Cost Structure, Cost Trends and Strategy in Community Colleges

Controlling costs is a major higher education issue that has become more visible as citizens have become more concerned with college affordability. This paper reviews literature on cost control and discusses why the topic is difficult to address. Accounting for cost of instruction, costs incurred by the community colleges themselves to provide services, cost structures, and cost management in higher education are discussed in the context of strategic management theory. Delta Cost Project data are analyzed to uncover meta-level insights about strategic decisions made by community colleges.