments per student of $3.7 million and $2.3 million respectively. Larger Ivy League schools like University of Pennsylvania and Cornell, also A graded, have endowments per student of
$808,000 and $345,000 respectively. American University (A-) in Washington, DC and Lewis & Clark College in Oregon (B ) have endowments per student of under $100,000. Private colleges generally need more than $150,000 per student to receive full credit in this category.
Three Year Average UNAEP to Expenses (15%) - A college’s Unrestricted Net Assets Exclusive of Plant reveals an institution’s financial flexibility and zeroes in on what an institution truly has available in resources to cover its annual expenses. (see story) If a college has perennial operating deficits and negative UNAEP, it is almost always a sign that they are plundering so-called restricted funds, or endowments, to remain open. The measure often provides an early warning for colleges in financial distress. Our ratio, provided by analytics firm Perspective Data Science, looks at a three year average of UNAEP to annual expenses. No credit is........