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Too little is known about whether money spent on higher education is worth it

economist.com

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Re: Too little is known about whether money spent on higher education is worth it

#51

Post by mturmon »

DannoHung wrote: post #22
Donzo wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I agree with your general sentiments, I find that most people who bash the Common Core State Standards don't really understand them. Why, exactly, do you feel that Common Core is a failure? Education is one of the few areas that the state has clear, Constitutionally defined authority to manage over the federal government. Yet, 46 out of 50 states have accepted the Common Core, which seems to me to be a tremendo…

Maybe the Common Core standard is fine, but whoever is coming up with the actual problem sets for the Common Core seems to be an actual crazy person.

I have to agree. My kid's fourth grade class (Common Core, California; adopted a NY State based text) has been going over multiplication of two and three digit numbers in three different ways for over a month now.

I like math, and I can see what they're trying to do (build intuition in a multi-faceted way & justifying different multiplication algorithms) but the way it is done is boring her to death. It is too much repetition, and they have squeezed the fun out of it in what seems like a desire for repeatability.

Re: Too little is known about whether money spent on higher education is worth it

#52

Post by Thriptic »

vacri wrote: post #47
mblevin wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is actually the most insidious misperception that a wide swath of people appear to have about American education. It's not that the government spends too LITTLE money - it's because it spends too MUCH without any in the form of cheap student loans with no risk based pricing. Any 18 year old with no credit history can go and and take out over a $200k of student loans ($57,500 / year) from the government, without…

So, here's the crazy thing. Back-of-the-envelope, but it gives a picture. Harvard has 20,000 students, give or take. Plucking a number from the air, let's say that one year of study is $50,000. Across 20,000 students, that's $1B in tuition fees. Harvard's endownment is $36B. For less than 3% of their endowment, they could give 'free education'. Obviously the whole picture is a little more complex, but it does add som…

I can't speak for Harvard, but MIT for example insures that all students who come from families making http://web.mit.edu/facts/tuition.html

Re: Too little is known about whether money spent on higher education is worth it

#53

Post by delecti »

roguecoder wrote: post #50

As an economist, if people are willing to pay the price being charged it is almost by definition worth it.

Doesn't that entirely ignore the phenomenon of bubbles bursting?

How many homes were "worth" more in 2007 than in 2009?

Re: Too little is known about whether money spent on higher education is worth it

#54

Post by drawkbox »

mjklin wrote: post #33
madengr wrote: post #29

Worth a watch: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/collegeinc/view/ Interviews an ex rocker, coke addict, making $$$ starting for profit schools, who's latest endeavor (Hope University or some such nonsense) milks tuition grants from ex-cons and the homeless. University of Phoenixes are strategically located near freeway exits.

This is the real strategy. Phoenix looks at what the federal government needs and offers classes in those subjects. Students get federal loans to pay for it all. Money is funneled straight from US govt to Phoenix, with students on the hook for it.

The thing that sucks about that is there is a real need for adult acceptable college, we declare people done/sorted way to early in life at 22/23.

University of Phoenix started for that need and actually used to have some decent focus in that area before it was bastardized for profit and major growth late 90s/early 00s. They may have also proved online learning is acceptable somewhat as you see other schools and traditional Universities offering it now. OSU offers a full CS online degree. The problem for UoP is they did not focus on quality and got greedy, they can't compete with traditional online as much now.

I think that online is partly the future of education and there also needs to be a focus on actually preparing young as we do now, and regular adults for new challenges. Anytime someone at any age is willing to go on a learning challenge the systems we have should encourage that.

Re: Too little is known about whether money spent on higher education is worth it

#55

Post by guyzero »

Thriptic wrote: post #52
vacri wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, here's the crazy thing. Back-of-the-envelope, but it gives a picture. Harvard has 20,000 students, give or take. Plucking a number from the air, let's say that one year of study is $50,000. Across 20,000 students, that's $1B in tuition fees. Harvard's endownment is $36B. For less than 3% of their endowment, they could give 'free education'. Obviously the whole picture is a little more complex, but it does add som…

I can't speak for Harvard, but MIT for example insures that all students who come from families making http://web.mit.edu/facts/tuition.html

I think on a few levels, MIT is not the source of problems in the US university system.

People do not tend to graduate MIT in deep debt and without job prospects.

Re: Too little is known about whether money spent on higher education is worth it

#56

Post by barry-cotter »

>More information would make the higher-education market work better.

Not by that much. Most graduates get jobs that their degrees are irrelevant to. Also, more selective universities will have better results than less selective ones even if they are merely equally good at teaching as less selective ones.

>Common tests, which students would sit alongside their final exams, could provide a comparable measure of universities’ educational performance. Students would have a better idea of what was taught well where, and employers of how much job candidates had learned.

There is no necessary connection to universities here. Why not just straight up separate teaching and testing? Why restrict taking these tests to people in their final year of university? P.Eng. exams are respected without being a university degree, like the Royal Statistical Societies certificates and diplomas.

Re: Too little is known about whether money spent on higher education is worth it

#57

Post by dollaaron »

vacri wrote: post #47
mblevin wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is actually the most insidious misperception that a wide swath of people appear to have about American education. It's not that the government spends too LITTLE money - it's because it spends too MUCH without any in the form of cheap student loans with no risk based pricing. Any 18 year old with no credit history can go and and take out over a $200k of student loans ($57,500 / year) from the government, without…

So, here's the crazy thing. Back-of-the-envelope, but it gives a picture. Harvard has 20,000 students, give or take. Plucking a number from the air, let's say that one year of study is $50,000. Across 20,000 students, that's $1B in tuition fees. Harvard's endownment is $36B. For less than 3% of their endowment, they could give 'free education'. Obviously the whole picture is a little more complex, but it does add som…

Harvard and Princeton both offer no-loan financial aid.

http://admission.princeton.edu/financialaid

Re: Too little is known about whether money spent on higher education is worth it

#59

Post by UberMouse »

sprusr wrote: post #32
dreamdu5t wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never went to HS or college. It's pretty easy to learn if you're motivated and have an internet connection. I have a high-paying career that I made for myself. Of course, whenever I bring this up people write me off as some kind of genius (I'm not) or some kind of exception. I'm really not. Yes, statistics show that going to college is correlated with more financial success than those who do not attend college. I s…

I'm a high school student in the UK in the process of applying to university courses beginning September this year. I haven't really put much thought into why I'm applying to universities as opposed to doing something else. It just seems like the done thing. I consider myself fairly knowledgeable when it comes to programming and software design, but if I were to be thrust into a working environment right now I'm sure…

A computer science degree at University will not teach you 'working skills' for the software world, you only get those from working on software with a team. I started my first job as a part time software developer at a local company in my last year of highschool and I'm now working full time at my second software company (And I'm only 20), I attended the first year of a computer science degree through my highschool which is the only higher education experience I have. As long as you demonstrate the ability to learn I think you would do fine at a software company, it's definitely something I would investigate before committing to university.

Now this is only my perspective as someone living in New Zealand, I'm not very familiar with the UK. But I think it would still be similar in the UK.

P.S I feel I should disclose that I am biased against universities, none of my friends have gone to uni and my flatmate is in the same situation as me. I don't really believe in the reasons most people go to university, I certainly don't think it's a decision someone should make coming out of highschool.

Re: Too little is known about whether money spent on higher education is worth it

#60

Post by judk »

brownbat wrote: post #40
nickonline wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The sticker price is misleading... There are scholarships... Work study... employers... offer loan repayments... public service makes some eligible for loan forgiveness Most of these (scholarships, work study) are available in other countries without the sticker price in the USA. Employers don't need to offer loan repayment as a starting bonus in other countries because the sticker price isn't so ridiculous. It wor…

> Most of these (scholarships, work study) are available in other countries without the sticker price in the USA. That's a distinction without a difference if almost no one is paying the sticker price except for the trust fund kid without any ability or willingness to work. > It worries me how you rationalize this away I disagree with you because the alternative model, "free or cheap for all," ends up subsidizing tha…

Therr are other ways to tax the wealthy than with extremely complex tuition funding shell games
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