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Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

nytimes.com

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Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#51

Post by Jtsummers »

minitoar wrote: post #16
DC-3 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did it ever occur to you at all that people might value education for its own sake and not for potential financial yield alone?

I don’t think most people going to 3rd-tier college to study humanities are doing it out of some abstract love of education. They’re doing it because every adult or counselor in their life told them they have to go to some college no matter what.

And, worse, many office jobs that were satisfied with high school diplomas or 2-year degrees in 1980 were requiring a bachelors by 2000. Even when the degree was irrelevant. Seriously, data entry does not require a history degree. At one place I worked nearly every one in the data entry positions had a history degree, and all had 4-year degrees of some kind.

(NB: Talking about in the US)

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#52

Post by dgfitz »

DC-3 wrote: post #11
awillen wrote: post #7

I think this is generally a good thing. I believe there are really two positive things that can come out of going to college - either you get a name-brand degree that opens doors and gets your resume looked at, or you get useful skills that enable you to go down a particular career path (e.g. CS degree). Obviously in some cases it'll be both. The reality is it's really tough to make any case that a humanities degree…

Did it ever occur to you at all that people might value education for its own sake and not for potential financial yield alone?

“You wasted $150,000 on an education you coulda got for $1.50 in late fees at the public library.” - Good Will Hunting

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#53

Post by gonehome »

a-posteriori wrote: post #6
sct202 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The top colleges have very complicated pricing schemes and are basically free to middle and lower income students, for example a student to MIT only pays if their family earns more than $90k a year which is above the median household income of $68k.

When I was there, less than 8% of the students were paying full tuition (of which a good chunk were international students). At a certain point, the colleges start to look like perfectly price discriminating monopolists: rather than charging the highest price to each customer, they set a maximum price ceiling and then subsidize the gap to the customer's marginal ability to pay.

The price is so high that even if you’re not paying full price, it’s often still extremely expensive.

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#54

Post by kop316 »

DC-3 wrote: post #11
awillen wrote: post #7

I think this is generally a good thing. I believe there are really two positive things that can come out of going to college - either you get a name-brand degree that opens doors and gets your resume looked at, or you get useful skills that enable you to go down a particular career path (e.g. CS degree). Obviously in some cases it'll be both. The reality is it's really tough to make any case that a humanities degree…

Did it ever occur to you at all that people might value education for its own sake and not for potential financial yield alone?

I have found Community Colleges to be the perfect place for this actually.

Community College classes are MUCH cheaper, and are even more so if you don't take the class for credit (where I went, tuition was $20 for a 1 credit class for non-degree seekers. No that was not a typo, it was Twenty USD for the entire class).

Community College professors don't do research, so they are usually focused much more on teaching classes. I have actually known quite a few professors who are in actual industry and teach a class or two.

I took a Jazz Combo class every semester with a well known local musician. He enjoyed teaching the class because everyone wanted to be there (we were all adult non-degree seekers), and since it was on a weeknight, he wasn't gigging anyways so it was a nice bonus to his freelance work.

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#55

Post by colinmhayes »

borski wrote: post #35
colinmhayes wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plenty of middle class families making low to mid 100k but not contributing to their children's tuition bill because they live in HCOL area. But yes, low income students don't pay.

“Plenty,” sure. But not a majority or anything. The median family income in the US is something like 68kb

What about the median income of people who attended college?

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#56

Post by mrweasel »

minitoar wrote: post #16
DC-3 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did it ever occur to you at all that people might value education for its own sake and not for potential financial yield alone?

I don’t think most people going to 3rd-tier college to study humanities are doing it out of some abstract love of education. They’re doing it because every adult or counselor in their life told them they have to go to some college no matter what.

The article is about colleges in the US, so I have no reason to doubt you. It’s just a ready bleak observation for someone who is raised to pursue a career that would make me happy, and be lucky enough to live in a country that allows me to do that.

More and more the Internet makes me feel that the US somehow lost the cold war and it’s now a dystopian nightmare.

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#57

Post by AlwaysRock »

There are a lot of people in this thread talking about how important a big name college is. As a counterpoint... If you are not trying to work for a FANG company within your first ~3 years of graduating I don't think a big name college with a great CS program matters at all.

A Carnegie Mellon degree may help you get more interviews and therefore land your first job if you are struggling otherwise but its likely the person with the Kent State CS degree and the Illinois Urbana Champaign CE degree are not applying for the same jobs right out of school.

After the first few years education becomes less important and actual skills become far more important. Again this is more true at non FANG/SV/Start up type companies. Which is where most engineers will work for the majority of their career.

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#58

Post by lumost »

leetcrew wrote: post #5
lumost wrote: post #2

Colleges should have more price stratification than they do. At present the price difference between MIT and Umass Amherst out of state is only 41%. Both will leave a student heavily in debt to the tune of 150-300k, the difference likely doesn't materially matter to the student as they are looking at is as a ticket to a better life.

> Both will leave a student heavily in debt to the tune of 150-300k unless you have a very weird financial situation, no US student is going into anything like that much debt to go to either of those two schools. it looks like you got those numbers by just taking the tuition and multiplying it by four. both schools offer substantial aid packages for eligible families. the average yearly tuition contribution for MIT i…

I left Umass Amherst with ~75k in debt in 2010. At the time the list price was 30k.

If your family exceeds the cutoffs for financial aid, but for various reasons cannot provide for college expenses - you are going to go into a lot of debt. One of my friends from the time managed to take 120k for an english major that left them with a $12/hr job at graduation.

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#59

Post by Kinrany »

ryandrake wrote: post #39
BitwiseFool wrote: post #25

I sense that the fundamental purpose for going to College has changed from "getting an education" to "building your brand" as an individual. I don't work in Human Resources, but as a software developer I do spend a lot of time around my company's recruiters and I'm involved in the hiring process. A candidate's alma mater has an outsized impact on the likelihood they will advance to the next step of the hiring process…

> Most people people don't realize just how much name recognition matters when sifting through resumes. I think most people do realize it, which is why we're seeing what's being written about in the article. People realize if you merely want to be educated, you can do that for cheap or free anywhere, but nobody in HR screening resumes cares if you're educated. They care that you have name-brand pedigree. I remember f…

Sims + Battle Royale, this is great

Re: Interest surges in top colleges, while struggling ones scrape for applicants

#60

Post by jawzz »

akhilcacharya wrote: post #22
lumost wrote: post #2

Colleges should have more price stratification than they do. At present the price difference between MIT and Umass Amherst out of state is only 41%. Both will leave a student heavily in debt to the tune of 150-300k, the difference likely doesn't materially matter to the student as they are looking at is as a ticket to a better life.

How much worse off is someone going to UMass by your calculation?

Not the OP, but as I’d say that subjectively speaking, you’re better off going to MIT, but only if you have the passion and drive to succeed at a place like that (which you probably do if you got into MIT).

But for Boston College, Boston University, or Northeastern? You’re probably going to end up paying more than MIT and get an education that’s indistinguishable from UMass, quite possibly worse in some respects.

What people have been saying in this thread is not incorrect (though should be nuanced): the ivy leagues are worth it for the caliber of the student body and reputation; otherwise, go to a (Tier 1) public school.

Unless, of course, you don’t want to and can easily afford otherwise.

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