One of the most critical issues affecting higher education access today is the rising cost of going to college. Symptoms of the trend include dramatic increases in tuition and fees, reduced state higher education budgets, declines in the purchasing power of student grant aid, increasing student debt burdens and heightened demand for institutional accountability. Left unchecked, the real and perceived cost spiral can have serious consequences. It can limit access and lifetime opportunity for aspiring college students, particularly low-income students, thereby threatening America's future in the global, knowledge-based economy. Unfortunately, dialogue about the issue has become counterproductive. Harsh proposals and counterproposals and arguments about who's to blame add to the divisive nature of this topic. To raise the dialogue to a more constructive level, Lumina Foundation for Education proposes an initiative to improve discourse and find shared solutions. It turns out that practical, low-cost solutions to this problem exist and are available for shared implementation. Additional creative solutions are sure to be found when people come together for the common good. This policy brief proposes to be a first step in that process. It provides essential background, and then identifies potential strategies that stakeholder groups might consider in addressing the issue. (Contains 2 tables and 33 endnotes.)