So I have noticed we have many threads about how to afford a college education. Some politicians have floated trial balloons suggesting government assisted free education. There seems to be a drive for everyone to be college educated.
So lets project into a mythical future where public colleges are free for everyone. To avoid any overt political issues, assume for argument’s sake that this can be done without any public funding.
Given this scenario: Free public education that is not financed by public money. No strings attached. - discuss the Pros and Cons. What do you see happening in the US given this type of scenario? I will sit this out for a few days to see what transpires. Enjoy.
I don’t think that’s what the OP had in mind. If by a wave of a magic wand, all universities began to offer free tuition at the current levels of “education quality” and “prestige” to all admitted students, what would happen to the college application process etc.?
Too bad the OP is not here to confirm this. I hesitate to post much in the threads where the OP takes the approach of throwing in the bait, stepping back, and watching the “circus.”
Sorry. BB. I only meant that I did not want my opinions to color the debate. I wanted to get the opinions of others on the matter. Your interpretation of the premise is fairly close. I don’t know that in my head I would assume current level of anything. All that I intended was that the cost of attendance would be zero for any and all students. (and that there would be no public money used…pretend the richest people in the world just gifted it with no other stipulations)
I don’t like anything to be completely free, whether its a lunch, a college education or a visit to the doctor. My reason is simply economic. That which has no cost people tend to assign no value. I think higher education should be more affordable, through cost control, scholarships and even (gasp) reasonable rate and sized loans, but I don’t think it should be completely free.
When higher education is no longer an exclusive privilege for the wealthy, I think society as a whole benefits.The ‘drive to have everyone college-educated’ should be edited to the ‘drive to give everyone, WHO WANTS IT, a college education.’ That’s an important distinction. Another important distinction (if we are comparing it to k-12 public eduction): free of charge doesn’t mean everyone who signs up automatically gets a degree. You must still earn passing grades to get your degree. College isn’t for everyone, and people who don’t want to there aren’t going to be forced to go. And people who don’t get passing grades will flunk out.
One of the main pros to free public college education, I think, would be the ability for people to go back for different educational degrees and reinvent themselves.
Rather than being stuck in a job to pay off existing student loans, and obviously with no financial ability to go back to school, someone not satisfied with their professional life could afford to get a degree in something else and possibly make a much greater contribution to society. That flexibility, the ability to unleash different talents and creativity, could be tremendously beneficial.
I don’t really see a con as long as academic standards are upheld and the credential retains its value despite greater access.
I think we would see academic value decline very much very quickly. Everyone would go straight to 4 year institutions rather than CCs or JCs. And probably overcrowding at schools nationwide…
My main concern with this (I’d like to be 100% behind it) is that issue of overcrowding. Take CA, for example. If suddenly every public (or did you mean EVERY?) university was free, you’d have a huge influx of students applying to UCs and CSUs that would normally attend JCs or CCs.
At least with the UCs, every one of them (except Merced at the moment) is reaching student pop levels that may not be sustainable at the current level they are. You’ve got admission rates lowering, and more and more students still coming in. How do we accommodate a much larger student population.
If, with new “free” higher education, we also suddenly had new universities, then maybe this wouldn’t be such an issue. However, I have trouble seeing this situation through a non-economic lense. In the end, money’s gotta play into this somehow.
Many societies in the past have provided free college education…including some parts of the US in the recent past like CCNY/CUNY till 1975.
However, free college education didn’t mean it was guaranteed to everyone who aspired to go. Most such societies provided free college education PROVIDED one passed the various forms of academic merit ranging from national college entrance exams to regional college-prep HS academic exit exams or allowed for open admission but had college curricula/systems to ruthlessly weed out the academically undermotivated and under/unprepared. Heard from some Profs who attended college in the '50s that some midwest state Us operated on the latter system for in-state students.
Many such societies also tracked students academically so students who weren’t in the top half or even top 20% by the end of middle school tended to be placed on various vocational tracks or even expected to leave school and start apprenticing themselves/working at 13-14.
Such societies…including some in the US such as students and folks who remembered CCNY/CUNY before the implementation of the ill-conceived open admissions policies of 1969 sustained the academic and perceptive value of their respective free colleges by making admission to them exceedingly selective.
One reason why free college may not work as well now is because the US educational culture and society at large has the idea that everyone should not only be entitled to going to college, but also to graduate within a certain number of years no matter how academically undermotivated and/or under/unprepared. That tends to lead to waste of scarce academic resources even if the student concerned has full-paying parents as he/she’s taking up space and resources which could have benefited more academically motivated and/or prepared students in the same time period.
This very issue is something friends who teach at community colleges and even 4-year directional public and even some private colleges have expressed concerns with. Especially considering the US public increasingly views college education in a consumerist “I pays my tuition, I should get my degree” rather than the more accurate gym membership analogy where one’s level of benefit is correlated to the amount of time and effort put in.
Even the elite Us aren’t immune considering the countless accounts of undergrads and/or their parents angrily calling up Prof friends or worse…even going into their offices to angrily demand that A the special snowflake “deserved” when the actual student work product actually merited a far lesser grade. A few have even threatened lawsuits with actual lawyers/lawyer parents.
" suggesting government assisted free education" - Government has no money, so there is no such thing as government assisted free education. Government can force the taxpayers to pay for colleges. Then it will be " taxpayers’ assisted education" which by definition is NOT FREE at all. I just wanted to make sure that the definition is correct, otherwise, the discussion does not make much sense.
Why on earth are people conflating free education with everyone gets to go to college? They’re not even in the same ballpark as the same.
Even if Harvard were to be completely free to everyone, not everyone would get to go there.
Imo, it would make schools more competitive because people wouldn’t be scared off by cost. You’d have more students going out of state and you’d probably have more state migration. Older folks would be able to go back and not worry about their kids starving and poor folks like myself would experience less stress and more social mobility.
For me personally, it would’ve meant I didn’t have to work full time in undergrad. That would’ve been nice.
i think there’s no con only pro’s. Traditional middle class jobs are disappearing and new jobs require more education. Admissions will become more competitive. I think it’s win-win. At minimum we need to make State college more affordable. I don’t think we can compare free colleges with public k-12. Colleges get to choose whom they admit.
Back in the 70’s, I went to a public university that was very, very inexpensive. I recall paying something like $400 per semester. I think most families could afford that back then. I don’t know of anyone in my dorm or in my group of friends taking out loans to pay for college.
It meant that a few years after I graduated H and I could buy a house, a car, and get started on our own savings without the burden of debt. That was a very good thing because, those of you who are of a certain age, will recall that interest rates back then were CRAZY! (This was in the Jimmy Carter years).
But today the states no longer fund the public universities the way they used to and there are way too many unneeded administrators making too much money. All this falls on the students and means that many will be taking student debt into their retirement years.
This type of thing probably happened (and still happens) by default when a state has plenty of state university capacity to have rather lenient admission standards. Also, it presumably happens in the open admission community colleges.
Not enough supply (seats available) to meet demand, at least in the short term. There would certainly be a spike in demand, but buildings don’t build themselves. And many schools would not take on the risk. What is their incentive?
For those schools that decided to admit an increased number of students, there would be (at least) short-term increases in class sizes or increased registration difficulties if class sizes remained fixed.
For those schools that decided to admit an increased number of students, there would be increased competition for meetings with professors and services from university staff – like career counseling, academic advising, and academic support.
How robust and reliable is the source of the funding? A great many taxpayers would balk at funding the entire higher-ed industry, so much so that this issue would drive many voters to elect officials who would overturn it. This funding might become cyclical, based on political tides. Many faculty and other workers, bothered by this uncertainty (and/or declining income: if government is funding the schools, government will probably set educators’, administrators’ and staff’s salaries. Private salaries almost always are higher than their gov’t counterparts in the same industries.), will seek employment elsewhere. So – we’re looking at much higher student-to-faculty ratios, far fewer services, fewer courses offered, etc. In other words, a tremendous drop in quality and value.
Those are just some of the cons. The old maxim rings true: you get what you pay for.
