Earlier quoted context omitted.
> You're just confused over who's paying for it. He's not.
He is.
You believe that people in countries that fund college tuition genuinely don't understand that it comes from general taxation?
Colleges where everyone works and there's no tuition
71–80 of 149 posts
Re: Colleges where everyone works and there's no tuition
#72Earlier quoted context omitted.
This should be unsurprising since most colleges/universities already have student workers. From places in admin, campus guides, working odd jobs like the cafeteria or library, or many other places. The two schools I've been to limit these workers to 20 hrs/wk (so it is part time and they can be "full time" students). But this is nowhere near enough to pay for tuition. It is really just "beer money" (about $300/wk if…
Harvard, or other universities, are not too different from other corporations. Why would they offer to pay for something that their customers themselves would pay for? After all, a Harvard degree is quite valuable, and who's reaping the benefit of it? They want to make as much money off their endowments (savings) as they can, and spend as little of it as possible on things that they don't need to pay for. Note that w…
Altruistic behavior in a non-profit? The horrors. If they want to be a corporation fine, then pay taxes like one. Otherwise they should find ways to price education at cost, not at market clearing prices. I am sure they can, just hit up donors some more and trim the administrative largess.
Re: Colleges where everyone works and there's no tuition
#73One thing that strikes me from this article is a vast bureaucracy, regulation, credentialing structures, accounting, etc. that the story revolves around. In Sweden, where I live, there are plenty of educational opportunities available to people completely free of charge. Entirely subsidized by the government. Instead of assembling elaborate bureaucratic structures, the state spends its money paying school admin and t…
When I went to university (in Sweden), a lot of people were just pottering around, taking additional courses to delay having to get a real job, so I suppose that should be factored in when comparing efficiency between different systems as well.
I was surprised to discover the same thing i Australia, where people pay tuition. I think we should be critical for this as an argument for tuition.
Re: Colleges where everyone works and there's no tuition
#74U. of Waterloo has an innovative model of alternating 4-month coops and then 4 months of school. By the time students graduate they've made some money and have a good amount of work experience. I really this was a model accessible to more people.
Northeastern is the big school for this in the US, the traditional model is two years of classes followed by alternating semesters of work and class until graduation for either 2-3 more years. In some cases you can come out with 2 years of experience before graduation
Re: Colleges where everyone works and there's no tuition
#75Another is Deep Springs College, about 30 miles from Big Pine, CA. This is a two-year school, in the remote desert. Enrollment is about 30 students, coeducational since 2018. There is no tuition, but students work ~20 hours/week at jobs including cook, irrigator, butcher, groundskeeper, cowboy, "office cowboy", dairy, and feedman. The college was created to both train and accustom technical staff for powerplant engin…
It feeds into really top tier schools, right?
Generally yes, I think the most common destinations are Chicago, Harvard, Cornell, and Michigan (Cornell and Michigan have Telluride houses which are run by the same organization as the college itself).
Re: Colleges where everyone works and there's no tuition
#76Sorry to depart from the feel-good narrative, but this kind of student labor is token or symbolic at best. The kinds of jobs that students can perform are not nearly the kind of jobs that a college with a physical plant to maintain, professors to pay, finances to administer, etc. can make a meaningful dent in. (By and large), students are not going to be doing electrical work, maintenance, financial accounting, admin…
It reminds me of https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_education_system This system is only used in German-speaking countries but it works there. The basic is that students are employed by a company and work there half the time. In return the company pays for the studies in the other half.
That's not 'only used in German-speaking countries', unless you insist on the (translated) naming.
It's called 'an apprenticeship' in the UK for example, and similarly elsewhere I assume.
Some universities offer them for professional degrees now too - I had a colleague at Arm who was part-time and a student on such a programme. (Two days a week year round apart from a break for exams iirc - quite distinct from the (more common) summer internship format.)
Re: Colleges where everyone works and there's no tuition
#77Re: Colleges where everyone works and there's no tuition
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
That does beg an interesting thought experiment though: what would that school look like if everything had to be done by the students. Less professoring and upper managerial responsibilities? Make the business students hash out contracts with vendors, IT students handle the networking, mechanical engineers the boilers, hospitality management majors dorm maintenance, and so on and so forth. Something like 15-20 hrs/we…
As you hint at, I think you would quickly find that the university would look like it's run by a bunch of slumlords, with things falling apart, and no one responding when the toilet gets clogged or the wifi goes down.
Why is it that people think it's okay to give 18 year old a machinegun and a granade and to send them to kill, or trust them with a 40 ton vehicle, but they can't be trusted at basic everyday life?
Even teenagers are perfectly capable of most administrative tasks. People rise to the challange, if the environment is right
Re: Colleges where everyone works and there's no tuition
#79Sorry to depart from the feel-good narrative, but this kind of student labor is token or symbolic at best. The kinds of jobs that students can perform are not nearly the kind of jobs that a college with a physical plant to maintain, professors to pay, finances to administer, etc. can make a meaningful dent in. (By and large), students are not going to be doing electrical work, maintenance, financial accounting, admin…
It reminds me of https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_education_system This system is only used in German-speaking countries but it works there. The basic is that students are employed by a company and work there half the time. In return the company pays for the studies in the other half.
A more concrete example of universities with this system are DHBWs in the state of Baden Württemberg:
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baden-W%C3%BCrttemberg_Coopera...
Re: Colleges where everyone works and there's no tuition
#80Fun fact about Berea College, researchers who studied it found that "white students who are randomly assigned black roommates have a significantly larger proportion of black friends than white students who are randomly assigned white roommates" [0]. Not all papers have found the same to be true [1], so there I personally think there is something especially propitious about the setting for breaking down barriers between groups, e.g., the strong egalitarian vibe/shared work experience.