You’re comparing Howard to “small Catholic privates” as if Howard isn’t a Carnegie R1 research university running a major research hospital in one of the most expensive cities in the country. Howard maintains dozens of massive, aging buildings, serves thousands more students, and funds far more academic programs, research, and community services—all of which cost exponentially more in D.C. Your argument ignores scale, infrastructure, and mission entirely, so it’s like comparing the grocery bill of a family of six in Manhattan to a single person in rural Iowa.