As students and parents prepare to settle into the new school year, there are undoubtedly many that are still suffering from sticker shock when they see the cost of attending college. There is both good news and bad news on this front.

The good news is that college prices have plateaued and even fallen a bit in recent years. The College Board’s annual report on college pricing tracks changes in the net cost of attending college — the total cost, including tuition, fees, room and board, minus any grant aid like Pell grants that do not have to be repaid.

The most recent report reveals that, after adjusting for inflation, net costs have been falling modestly for several years. For example, the net cost to attend a four-year public college fell from around $24,000 in the mid-2010s to around

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