Cost & Fees

The cost of an education at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago includes more than just tuition—below you’ll find a full breakdown of direct costs that may be charged to a student's account, including housing, insurance, and more.

NOTE: A full breakdown of a student's estimated Cost of Education (also called a Cost of Attendance or Student Budget), both direct and indirect costs broken down by program, can be found at saic.edu.fyc.

Tuition/Fee Charges and Billing Cycle

Academic Year 2025–26

Fall 2025, Winter 2026, Spring 2026, Summer 2026

Academic Year 2024–25

Fall 2024, Winter 2025, Spring 2025, Summer 2025

* Applicable to exchange students, students-at-large, and other students enrolled in degree program courses through Continuing Studies. Degree program courses are not available on a noncredit or audit basis.

Academic Year 2025–26

Residence Life offers housing contracts for the academic year, spring semester, and/or summer term. 

If you are experiencing housing insecurities or homelessness, please see our resources for students for additional information

Annual Health Insurance Requirement and Waiver/Request Deadlines

For the 2025–26 academic year, the cost of health insurance for full-time domestic and all international students is $1,850 per semester ($3,700 annual) for each of the fall and spring semesters. The spring semester health insurance plan includes coverage through the end of the following summer.


For information about SAIC's health insurance requirements and eligibility to submit a waiver, please refer to the student health insurance webpage. All students who are required to have health insurance at SAIC are charged automatically each fall and spring semester they are enrolled.

Waiver Request Instructions: If students do not wish to have coverage under SAIC's student health insurance plan and have coverage under their own comparable health insurance policy, they may request a waiver of the SAIC’s health insurance. Minimum coverage requirements can be found via the student health insurance webpage on SAIC’s website.

SAIC health insurance waivers can only be submitted online at saic.myahpcare.com for the entire academic year and the spring-only semester.

Students will access the online waiver at saic.myahpcare.com using their Artic account login and password. Questions associated with Artic account activation and/or login problems can be directed to SAIC's CRIT Help Desk at 312.345.3535 or crithelpdesk@saic.edu.

Each submitted online waiver must be accompanied by a scanned copy of the front and back of the student's health insurance ID card. Additionally, international students must submit a scanned copy of their complete insurance policy in English, with coverage amounts reflected in US dollars, as well as a scanned copy of their medical evacuation and repatriation coverage. 

This can be done in the fall for the entire academic year, or in the spring for the spring-semester only.

Requests to waive annual and spring-semester only health insurance must be submitted annually.

After submitting the online waiver at saic.myahpcare.com:

• Via an automated process, a health insurance waiver credit is applied to the account of each student who submits a health insurance waiver that has been verified and approved.
• Submitting a health insurance waiver request does not guarantee that it will be approved.
• Information regarding the non-SAIC health insurance policy that is provided on the health insurance waiver will be verified by Academic HealthPlans, to ensure that the plan meets minimum standards.
• Academic HealthPlans will contact the student and/or the policyholder (if the student is not the policyholder) as needed during the verification process.
• If the information provided on the waiver is incomplete, incorrect, cannot be verified, and/or if the insurance plan does not satisfy criteria:
  • the waiver will not be accepted
  • health insurance coverage through SAIC will be required.
• One or more factors may impact Academic Health Plans ability to complete waiver verification. It is important that students and/or policyholders respond if contacted by Academic HealthPlans and/or SAIC regarding additional information required to verify insurance coverage.

Request Instructions:
Part-time domestic students will not automatically be enrolled in SAIC's Student Health Insurance Plan, but coverage is available upon request at saic.myahpcare.com. Students will access the online health insurance request page using their SAIC student ID number and birth date. The deadline to request insurance coverage is the first day of the fall and spring semesters.

2024-25 Health Insurance Waiver/Request Deadlines

Fall and Spring Health Insurance Waiver/Requests may only be submitted electronically online at saic.myahpcare.com.

*SAIC Health Insurance for the summer semester: All new full-time domestic students and all new international students who are beginning their degree program in the summer, as well as all new international students participating in SAIC's EIS (English for International Students) program, are automatically enrolled in and charged $710 for SAIC’s Summer 2025 student health insurance plan. Students with comparable coverage who do not wish to purchase SAIC’s summer student health insurance plan may submit an online waiver through saic.myahpcare.com by the first day of classes for summer sessions 3W3 and 6W2.

Summer health insurance coverage is also available upon request for continuing degree-seeking students enrolled for summer who were not covered under SAIC’s student health insurance plan in the spring by submitting an online request through saic.myahpcare.com.

All students enrolled for six or more degree credit hours are charged a technology fee. This fee helps provide access to wireless and wired networking, curricular software in computer classrooms and labs, and CRIT Help Desk support and training. In addition, students with a qualifying laptop computer can access curricular software both on and off campus, along with CRIT Help Desk support.

The Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) will allow eligible degree students to opt in or out of the U-Pass program. Eligible students are those who are registered with six or more credit hours for each fall and spring semester, and three or more credit hours for each summer and winter term. The CTA U-Pass allows eligible students at SAIC unlimited use of CTA bus and rail transportation for the fall, winter, spring, and summer semesters.

For more information please visit the U-Pass page here.

2025-26 - Other fees billed to the student account include:

Additional fees include:

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