Students walk between classes at the University of Kansas on Monday, Nov. 16, 2015, in Lawrence, Kan.

A Kansas State University student last week, literally and figuratively, gave K-State the middle finger and announced on social media he was quitting college because the payoff wasn’t going to be worth the high cost of tuition. (Click here for the full story from K-State’s student newspaper, The Collegian.)

Spot-on or short-sighted? Whatever your take, his tirade has a lot of people on the Internet talking about college tuition right now. Seemed a good opportunity to take a look at just how bad (or how good, again depending on your take) ex-Wildcat Billy Willson and his counterparts at other universities have it these days.

KU has the highest tuition of all our state universities, most of which are much smaller. According to The Chronicle of Higher Education’s database of university tuitions nationwide, KU also has the highest tuition of any public university in the Big 12 and the fourth-highest of its 10 stated peer institutions.

These figures are for the current academic year. Totals represent tuition and required fees for in-state students; numbers in parentheses represent tuition and fees plus room and board. (Note: Click here for my story on the Kansas Board of Regents approving 2016-17 tuition rates. For KU, The Chronicle appears to have used the compact rate available to freshmen, which is higher than the standard rate but locked in for four years. Using the standard rate — $10,548 for a year, including required fees of $970 per year — KU would fall a bit lower on the lists.)

Tuition at Bold Aspirations peer universities

These are the 10 peer universities named in KU’s strategic plan, Bold Aspirations. The plan says some “are roughly comparable to KU, and others are in the top tier that we aspire to join. All the universities, like KU, are members of the prestigious Association of American Universities.”

University of Virginia — $15,714 ($26,440)

Michigan State University — $14,063 ($23,797)

University of Colorado at Boulder — $11,531 ($25,121)

University of Kansas — $11,455 ($21,891)

University of Oregon — $10,762 ($22,972)

Indiana University — $10,388 ($20,428)

University at Buffalo, The State University of New York — $9,574 ($23,122)

University of Missouri-Columbia — $9,518 ($19,618)

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill — $8,566 ($19,784)

University of Iowa — $8,325 ($18,433)

University of Florida — $6,381 ($16,291)

Tuition at Big 12 universities

Some Big 12 schools are more comparable in size and scope to KU than others, and a couple are private, but they’re all in the same league sports-wise and in the Midwest region (except outlier West Virginia University).

Texas Christian University (private) — $42,670 ($54,670)

Baylor University (private) — $42,276 ($54,030)

University of Kansas — $11,455 ($21,891)

University of Oklahoma — $10,881 ($21,161)

University of Texas — $10,110 ($21,566)

Kansas State University — $9,874 ($19,024)

Texas Tech University — $9,781 ($18,286)

Oklahoma State University — $8,321 ($16,011)

Iowa State University — $8,219 ($16,575)

West Virginia University — $7,992 ($18,210)

Source: Chronicle of Higher Education Tuition and Fees database, last updated Oct. 26, 2016
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• I’m the Journal-World’s KU and higher ed reporter. See all the newspaper’s KU coverage here. Reach me by email at sshepherd@ljworld.com, by phone at 832-7187, on Twitter @saramarieshep or via Facebook at Facebook.com/SaraShepherdNews.