Federal College Scorecard provides pocketbook data on Tampa Bay higher education

The College Scorecard, an online tool to help families assess and compare colleges and universities in areas like cost, graduation rates and student debt, rolled out last month with new updates and more information.
The scorecard is an Obama administration project that puts troves of federal data about American colleges and universities online in a searchable format. It has been scaled back from President Obama’s original promise of rating schools based on affordability and return on investment — a contrast to other private rankings that emphasize prestige and endowment size.
The government site, while not really a ranking tool, does make it easy to find information on student outcomes — the bang for your education buck, in other words. The card that comes up on a basic search of an individual school provides three figures: average annual cost, graduation rate and salary after attending…
New College of Florida in Sarasota is the lowest cost among local four-year universities, at $10,015. It also boasts a 67 percent graduation rate. (The national average is 44 percent.)