The US Senate on Thursday demanded information from the nation’s 136 wealthiest colleges and universities, led by Harvard and Yale, about how they have raised tuition, determined financial aid and spent their endowments over the last 10 years.

The Senate Finance Committee has recently been pressuring schools to spend more of their funds on financial aid, and has threatened to require them to spend a minimum of 5 percent of their endowments each year, according to the NYT.

Weighing in with the largest endowment is Harvard, whose endowment grew 20 percent in the last fiscal year to $34.6 billion. Yale’s endowment, the second largest, grew 25 percent to $22.5 billion, according to a report released this week.

Harvard and Yale have recently expanded their financial aid programs to make more money available to students with higher family incomes. Last month, Harvard announced that it would now offer financial aid to students whose parents have incomes of $120,000 to $180,000. Yale followed suit this week and will now make financial aid available to students with family incomes of $120,000 to $200,000.

University officials, though, seemed cautious about the idea of Congress mandating how schools spend their endowments.

Is the rising cost of tuition and the supervision of university endowments, especially private universities, something lawmakers should step in on?

Would forcing colleges and universities to spend more of their endowments help address rising college costs?