Higher education report card

College is all about the grades, not just for students, but the colleges themselves.

"Well I like the A's and B's, I'm not too happy with C's and that F of course," said UW-Oshkosh's Chancellor Richard Wells.

The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education just came out with their report card for the states, and when it comes to affordability, Wisconsin gets a failing grade.

"It's not terrible, but it's more than I can afford and I have to pay for it," said sophomore Ben Brunner.

"What's happened here in the last 10 years or so is tuition has gone up significantly while the financial aid has not kept pace," said Wells. "It's not so much that it's an F or a D or a C, the fact is it's a challenge for us and we need to figure out how to make higher education more affordable."

At least locally in the short term UW-Oshkosh is doing something about it. In response to the economic downturn, the university created a student financial emergency response team to help students make education more affordable in these tough times.

"Students may have a bill they haven't been able to pay, they have money set aside, but because of the financial crisis they've had to use that money for something else, now they're short on tuition," said Beatriz Contreras, the university's director of financial aid.

The team helps make payment arrangements for students and help them find other funding sources.

"We've been able to help about 50 students so far," said Contreras.

The report card isn't all doom and gloom however; higher education in the state received an A- for completion rates.

"We're very pleased with that," said Wells.

Fifty-eight-percent of students get their bachelor's degree within six years, and participation is trending up with a C+; the percentage of young adults enrolling in college has improved since the 1990s. While UW-Oshkosh's Chancellor says he'd like to see some of the grades curved, some of the low marks just mean one thing, the only place to go is to improve.

Wisconsin wasn't the only state that failed in affordability. California was the only state that passed.