The word 学费 is formed by directly combining two meaningful characters: 学 (xué), which means "to study" or "learning", and 费 (fèi), which means "fee" or "expense". The concept is constructed by placing the object or activity (学) first, followed by the type of cost associated with it (费), resulting in a transparent, compound idea that literally means "study fee" or, conventionally, "tuition". This method of formation creates a new, specific term through the straightforward logical combination of two independent concepts.