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The Coming Meltdown In College Education & Why The Economy Won’t Get Better Soon

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Re: The Coming Meltdown In College Education & Why The Economy Won’t Get Better Soon

#71

Post by learc83 »

Retric wrote: post #57
mbell wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> New Mexico for example gives all students attending a state school with a high school GPA over 2.5 a scholorship. Where do you think that money is coming from?

Reducing the money they give to state schools. The stated funding source is lottery sales, but money is fungible. It's actually becoming fairly common Tennessee, New Mexico, Maryland, Georgia, Florida, Louisiana, New York, South Carolina, Missouri and West Virginia are among those sponsoring lottery-funded scholarship programs. http://www.scholarships.com/blog/financial-aid/lottery-schol...

Over time tuition costs begin to increase faster than lottery revenues.

Georgia has had the HOPE scholarship since 1993 (lottery funded), and since 2002 the amount covered has been steadily decreasing.

If student loan availability keeps increasing (causing tuition to rise), total tuition percentage paid by HOPE will be negligible

Re: The Coming Meltdown In College Education & Why The Economy Won’t Get Better Soon

#72

Post by lotharbot »

MaxGabriel wrote: post #23
gliese1337 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I do. That's why I quoted the price for non-LDS students. The price for tuition for LDS students, as listed on the same page, is about half of that; but, as the disclaimer says, you also have to take into account that they're paying an additional 10% of their total income.

Thanks! I am not really familiar with tithing, and when I first looked at the chart I didn't understand that LDS meant you payed a tithe.

Tithing is required for LDS who want a "Temple recommend" [0] (which itself is a prerequisite for temple marriage, exaltation, and so on.)

[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_%28LDS_Church%29#Entranc...

Re: The Coming Meltdown In College Education & Why The Economy Won’t Get Better Soon

#73

Post by learc83 »

AngrySkillzz wrote: post #26
MaxGabriel wrote: post #7

This was the first comment on Cuban's blog. Can anyone comment on it? I listened to the NPR Podcast, it is specific to private colleges; I am not sure how public colleges fit in. "The most recent Planet Money on NPR was about the cost of college. [1] They point out that the price that has been rising is the “sticker price.” However, the average price a student pays for college hasn’t risen (except to adjust for infla…

I believe that's true for many well-endowed and non-state institutions; the wealthy who can afford the full $45k tuition help to subsidize the poorer students who can't, and I don't see too much wrong with that. The problem is that that isn't the entire story. Yeah, federally subsidized loans mean more kids are attending school, but not everyone is eligible for subsidized loans. Many of my friends, and myself, were o…

>unnecessary equipment to have a selling point for certain departments, and construction/renovation is everywhere.

Exactly. When I started college I remember how ridiculous it was that every damn monitor on campus was a flat panel (this was when flat panels where still a few hundred dollars more expensive than CRTs)

Now that I'm going back to school I'm shocked by the amount of construction going on. They've doubled tuition since I was last there in 2007 and there using it on to buy a multi million dollar skyscraper and build pretty fountains.

Re: The Coming Meltdown In College Education & Why The Economy Won’t Get Better Soon

#75

Post by Lednakashim »

ender7 wrote: post #60
grannyg00se wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If that's all your resume says, then you're probably right. But there should be something on there that indicates that you can do the job otherwise you wasted your time applying. The point is that education says nothing about being able to do the job in many cases. If you are applying for an engineering position and you have MIT on your resume, that is certainly going to imply that you very likely have what it takes.…

Unfortunately, "went to MIT" is both easily recognizable and easily verified. "Built a fusion reactor in my basement" is neither of those things. Similarly, "check out my GitHub" has many of the same problems. I'm sorry, but most employers don't have time to look you up on GitHub to crawl through all your commits. That will happen if you get past the first cut, but it won't do anything beforehand. Sure, you can put "…

My experience says otherwise, but it requires approaching the person and bragging for minutes. Its certainly possible to do this, but not via Internet or paper applications.

Re: The Coming Meltdown In College Education & Why The Economy Won’t Get Better Soon

#76

Post by randomdata »

ender7 wrote: post #56

I agree that the price of a college education is too high. I don't see how this justifies the conclusion that "therefore, people should stop going to college and take online courses." Most medical care is overpriced, but that doesn't mean that you shouldn't get a heart transplant. I am deeply skeptical that online courses or for-profit education will result in anything but a horrible mess. (this is not to say that it…

but it's much harder - it's harder to get hired and it's harder to acquire the knowledge and experience necessary to be qualified for a position

Is there any data to back this up? If we assume college is a four year undertaking, even if it takes you three years of work to find the job you are looking for without a degree, you're still expending less effort.

My anecdotal experience says it's not even difficult at all. I was able to land my first job in the industry I still work today on my first attempt in high school. Though I recognize that not everyone is so lucky.

Re: The Coming Meltdown In College Education & Why The Economy Won’t Get Better Soon

#78

Post by brc »

randomdata wrote: post #68
ntkachov wrote: post #17

The other end of the problem is that kid's aren't even trying to flip their degree. Most kids consider college and experience not an investment. You're kid is the worst investor on the planet. Because instead of majoring in Bioengineering they are majoring in psychology. And If they are majoring in psychology they aren't out to get the best damn research positions over the summer and publish papers, they are out work…

Most kids consider college and experience not an investment. How many are there due to pressure? At the end of my high school career, I was ready to enter the workforce. I was already working in the industry I wanted to be in; there was little value to going from that perspective. Yet, the pressure from teachers and peers persisted. I was going to fail in life if I didn't go to school. You know the meme, I'm sure. I…

I think this is the relevant point that most people are missing by looking at the trees instead of the forest.

It's patently absurd to think that every single person should go to college and receive a 3 or 4 year degree. For a start, some people will not be suited to study, and for a second, increased numbers of higher education qualifications simply reduce the value of said qualification.

More people would be better served by direct time in the workforce and specific vocational training.

But the meme of 'go to college or miss out' is pervasive, and continues to cause massive amounts of people to put major time and money into their qualifications. Education has become a sacred cow that nobody is allowed to criticise, yet objectively there is no evidence that increased amounts of college graduates are making a positive difference.

I'm all for continuing education - education should be a lifetime pursuit for everyone - but the current model of growing universities and growing student debt is clearly unsustainable. The growth has to at least stop at some point, and probably reverse.

Until people start looking at the cost/benefit ratio objectively instead of emotionally, nothing is going to change.

Re: The Coming Meltdown In College Education & Why The Economy Won’t Get Better Soon

#79

Post by Lednakashim »

There is no clear financial connection. The only way to make a strong financial connection is to imagine a default scenario; where thousands of students can't pay off their loans. There is little evidence for this as student loans tend to be cheaper then housing loans (It is impossible get 300K of student loans) and they tend to have nicer terms less ways to default. Perhaps whats happening is some kind of social slavery where it is harder to peruse ones dreams due to loans, but its not a financial bubble.

Re: The Coming Meltdown In College Education & Why The Economy Won’t Get Better Soon

#80

Post by LockeWatts »

impendia wrote: post #16

I am in my first year as a mathematics professor at the University of South Carolina. Having moved here from Stanford, I've noticed several things. (1) Many students are woefully underprepared. In my calculus classes I have found that a great many of the students have not mastered high school algebra. And these are the students who pass our placement exam, and aren't obliged to take one of our many algebra and precal…

>I have found that a great many of the students have not mastered high school algebra.

Why should they have? It doesn't take 'mastery' to pass a class, it takes proficiency. Expecting perfection in all previous classes from students is silly.

>Many of the students aren't all that motivated, and resented me for asking a lot of them.

Are you teaching Math majors? If not, of course they aren't motivated. Most of them won't be using calculus in their daily life, they don't see it as valuable. Why should they, either, if nobody is presenting it's value?

Your post isn't a bad one, I just find a frustration with professors who forget sometimes that not everyone is interested in their subject. In an ideal world you would only teach people who want to learn your subject, but this is not an ideal world.

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