Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free • Hacker News Board

Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free

#201

Post by em-bee » Mon, Oct 02, 2023, 7:28 PM UTC

_8j50 wrote: post #106

I couldn't bring myself to be indebted at such a young age so I skipped college then. But this is america, not europe things are different. For better or worse, indebting people at a young age is how the "college educated worker" pipeline works and the class system functions and controls upward mobility. Not to mention military service. If you are ok with mandatory military service and more stringent and competitive…

the government telling you based on your score what degrees you can pursue for free

in germany this is solved by allocating a number of slots for each degree. those slots are then filled with the best students first, until all slots are allocated. the score that you needed to get in was effectively the lowest score of any student that did get in. this means that in one year it could be that you needed an A to get into eg physics and in another year a C was enough. so it's very much supply and demand, and better grades give you more choices.

Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free

#202

Post by MarkMarine » Mon, Oct 02, 2023, 7:31 PM UTC

monero-xmr wrote: post #124

MarkMarine wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

could you answer those questions I asked you?

On this thread I prefer to debate in the abstract rather than let emotions into it. Emotionally speaking my friend’s kid has muscular dystrophy and it’s extremely sad and heart wrenching to watch what was formerly an active toddler degrade into wheel chair bound pain and suffering, leading to a death around 30 years old. I wish society would put unlimited funds into solving this disease because I personally see how d…

That answers the question. You’ve got a college degree, probably for a lot less than kids today are faced with paying, you’re probably quite successful and yet… it’s just not enough right. The most important thing is that you keep as much wealth as you can. The broader concerns of what’s good for society, that shouldn’t come into play. You got yours, how do you stay there if not by keeping the rest down and not contributing

Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free

#203

Post by whatshisface » Mon, Oct 02, 2023, 7:32 PM UTC

jncfhnb wrote: post #160

karaterobot wrote: post #46

> There’s the age-old question of how we pay for this. Sanders proposed a Wall Street financial transactions tax. A 0.1 percent tax, according to a Congressional Budget Office estimate, could raise $777 billion over 10 years. Or we could hike taxes on corporations and the wealthiest Americans. I have no problem taxing wall street or "the wealthiest Americans", but I don't see the connection between this proposal and…

It’s probably a pretty smart idea. The “ideal tax” is probably a wealth indexed income tax. We don’t like the idea of just taxing wealth because you have it. We do tax income but it’s hard to scale it in a way that people perceive as fair. What we want is to make it harder for the rich to get richer without making it harder for the poor to get rich. That is, if you’re a billionaire, every dollar is taxed at 99 cents.…

Why does receiving rent involve more layered financial transactions than paying rent?

Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free

#204

Post by tester756 » Mon, Oct 02, 2023, 7:32 PM UTC

godelski wrote: post #166

A bit off topic, but honestly meeting people at top schools and mid/low ranked schools, I don't see much of a difference except in the opportunities these people have. Whether it is physics or CS, I don't see a meaningful quality difference in their work, only that the Stanford/MIT/Berkeley kid gets more internships and has an easier opportunity getting a new job if they mess up at their old one. I routinely see peop…

That's why I wish there were exams just like high-school ending exams.

This way it aint as relevent where you went, but what your score was, so people from the "bottom" can bootstrap themselves easier.

In India there's such a thing

>Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE) is an entrance examination conducted in India that primarily tests the comprehensive understanding of undergraduate subjects in engineering and sciences for admission into postgraduate programs.

Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free

#205

Post by dbrueck » Mon, Oct 02, 2023, 7:40 PM UTC

kelseyfrog wrote: post #168

dbrueck wrote: post #142

I agree with the 'stop arguing over elite schools' bit. To me, elite schools look like a huge waste of money and I urge anyone considering an elite school to study the law of diminishing returns. To other people, going to such a school is absolutely worth it and crucial to their life plan. Let them charge what the market will bear and let them accept students within the same framework that any other business follows…

Elite schools transmute money into merit. Even if we completely marketize them, the human biases that exist in relation to them are sticky. This doesn't mean that "people's biases are wrong, therefore the consequences are irrelevant." It means that the choices made must account for those biases. The choices we make regarding merit laundering, must account for people's biases toward graduates. We would be fools not to…

> Elite schools transmute money into merit.

Eh, I don't know. Those schools transmute money into networks for sure, but the degree they do it for merit seems drastically less, perhaps it's even initially a negative at first. I mean, the lazy rich kid who got into Yale because of daddy is such a well-established stereotype now that it's almost the default expectation. :)

Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free

#206

Post by jonhohle » Mon, Oct 02, 2023, 7:41 PM UTC

biomcgary wrote: post #155

jonhohle wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My parents couldn't afford anything… Not saying its the right way, but grew up without a lot of financial resources, no money specifically to pay for college, and I went to a private 4 year engineering program starting in 1999 by taking out boat-loads of loans. Going into school I had nothing and needed 100% of my tuition covered by loans, grants, or scholarships. I was reasonably confident that having an engineeri…

My college experience was similar and around the same time (but I tacked on a biology PhD and post-doc, which delayed earning considerably). My impression is that the cost of higher education has increased considerably over the past two decades relative to general inflation and expected income. Increased expense reduces lifetime ROI of education considerably and delays many milestones (e.g. purchase of first home).

The same things were being said in the 90s: college is too expensive, only wealthy families can afford it or you'll need to get a full ride scholarship (that's what I was guilted with during HS).

You're right though, about increased tuition, and it's easy loans that cannot be discharged that are one of the major culprits, but living on campus at a public university costs as much as my private tuition plus room/board did 20 years ago. Inflation adjusted, it's 55% of what I paid and starting engineering salaries are 250% higher than when I graduated (it makes me a little sick to see what college hires make ;-) ).

This isn't true for maybe 90% of the degrees a university offers. I would never suggest anyone take out a loan for a degree that wouldn't pay for itself with low risk. This includes degrees that are undervalued (teaching, for example).

Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free

#207

Post by currymj » Mon, Oct 02, 2023, 7:44 PM UTC

candiodari wrote: post #170

currymj wrote: post #159

ETH Zurich and EPFL (in Lausanne) are elite technical schools, which also have extremely low tuition (roughly $1000 total per semester) and open admissions. There is no entrance exam required for students who have a Swiss high school degree that qualifies them to attend university at all -- they may simply enroll. The trick is that the first year or two are made extremely difficult so many people drop out. However, t…

Only if you satisfy a long list of conditions. The reason this is the case is that Switzerland sorts kids very early, at 12 years essentially. Get sorted wrongly once and while you do get a second chance, they make sure it takes you 2 years absolute minimum, 4-6 years normally and even more is possible to enter university. Oh, and if you get sorted wrong (lang or kurzgymnasium), it takes years and expensive courses t…

what is the tuition if you are over 25? I think it is still about 800 CHF. This is extremely cheap.

Compare to MIT which is about $40,000 a semester, with the average student after financial aid paying $20,000, and is in Cambridge, a city where rents are about as bad as Zurich (although most students live in MIT dorms). if MIT failed out 50% of their class with $40-80k in debt, this could not be tolerated.

Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free

#208

Post by _8j50 » Mon, Oct 02, 2023, 7:58 PM UTC

em-bee wrote: post #201

_8j50 wrote: post #106

I couldn't bring myself to be indebted at such a young age so I skipped college then. But this is america, not europe things are different. For better or worse, indebting people at a young age is how the "college educated worker" pipeline works and the class system functions and controls upward mobility. Not to mention military service. If you are ok with mandatory military service and more stringent and competitive…

the government telling you based on your score what degrees you can pursue for free in germany this is solved by allocating a number of slots for each degree. those slots are then filled with the best students first, until all slots are allocated. the score that you needed to get in was effectively the lowest score of any student that did get in. this means that in one year it could be that you needed an A to get int…

That's a very level headed approach. But I wonder if the US would be more like India where kids kill themselves over college admission scores because since college is free, everything you can do in life depends on it.

Personally, I like free college but only for very specific degrees where is demand and having a degree makes sense. Like IT shouldn't be free but medicine or law should, because you can learn IT on the job and it is more close to a trade you can apprentice in. Where apprenticing or learning on the job makes sense, degrees should not be subsidized and pursuits like philosophy where there isn't any economic demand for the degree should be paid by the student.

Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free

#209

Post by xboxnolifes » Mon, Oct 02, 2023, 8:19 PM UTC

saghm wrote: post #196

karaterobot wrote: post #46

> There’s the age-old question of how we pay for this. Sanders proposed a Wall Street financial transactions tax. A 0.1 percent tax, according to a Congressional Budget Office estimate, could raise $777 billion over 10 years. Or we could hike taxes on corporations and the wealthiest Americans. I have no problem taxing wall street or "the wealthiest Americans", but I don't see the connection between this proposal and…

> It feels like taking money away from people who don't vote for you, and giving it to people who do. That's a bad direction to go down, and I'm generally skeptical about politicians who do this (which is a lot of them) I'm trying to follow this logic, but I'm struggling. Do you think that people should be able to opt out of taxes by just not voting, or voting for a third party that never wins, or strategically tryin…

It's effectively buying votes with someone else's money. You run a campaign with a promise that amounts to: I'm going to tax 0.01% of the population and distribute it to everyone else. Do you think that impacts whether you get votes from the remaining 99.99%?

It's easy to suggest taxing people who aren't in your target supporter base.

Re: Stop Arguing over Elite Schools. Just Make Public Colleges Free

#210

Post by kelseyfrog » Mon, Oct 02, 2023, 8:23 PM UTC

dbrueck wrote: post #205

kelseyfrog wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Elite schools transmute money into merit. Even if we completely marketize them, the human biases that exist in relation to them are sticky. This doesn't mean that "people's biases are wrong, therefore the consequences are irrelevant." It means that the choices made must account for those biases. The choices we make regarding merit laundering, must account for people's biases toward graduates. We would be fools not to…

> Elite schools transmute money into merit. Eh, I don't know. Those schools transmute money into networks for sure, but the degree they do it for merit seems drastically less, perhaps it's even initially a negative at first. I mean, the lazy rich kid who got into Yale because of daddy is such a well-established stereotype now that it's almost the default expectation. :)

The point of laundering is sneaking in just enough bad with the good that it's more difficult/expensive to sort it out again than it is to accept that it's good and doesn't damage the brand.

The reputation of elite institutions is a product of them mixing in just enough bad[sons and daughters of the elite[1]] with the meritorious[high student performers] that it's not worth it for us to sort it out ourselves and doesn't damage the reputation of the institution.

The lazy rich kid to you, may be the perfect candidate to a VP hiring for an influential role. I'd be hasty to generalize your own perspective to those who are filling those seats.

I brought up merit laundering for a reason: offering free public institutions reduces the merit pool for elite institutions in a way that reduces their efficacy in laundering merit.

The meritorious care far less about the reputation of elite institutions than the elite do. After all, the launderers gain more from cleaning the dirty money than they do from dirtying the clean.