CMU has increased its total investment in institutional financial aid for undergraduates by 86% over the last 10 years. The university’s funding commitment rose from $76 million in 2015 to $142 million in 2024.

This increased in support is paying off.

• The average CMU grant recipient received nearly $54,000 in institutional support this year, which is an 80% jump compared to just 10 years ago. 
• The share of federal student loan borrowers has dropped from 52% of the Class of 2019 to just 28% of the Class of 2024.
• During this same 5-year timespan — and even in the face of rising tuition costs — the average federal debt held by a graduating CMU student fell to just $18,200 total per student.
• CMU has increased its investment in graduate students with institutional aid jumping 55% in the last 10 years — from approximately $108 million in 2015 to $167 million today.

CMU’s latest access and affordability initiative — called the CMU Pathway Program — will begin in the 2024-2025. It will enable qualifying undergraduates to: 

• Attend CMU tuition free if their family earns less than $75,000 annually.
• Attend CMU without utilizing any federal student loans if their family earns less than $100,000 annually.
• Continue to have 100% of their demonstrated financial need met, even if their family earns over $100,000 annually.

Learn more about the CMU Pathway Program 

CMU continues to transform its academic and research infrastructure while also bolstering support for student success and the overall student experience. Some projects on this front include:   

• Opening the Highmark Center for Health, Wellness and Athletics, a multimillion-dollar facility that houses clinical, health and wellness services as well as CMU athletics programming.
• Renovating more than 100 classrooms, laboratories and other learning spaces across campus.
• Breaking ground on the Robotics Innovation Center at Hazelwood Green. Once complete, this facility will leverage the intersections of robotics, advanced manufacturing and AI to spark new collaborations, innovations and economic growth.
• Opening 2 new residence halls: One at Fifth and Clyde and one at Forbes and Beeler, which also houses CMU’s first-ever on-campus grocery store.
• Kicking off construction on the Richard King Mellon Hall of Sciences, a $300 million transformation hub that will bring together departments from CMU’s Mellon College of Science, School of Computer Science and Institute for Contemporary Art.

Read More About CMU's Renovation and Construction Projects

CMU’s momentum in shaping the nation’s research and innovation agenda — and in driving research and innovation globally — continues to grow. External funding to support CMU's research and development enterprise rose 44% from 2018 to 2022, with the university drawing $618 million in external funding for research in 2023. 

Government, industry and philanthropy partners have awarded Carnegie Mellon funding to advance center-scale research efforts across a number of emerging areas. This list includes:

• Faculty in the College of Engineering earning a pair of multimillion-dollar awards from the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health to develop bioelectronic medical devices.  
• CMU securing an NSF award to launch an Engineering Research Center dedicated to utilizing robots to amplify human labor.
• Faculty in the School of Computer Science and Dietrich College collaborating on the NSF AI Institute for Societal Decision Making. 
• CMU’s Heinz College leading an effort from NIST to advance research related to the testing and evaluation of modern AI technologies. 
• Faculty in the College of Engineering leading a NASA Space Technology Research Institute dedicated to advancing Additive Manufacturing. 
• CMU partnering with NVIDIA to launch the nation’s 1st NVIDIA AI Tech Community.  
• CMU joining the U.S. Department of Commerce to sign on to a historic $110 million U.S.-Japan partnership to accelerate AI innovation globally.

Learn More about CMU's Work with Artificial Intelligence

CMU continues to strengthen the region and communities around in countless ways. Some of these key contributions include: 

• Participating in an 11-county regional coalition overseeing the disbursement of a $62 million Build Back Better Regional Challenge grant to expand the region’s robotics, AI and automation cluster into local communities.
• Supporting nearly 18,000 jobs with an estimated economic impact of $2.7 billion annually. 
• Providing educational experiences and professional development to more than 10,000 K-12 students and teachers annually. 
• Supporting students in partnering with hundreds of nonprofits and industry partners annually to help solve real-world challenges in the community.
• Launching Deeper Conversations, a university-wide initiative that seeks to promote the power of civil discourse and engage the campus community in conversations about some of the most complex challenges facing society today. 
• Hosting the President’s Lecture Series, which brings high-profile government, industry, nonprofit and academic leaders to campus to share their perspectives and experiences with the CMU community.
• Shaping the performing arts, with CMU faculty and alumni earning 13 Academy Awards, 64 Tonys and 149 Emmys throughout history.

Read More About CMU's Regional Impact