These "above the line" deductions are particularly advantageous because you don't have to itemize to claim them and they help to determine your adjusted gross income or AGI.
Several other tax breaks can depend on your AGI because they're phased out or even eliminated entirely for taxpayers whose AGIs are too high.
Alas, you'll have to depend on other above-the-line deductions if you want to try to whittle away at your AGI going forward. The tuition and fees deduction was scheduled to sunset or expire at the end of 2016 unless Congress acted to breathe new life into it, and Congress did not.