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Why Germany Educates International Students for Free

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Re: Why Germany Educates International Students for Free

#211

Post by mafribe »

aphextron wrote: post #23

Should I study engineering in Germany? I'm looking at undergrad programs in California right now and the numbers don't add up for me. Not just tuition, but cost of living as a full time student as well. I also feel like it would be much easier for me (a non-traditional student) to get into a better university over there, as they pretty much just look at your test scores. Not all this GPA/extra-curricular "well rounde…

If you worry about accreditation and brand recognition, why not do a Bachelor's degree in Europe for free/cheap and then do a Masters in the US?

The Masters programs in top US universities are much easier to get into than their undergraduate degrees, and you'll only pay crazy fees for a short while.

Moreover, undergraduate teaching isn's all that different anyway, they mostly use the same textbooks, and most important: how much you learn is mostly a function of how much effort studying you put in (aka the negative correlation between party and learning). A good Bachelor's degree from a good European university coupled with a good letter of recommendation will get you into masters program in top US schools. (Source: I'm teaching at a European univ here, and I always gets my top students into US masters courses if I want to.)

Re: Why Germany Educates International Students for Free

#212

Post by biswaroop »

fauigerzigerk wrote: post #193
sparkling wrote: post #182

The article is wrong on so many ways. The author states that foreign students _plan_ on staying in Germany, however that is not what is actually happening. 41% of students abandon their studies before they have a degree. Out of the students that finish their degree, only 36% remain in Germany. Out of those remaining, more than half of them need more than 1 year(!) to land a job, indicating that they may not have the…

>First, despite constant media reports saying otherwise, there is no major talent shortage expect in very few niches. "Shortage" is not the right frame of refrence here, because it implies a fixed-size pie. Having an educated population tends to grow the pie for everyone (on average over a longer observation period). It's not like there is a fixed number of jobs mined from the soil of each country. This sort of flawe…

>It's not like there is a fixed number of jobs mined from the soil of each country.

This is so true. It applies to any system with competition. People tend to treat things like jobs and startups like natural resources, and tend to assume that competition is necessarily bad. In reality, feedback processes and strong interactions between players turn economies into highly unpredictable emergent phenomena. It's more like a flock of geese than an elementary chemical reaction.

For such large systems, it's hard to tell what the Nash equilibrium is, and whether it matches with the optimum global outcome. Animals (especially humans) have evolved to cooperate well in small groups (e.g. tribes, families). Over larger scales (e.g. countries, between language families), we have a strange balance between distrust, competition, and compassion.

Re: Why Germany Educates International Students for Free

#213

Post by whack »

dalbasal wrote: post #143
whack wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There can be an "absolute sense" from a financial perspective. For better or worse, having a degree from Harvard/Stanford/MIT can open a number of doors that may be otherwise shut. Doors which can be very financially lucrative. For example, suppose you want to work in finance/law. Most prestigious firms place a very high premium on having a degree from a top university, and pay extremely generously if you get your fo…

Can and will pay off is not exactly the same thing. To break even on an extra 100k within 10 years of graduating, the pre-tax premium on your salary needs to $1.5k -$2k on gross monthly salary. I wouldn't call that a brilliant investment even if it was a lot more certain than it is in reality. But importantly, there are lot of potential loss scenarios. The student could drop out, get sick at some point in the next 15…

> "To break even on an extra 100k within 10 years of graduating"

Why are you limiting yourself to a 10 year window? The average career last 30+ years. Over a time period that long, it's much easier to recoup the initial investment costs.

> "The student could drop out... get pregnant, go to jail"

Ironically, many of these dangers are much more likely to occur at non-elite universities, due to peer-influence and peer-pressure. This is actually a great reason to attend elite universities where you'll be ensconced in a ivory-tower-bubble.

> "A debt burden like this taken on by young people seems to me to be incompatible with the concept of free society."

I guess you and I define freedom differently. A society where only the ultra-wealthy attend elite universities, doesn't sound nearly as free to me. Allowing extremely bright middle-class kids to invest $0.25M in their education, so that they can optimize for their millions of dollars of lifetime earnings, as well as get the education they've dreamed of, sounds perfectly reasonable to me.

Would I prefer it if elite schools like Harvard weren't so damn expensive? Of course. But the current situation still sounds far better than getting rid of student loans entirely.

Re: Why Germany Educates International Students for Free

#214

Post by JoeAltmaier »

fauigerzigerk wrote: post #193
sparkling wrote: post #182

The article is wrong on so many ways. The author states that foreign students _plan_ on staying in Germany, however that is not what is actually happening. 41% of students abandon their studies before they have a degree. Out of the students that finish their degree, only 36% remain in Germany. Out of those remaining, more than half of them need more than 1 year(!) to land a job, indicating that they may not have the…

>First, despite constant media reports saying otherwise, there is no major talent shortage expect in very few niches. "Shortage" is not the right frame of refrence here, because it implies a fixed-size pie. Having an educated population tends to grow the pie for everyone (on average over a longer observation period). It's not like there is a fixed number of jobs mined from the soil of each country. This sort of flawe…

I agree. I've had 10 jobs in my life, and only 2 were regular employment. There rest? I invented them. They didn't exist until I approached someone and said "This is what I can do for you".

Re: Why Germany Educates International Students for Free

#215

Post by 1maginary »

nshelly wrote: post #87
paganel wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yes, you must first learn German, Maybe because of this? > be able to borrow EUR 9,000 to apply for the student visa Also, this. 9,000 euros does not seem like too much for people from first-world countries, but for people coming from relatively speaking much poorer countries that sum is quite high.

Yes, exactly. Learning a foreign language not widely spoken outside of Europe, while also taking college-level math and science courses is a high barrier to entry. This is the primary reason Germany is able to pull this off. If a high-quality college education were free in an English-speaking country, say Australia, there would be a lot more international students willing and able to enroll there. After graduating, y…

>Yes, exactly. Learning a foreign language not widely spoken outside of Europe, while also taking college-level math and science courses is a high barrier to entry

Obligatory "anecdote isn't data" but as someone in a third world country who seriously considered studying in Germany, the language learning aspect was the least of my worries. I got to a B2 proficiency level in around a year and to C1/C2 within a year of that (for context: you need B1 to apply for citizenship and C1 to apply to higher education programs in German).

Getting the 9k, plus flight expenses, all the paperwork expenses was what proved to be impossible; in reality you need around 12k. It was all too much. I had no way of getting that amount of money.

In the end I decided to stay and get my degree here. Learning German was a great experience so it wasn't all a waste. Met some great people along the way and discovered my love for linguistics.

I also personally agree that this policy isn't necessarily helping Germany overall. I think the Blue Card program is a lot more valuable and should probably be more heavily "advertised".

Re: Why Germany Educates International Students for Free

#216

Post by trident117 »

anon_7523 wrote: post #91

My personal experience says, that it is not working out. I cannot tell for the whole country, but I do have some insights, since I am hiring and interviewing students and studied in one of the universities mentioned elsewhere in the thread. There is an English speaking Master program, consisting almost entirely of Pakistani and Indian students. Some facts about them: - They are not required to learn German, so they s…

I would have to agree with you being an Indian student in Germany right now. I have seen a lot of Indian/Pakistani/Middle-Eastern students at my University with lower skills than what is usually desired of them at a Master's level. Of course, I can't generalize and there definitely are a lot of talented students in the mix as well. One interesting fact is, that my University recently reduced the number of admissions given to International students with probably some changes to the admission criteria, the standard of new students has now increased.

Also, you are right about some Universities being closer to German standards than others in India (I guess every country has good and bad Universities, the onus here is on the German Universities to identify the right ones and improve the admission criteria). I personally do not see a lot of difference between my University back home in India and the one I am enrolled at in Germany.

Re: Why Germany Educates International Students for Free

#217

Post by lispm »

patall wrote: post #180
markdown wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's interesting. Are there options for the 73% that don't go to Uni? Trade schools? What about at lower levels (ages 5-12)... do kids get to progress to the next level regardless of performance in an annual exam (like the US "no child left behind" policy), or do they have to have to repeat a year/level if they fail?

In addition to the other comment, 73% is counting all grown up germans. The current generation has an university enrollment rate of about 50%. So while many older germans have basically been trained on the job, many younger once wont which is one of the reasons many younger foreign europeans now learn a job in germany as no inlanders apply. Tradditionally we have the concept that kids can fail a grade and have to rep…

> The current generation has an university enrollment rate of about 50%.

Enrollment does not mean that they get a degree. That's simply a different number.

Re: Why Germany Educates International Students for Free

#218

Post by paganel »

cagataygurturk wrote: post #152
paganel wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yes, you must first learn German, Maybe because of this? > be able to borrow EUR 9,000 to apply for the student visa Also, this. 9,000 euros does not seem like too much for people from first-world countries, but for people coming from relatively speaking much poorer countries that sum is quite high.

Why learning German is a big issue? These are young people who can learn a language easily and in the beginning nobody expects you so high proficiency and people will always help and encourage you to learn the language. In Europe many educated folks know min 2 languages more and very open to learn more, you just need to leave your comfort zone. Learning languages also develops intellectually.

> In Europe many educated folks know min 2 languages more and very open to learn more

Am Eastern-European, my mother tongue is a Romance language, I speak and read English, read and understand Italian, French and Spanish. German has proved too much of a hurdle for me.

Re: Why Germany Educates International Students for Free

#219

Post by faragon »

wolfgke wrote: post #206
faragon wrote: post #157

In my opinion, unless German IT companies accept to work in English because available workforce in neighbor countries already know English, or they're going to have problems attracting world-class talent. I.e. accepting as "acceptable behavior" people not willing to learn German as a requirement.

> German IT companies accept to work in English because available workforce in neighbor countries already know English Let's look at the neighbor countries of Germany and my impressions of their German language skills: Austria: German is spoken there Belgium: ? Czechia: Czechs who want to work in Germany often know German (to me) surprisingly well (this can perhaps be explained by German history (keyword: Sudetenland…

> TLDR: In many Germany's neighboring countries it is common to know German on a decent level - at least if you plan to work in Germany. If there was I second language from a neighboring country in which work should be accepted, this should rather be French (for France and Belgium) instead of English.

Sure, e.g. I did myself one year of German courses (I forgot most of it, because it was long time ago). In my opinion the point is to make attractive world-class talent for working in Germany, even for short periods of time. I.e. the "nationalist barrier", that is still very strong in Germany and also e.g. in France, in my opinion hurts badly IT companies (fortunately, now is a much smaller problem versus how it was 15-20 years ago, when it was very difficult to work in Germany or France with just English).

In my opinion, unless European Union countries become more pragmatic, accepting the English as the "IT language", or the handicap for hiring world-class talent will still be a issue, for both the internal EU job market, and also for getting international talent (e.g. a talented Indian would try first to work in the USA or the UK just because he already did English in the school, being ha handicap having to learn French or German for a temporary job).

Re: Why Germany Educates International Students for Free

#220

Post by unityByFreedom »

louithethrid wrote: post #186
whack wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There can be an "absolute sense" from a financial perspective. For better or worse, having a degree from Harvard/Stanford/MIT can open a number of doors that may be otherwise shut. Doors which can be very financially lucrative. For example, suppose you want to work in finance/law. Most prestigious firms place a very high premium on having a degree from a top university, and pay extremely generously if you get your fo…

TL,DR; The Universitys work as a bribe-able doorkeeper, and nobody gives anything about the education. Why not bribe the companys you apply directly? Make a law degree for cheap and bribe a fellow with half a million? Cut out the middle man.

Haha you must be joking =)

Much as we like to decry the high cost of university, there is still a lot of value there for some. Others don't need it and can study law, or computer programming, on their own. Good on them. They prove themselves in other ways, like the bankrobber who later became a Georgetown law professor [1]

More bribes aren't going to make life any easier and definitely are not the solution to the high cost of university ;-)

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/grade-point/wp/2017/04/2...

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