Redesigned Massachusetts.edu features custom affordability calculator, new tools to help prospective students explore campuses
BOSTON — The University of Massachusetts has launched a redesigned website to highlight the university’s broad scope of education, research and impact and help prospective students research their options within the Commonwealth’s comprehensive public university system.
The new Massachusetts.edu features a dynamic, mobile-first design featuring new campus profile pages; videos and content exploring the university’s contributions to education, research and engagement; an interactive component highlighting the benefits of living and learning in Massachusetts; and personalized tools for prospective students, including an innovative affordability calculator that estimates the cost of attending UMass.
“The new Massachusetts.edu tells the unique stories of our four world-class undergraduate campuses, our top-ranked medical school and our mission-driven law school while conveying the collective impact of the UMass system,” said UMass President Marty Meehan. “It helps prospective students and their families by streamlining the process of researching their options within the UMass system, and the affordability calculator provides cost transparency while demonstrating that UMass is accessible and affordable for students from all backgrounds.”
The affordability calculator is the result of a first-of-its-kind partnership with Massachusetts-based MyinTuition. Using the calculator, prospective students and their families can estimate their cost to attend each UMass campus as an undergraduate in approximately three minutes. The estimates are 90 percent accurate because they are derived from data from current UMass students with similar financial and academic backgrounds.
UMass is the first public university system to join MyinTuition and the first institution, public or private, to create a custom calculator utilizing an MyinTuition’s API (application programming interface).
“A college education is an important path to social mobility,” said MyinTuition Founder and Creator Phillip Levine, who is also an economics professor at Wellesley College. “But if students only know the sticker price of college, without factoring in financial aid, how are they supposed to make good educational decisions? We have to clarify the true cost of attending college. The new affordability calculator at UMass helps accomplish that goal.”
An academic program tool offers prospective students a comprehensive, easily sortable database of programs across the university with a description that includes location, degree level and learning modality. It also provides a list of careers common for each area of study, giving students and their parents insight into how each academic area may translate to employment after graduation.
“By providing a central resource for program information and connecting academic programs with career opportunities, UMass is helping students and their families make more informed decisions about their college education,” said Massachusetts Secretary of Education and member of the UMass Board of Trustees James Peyser. “In doing so, UMass is meeting its obligation to both students and the Commonwealth.”
The redesigned website also features a user-friendly interactive tool that helps students explore the unique features of the university’s campuses in Amherst, Boston, Dartmouth and Lowell based on factors including size, location, first-year housing, athletics and test requirements.
“Students who don’t already have a strong familiarity with UMass get a quick picture of what makes each of our campuses unique,” said UMass Vice President for Communications Jeff Cournoyer. “If you’re early in your college research process and all you know is that you want to be in at a mid-sized university in an urban location where you have the opportunity to compete in Division III athletics, the tool is going to encourage you to learn more about UMass Boston. One of the things that makes UMass great is that at least one of our campuses meets nearly any combination of those factors.”
“I’m proud that we now have a new and powerful vehicle to share the incredible progress on our campuses and to more effectively demonstrate how we are transforming lives and shaping the future of this region every day,” said President Meehan.