Tuition costs make me sick.

So I was poking around my old community colleges website looking for information relating to GMAT testing, and I accidentally discovered a fact sheet related to tuition costs and fee's. Annual tuition for my community college is $702.00 per YEAR!!

My associates degree ran me around $2,400 and I earned my degree from one of the highest ranked community colleges in the country.

That got me thinking how it is that colleges and universities can stand to charge such absurd amounts for tuition and fee's?

 

Because they are not nearly as well subsidized by the government as your community college is. Don't get me wrong. I think it is a great thing that the government subsidizes public colleges and universities.

 

I think it would be nice if there were more opportunities for people to work off their college debt. I've heard that once upon a time some people could agree to take certain jobs in certain areas of the country and after two or three years their debt would be gone or substantially reduced. I never hear about these opportunities anymore and so I'm guessing that they don't exist. I think a lot of people, especially younger people, would gladly spend a couple of years working productivly in a disadvantaged part of the country in return for college debt forgiveness. Sort of a Peace Corps thing.

 

@Kizmet
Some states still have programs like that, especially for teachers. But I think it's going the way of the dinosaur as states grapple with massive budget shortfalls.

 

I thought that might be true but I haven't heard of it for some time so I figured it was a thing of the past. I think I originally heard of it in regards to med school grads. There used to be a TV series about it - pretty funny too - Northern Exposure.

 

Its simple K-12 education is generally obligated under the law in most states be funded and free, university level education is far more optional. But is it so much in my area Eckard College charges per year as a private school four times the state universities and should offer in both cases a decent education.

The states could opt not to fund them at all and force the costs onto students and their families, they opt not to.

 

Not sure about the accuracy of this graph, but it's pretty compelling: http://satyagraha.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/inflation-factors-2.jpg
It looks accurate to me. It makes you wonder how tuition costs have gotten so inflated. Is it simply greed?

 

To be fair, non-profit colleges often have much more generous institutional financial aid packages, so this would change the overall "cost" equation. Most for-profits rely almost exclusively on Title IV funding in financial aid packages.

 

For state universities it's quite simple. State appropriations to higher education are close to the exact inverse of the graph.

 

Not knocking your situation, because I understand everything else is higher in Californla, but my CC alma mater is now up to $133.85 / ch for in-state tuition:

TCC Tuition Rates and Fee Charts

Great school and all, but not worth that.

 

My grandfather attended the University of Wisconsin Madison and the staste medical school in the 50's and paid CASH paying with some money from his father a master welder and what he earned in summers. But he pointed out the big difference as he sees it is fluff. When he went state schools in the main were nice school with basic accomodations and facilities, decent professors and in his case at the big school did have some research going on but it was not a big push. Students went for an affordable education and frills like sports was secondary to academics and if you lived on campus it was simple and not overly expensive.

So I take it state school have gone away from being basic good no frills campuses as one reason for the tuition inflation. Another is they never adapted the curriculum why have a four year program I always thought a three year terminal degree ,for those not intending to go past the subject over the bachelors degree level, should be offered removing a year of unrelated classes to what is studied then offer a standard degree to but make it an option.

 

Hi OTB,

do you mean a three year BA degree like Athabasca has?

Abner

 

Not exactly they would have terminal bachelors for those not going to graduate or professional schools say if one studied business and likely would not be an MBA prospect after taking a year of classes they could opt for a 90 credit option a BSc in Business that is shorter. You could have distribution classes to the basic ones composition, speech, a foreign language and maybe two 5 credit general studies courses. Drop a minor as a requirement and they must take a major but could opt in with electives or a minor to flush it all out. Just get away from the classical degree model to meet the needs of people that are not in need of one but you can offer those to. It would just be a matter of the distribution requirements chosen for the degree the terminal one or the traditional one.

 

I have not checked into the cost involved but maybe a low cost way to earn credit is to audit appropriate courses then take CLEP and DSST exams.