@tutumom2001 I agree with your stance to some degree, I’m quite conservative and don’t believe in handing out everything to everyone. But you have completely taken NeoDymium’s arguments out of context. He/she is making a reasonable argument for socialized education. He/she has already stated that prices on college education would have to be controlled by regulation and paring down luxuries of population funded colleges in order to conceivably make the idea work. As far as who goes, he/she has certainly not argued for “only the elite” going; the whole point of free college is so that poor people can go as well. Make your pitch as to how colleges should be, policy wise, and I’ll listen, at least.
(1) Have high schools partner with CCs and tech schools to give kids opportunities to earn AA degrees in high schools.
(2) Don’t penalize the HS kids who have too many CC and AP credits to be considered freshmen.
(3) Eliminate mandates for freshmen to live on campus regardless of where they live.
(4) Offer more work-study opportunities.
(5) Either eliminate state lotteries that have driven up the price of tuition or raise the scholarship standards so that they are meaningful.
(6) Improve the quality of K-12 public education so that kids aren’t taking remedial classes in college.
(7) Encourage kids to consider alternatives to 4-year colleges such as skilled labor.
(8) Eliminate elitist attitudes that college-educated kids are “better” than skilled laborers.
(9) Make sure college students and their parents understand the loan process, including interest that must be paid back, terms of the loan, what happens when you drop out and/or default, and approximate monthly payments along with realistic potential salaries. A future teacher should understand that she is not going to have the salary to pay back the same loan that a future orthopedic surgeon will. When you apply for a business loan, the bank uses several factors to consider your ability to pay that loan back. But this doesn’t happen when you apply for an education loan.
Re: #261
- Already exists in some places where a community college is accessible to high school students. Presumably, you want it extended to more high schools?
- Are there any colleges that force students to be transfer students (instead of frosh) based on AP credit or college credit earned before high school graduation?
- At public schools with such requirements, these generally apply only to those outside of commute range and who are not non-traditional students. But these are the students who typically want to live in the dorms anyway.
Also Re: #261
4. I’m not sure that opportunities for student work is the problem. The problem is that tuition is so high that student jobs won’t cover the labor costs.
5. Can you clarify this point?
6. Agreed, but it doesn’t always work out. Colleges offering remedial coursework is more of a safety net than a solution to the problem. Some people have a bad experience in high school and it doesn’t hurt to have them re-learn some.
7 and 8. Education creep has made 4-year degrees increasingly necessary as a prerequisite even when other education has been fine. It will take some work to scale that back.
@tutumom2001 Okay then. Outside of eliminating lottery scholarships, how do you suggest lowering tuition prices without government funding/oversight? Even if lottery scholarships are eliminated, I don’t think that alone will drop prices since the ability still exists to cover the cost through student loans. I live in a state with a lottery scholarship, which doesn’t cover everything, but does help (my older sisters both used it.) From my point of view, it gives kids who were not academic superstars in high school a chance to go to college. They can still lose the scholarship if they flunk, but at least they have one chance. I understand that the economics of those scholarships are hard to support. My state has gone through revisions of the award offered in order to afford it somehow, and it comes into question every few years.
The best (perhaps only) way to reduce college tuition costs is to reduce the demand for seats at 4 year colleges.
Having millions of middle class kids opt for two free years of CC/technical school years would be my preferred way to do that.
Of course the real question is, how?
The question for me is not how, but why? I like things the way they are now.
Unless we can magically suspend the laws of supply and demand, free education will never work…for those who are saying ‘well K-12’ is free…I would suggest you get what you pay for. The US has some of the worst pre-college education in the industrialized world. We spend billions on meaningless drivel and our children often have no idea how the economy works…thus, they think we would have magical wonderland if only the money fairy would give them a free degree. And just for good measure, we don’t pay educators very well in the process.
The end result would be multi-faceted, but the most obvious result is that a BS would equal a HS diploma. Eventually, you would need an MS or PhD for any significant job and anyone lacking a BS would be considered unemployable for anything beyond manual labor. Where are all of the qualified professors coming from?
On the one hand I can sympathize. Neither I nor anyone within my immediate family ever had any trouble receiving and paying for high quality education at every level, nor at finding gainful employment even in fields that are not particularly lucrative. And further, I do like the idea of having all these luxuries because they are genuinely good to have.
But at the same time I realize that it doesn’t work in general and that an unacceptable number of people fall through the cracks for ridiculous and non-academic reasons. And in the long run the system does need to change or that will continue.
What a silly idea.
Individualism is great, but if we look at countries crushing us educationally… It is the ones touting free education that often are at the top.
The way we have it right now gives the rich the right to tier with the skilled rather than the rich to perform at their own abilities. Likewise, someone who maybe on the edge of elite knowledge may be lumped with those who are not based on what they can afford.
Anyone thinking the system we have currently is working is part of the problem.
Which countries are crushing the US in higher education?
^Surely there’s got to be US News and World rankings on that. Come to think of it, isn’t that the reason CC exists?
http://www.usnews.com/education/best-global-universities/rankings
Going purely off rankings alone, US private colleges top the list for the best colleges. Of course, some California public ones come in close to the top. I clicked through the first 30 or so and was still looking for Sweden and Finland.
But overall, I have heard that the US education quality has declined. Of course, that includes K-12, which is government provided (except for private schools.) I’m not sure why we think even more government control will advance the quality of education since our past experience doesn’t back that theory up, but that’s obviously open to debate.
You can get the highest quality education in the world right here in the US. Just not for cheap.
My community college’s tuition (NJ) is $7,800. In some states, this is tuition at a four-year school!
Our community college is awful; with only a 15% graduation rate. Most of these people are pressured into going to college, before realizing they can’t handle it. I think we should create strong, affordable options, for those who truly want an education.
That kind of graduation rate for community college is quite normal. Keep in mind that a lot of people have no interest in finishing school, and a lot of the people who would never have really belonged in school go there. Also part-timers who just want a class or two.
$7800 tuition is ridiculous though. If that’s the norm then I’d say that the “free community college” pledge makes a lot more sense.
And how then do you explain how these other industrialized countries can provide quality K-12? The public K-12 in those countries is also gov’t funded.
Privatize K-12, then privatize eeeeeveerrrythiiiiiiiiiiiiing /s!