Colleges at the breaking point, forcing ‘hard choices’ about education • Hacker News Board

Re: Colleges at the breaking point, forcing ‘hard choices’ about education

#831

Post by sjg007 » Fri, May 01, 2020, 6:52 PM UTC

jedberg wrote: post #179

gwd wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He had some massive college bills too and i didnt understand how those worked, but you cant get rid of them like you can a car loan. This is the thing that is really the most shameful and outrageous thing about the US system. Our entire K-12 educational system and our culture is set up to paint a college degree as a ticket to "the good life". Then an 18-year-old, potentially with parents who aren't great at math bu…

> All of us should be regularly lobbying our lawmakers to make student loans dischargeable by bankruptcy, just like any other loan. The reason they aren't dischargeable is because what bank in their right mind would give a loan to an 18 year old with no collateral? They only guarantee they get that it will be paid back is the fact that it can't be discharged. Student loans would dry up overnight if they could be disc…

Most student loans are guaranteed by the Federal govt. There is no risk for the lender. They just operate as a middle man basically. There was legislation to move all loans to the Dept. of Education and do away with Navient etc... but you know elections happened...

Re: Colleges at the breaking point, forcing ‘hard choices’ about education

#832

Post by anticensor » Fri, May 01, 2020, 7:49 PM UTC

Mediterraneo10 wrote: post #71

bambataa wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've never understood why students would even want the college to be so involved in their student life. Allocate some buildings to the student body, get them to organise themselves and throw a bit of a cash at them. I think that's a good balance. I studied at a university with quite a focus on "college life" and it was nice to feel part of something but we didn't need to organise our social lives.

> I've never understood why students would even want the college to be so involved in their student life. If I understand the American system, there is pressure from parents as well. The students might not want the college to be so involved in their student life, but many parents would be unwilling to allow their children to attend an institution that is not highly focused on keeping them safe, to the point of treati…

> mental-health personnel on university staff

This has also to do with worker safety. University clinics also act as worker clinics for their own workers.

Re: Colleges at the breaking point, forcing ‘hard choices’ about education

#833

Post by voldacar » Fri, May 01, 2020, 8:40 PM UTC

gvjddbnvdrbv wrote: post #444

WalterBright wrote: post #378

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Considering that humanities majors tend to believe in socialism does not burnish their critical reading skills and resistance to propaganda. The reality of the history of socialism is one of failure. And yes, I do understand that everyone thinks that those who disagree with them are ill-informed and susceptible to propaganda, and those who prefer socialism will think that of me :-)

Socialism in the form of social democracy has built some very very nice countries here in Scandinavian.

having a capitalist country with a large welfare system != socialism

Re: Colleges at the breaking point, forcing ‘hard choices’ about education

#834

Post by pirocks » Fri, May 01, 2020, 11:24 PM UTC

0az wrote: post #385

augustt wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's often the parents who are buying into these things. Meal plans and dining halls are so popular because parents think their kids can't possibly cook for themselves or walk 10 minutes to eat out (at least that's my perception in a college city with lots of options to eat out, most of them cheaper & better than meal plan).

Actual college student. UCSD has a food bank on campus. Here's the math as to why: Recommended daily dining dollar spend: $19 Breakfast: $3.95, "Bobcat Sandwich" Lunch: $5.25, Hamburger Dinner: $6.95, "Wok Entree" This adds up to $16.15. That hamburger isn't very filling (between Whopper and Whopper Jr.), especially if you still operate on a teenaged metabolism. Add a fries to it, or do what I did and get a $2 salad…

I'm from a european uni and in first year fire alarms where frequent. I don't understand why this is the case, since these fires are never serious, and the repeated false alarms result in them being ignored. This was even an issue in a real fire at Manchester Uni, since a number of students simply ignored the alarm.

Re: Colleges at the breaking point, forcing ‘hard choices’ about education

#835

Post by gvjddbnvdrbv » Sat, May 02, 2020, 7:09 AM UTC

voldacar wrote: post #833

gvjddbnvdrbv wrote: post #444

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Socialism in the form of social democracy has built some very very nice countries here in Scandinavian.

having a capitalist country with a large welfare system != socialism

The Nordics are more like socialist countries with a large capitalist sector. We use the regulated market as a tool where it works.

Re: Colleges at the breaking point, forcing ‘hard choices’ about education

#836

Post by gvjddbnvdrbv » Sat, May 02, 2020, 7:18 AM UTC

WalterBright wrote: post #551

gvjddbnvdrbv wrote: post #444

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Socialism in the form of social democracy has built some very very nice countries here in Scandinavian.

20% of Norway's GDP comes from oil pumped out of the ground and flows to the government. It's enough to cover the deficits of socialism. The others keep enough of a free market to keep things afloat, but are not known for being economic powerhouses. None have tried communal food production yet, for good reason.

Denmark and Sweden and Finland have the same systems without oil.

And yes these countries do use the market in a regulated fashion where it does a good job.

Re: Colleges at the breaking point, forcing ‘hard choices’ about education

#837

Post by gwd » Sat, May 02, 2020, 8:22 AM UTC

yazan94 wrote: post #819

gwd wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It will force "the system" to come up with some other way to pay for tuition. What do you think about Income Share Agreements? https://www.thesimpledollar.com/loans/student/income-share-a...

I fail to see how an ISA is better than an unforgivable loan, and to be honest, this seems a lot more like indentured servitude/wage slavery without the pretense of a loan. If the investor (Purdue in the article) has to step in and say we won't make more than 2.5x our investment on you, you know the student is being taken advantage of. The problem is that the ISA model is still bound to the private market by virtue o…

To me, fundamentally the issue is one of alignment of incentives.

Right now, there are students who can come to Perdue who are looking for university as an "investment" in their own future: they want to spend $100k to get more than $100k back over their lifetime. But the fact is, some of those students are studying subjects which will never pay them back for their investment; and others will never make that money back no matter what subjects they study.

So the question is, what incentive does Perdue have with regard to these students, under the "unforgivable student loan" system?

1. From a pure short-term financial perspective, it has an incentive to get as many students in the program as possible.

2. From a reputational point of view, there may be some damage to having lots of students graduate without getting jobs

3. Perdue is made of human beings, many of whom actually have feelings and morals; those people feel much happier when their students' investment pays off, and feel much worse when their students' investments don't pay off.

And the point is, at the moment, for students in the category of people we're talking about, you have #1 fighting #2 and #3. That's always going to be an unstable system where things fluctuate between "terrible" and "not quite so terrible".

Consider the incentives in an ISA system. The incentives are now aligned: Perdue would have a vested interest in the success of their students after graduation: the more money their students make, the higher return they get (up to a point). If a student wants to come in and major in Underwater Basket Weaving, they can say, "Perhaps a degree in in Accounting or Education might be a better choice." And if they do offer Underwater Basket Weaving, they'll be sure to add in classes on the Economics of Underwater Basket Weaving, Advanced Basket Weaving Management, and so on, to make sure that those students are actually prepared to make money after they graduate.

Re: Colleges at the breaking point, forcing ‘hard choices’ about education

#838

Post by poilcn » Sat, May 02, 2020, 9:12 AM UTC

gwd wrote: post #113

nimbius wrote: post #64

Disclosure: i never went to college, I went to a trade school. Colleges really only started scaring the heck out of me when I started enjoying my career. After spending a day wrenching in a garage, we'd hit miller time and head down to the Soapbox Bar and Grill. Over the span of a month or two ordering buckets and shooting pool I learned our bartender Javon had a masters in biology and his fiancee Cortisha who bussed…

> He had some massive college bills too and i didnt understand how those worked, but you cant get rid of them like you can a car loan. This is the thing that is really the most shameful and outrageous thing about the US system. Our entire K-12 educational system and our culture is set up to paint a college degree as a ticket to "the good life". Then an 18-year-old, potentially with parents who aren't great at math bu…

>All of us should be regularly lobbying our lawmakers to make student loans dischargeable by bankruptcy, just like any other loan. They were at some period of time, which allowed colleges intentionally bankrupt students and get paid by the government. Universities and colleges are cancer of education, we have opportunity to naturally get rid of them, at least in their current form.

Re: Colleges at the breaking point, forcing ‘hard choices’ about education

#839

Post by mac01021 » Sat, May 02, 2020, 11:48 AM UTC

xur17 wrote: post #472

dnautics wrote: post #445

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ironically, income share agreements are increasingly being challenged on the grounds that they violate the 14th amendment (being rather close to the indentured servitude model). I think the (optics) problem is that it's a "more obvious voluntary fractional slavery program". So it's easy to criticize. Of course, because it's a less obvious voluntary fractional slavery program, non-dischargeable loans are simultaneousl…

I could be okay with income share agreements if they had a (short) time and percentage cap. Otherwise I feel like we'll have the same problem, students will sign agreements that they don't understand, and then end up paying for it for a large part of their life.

Is 10 years short? 20% for 10 years is what it would take for many computer science majors to pay for their degree. And that's ignoring the time value of the money.

Re: Colleges at the breaking point, forcing ‘hard choices’ about education

#840

Post by lcall » Sat, May 02, 2020, 3:10 PM UTC

lcall wrote: post #299

grubb wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know that standard BYU has the lowest tuition in Utah, lower than any state school, provided you are a tithe-paying member of the Mormon Church [1]. Otherwise they have a higher tuition, similar to the in-state/out-of-state changes for most state schools. Does BYU pathway tuition work the same way? I don't have a ton of experience with Western Governor's, but the fact that unlike many online universities they are n…

Good question: if you ask BYU Pathway Worldwide people or browse their site to learn about it, would be a good follow-up post here, to say. :) I am pretty sure I link to them indirectly above (i.e., to a page that has a convenient link to them). (Edit: from what I have read, I don't think there are different tiers for tuition, but it is all the same. Corrections welcome. I think it is quite low, for any student, so t…

Update: FWIW, wkp makes WGU sound good, like here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WGU#Rankings and here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WGU#Methodology_and_Rigor .