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Chile is introducing free higher education

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Re: Chile is introducing free higher education

#51

Post by illumen »

MCRed wrote: post #47

I lived in Chile for several years. I think this is a bad idea for several reasons. First off, one of the things that makes Chile great is that its education system is independant of the government. It results in chileans who are markedly better at critical thinking than americans. (While there one of the things I did was work with high school and college students and of course got to know a lot of chileans.) Their s…

Is this good for the poor people who can not afford it? Will it make a difference? Certainly.

Will this result in a more highly skilled, and a more highly educated population? Yes.

People should still be able to afford private schools if they can now.

The American idea that you can't mix socialism and capitalism is absurd! (urg, just saying these words makes me feel like I'm using outdated old ideas from the 1800's!)

Societies much better than USA are mixing them well with great effect. Selling out your young people with debt is really silly. Having 45% illiteracy in the USA only benefits the people currently in power.

Re: Chile is introducing free higher education

#52

Post by the_af »

xname wrote: post #38

Is it fair to people who do not go to college?

Yes, it's fair. Just like a lot of public works and services are funded by taxes even if you in particular don't use them.

More importantly, fairness is a trade-off. Granting free universal access to certain things benefits the poor and those with lower incomes, even if it's not particularly beneficial for people with higher incomes. That's a good trade-off in my opinion, and in the opinion of progressive governments.

Re: Chile is introducing free higher education

#53

Post by ovulator »

the_mitsuhiko wrote: post #8

I don't think free college works without some sort of strings attached work. It exists in Austria and the quality of students and colleges is terrible. Everybody and their dog go to colleges now dropping the quality to abysmal levels. There is no proper selection happening.

The quality issue is already happening in the US. With the loans available to almost anyone in conjunction with a "college = success" attitude, everyone who wants to go to college pretty much is, regardless of the ultimate down the road cost.

And these colleges want to retain students for the full 4+ years to get the maximum amount of loan money, so they make the course work easier and easier to keep retention high.

Re: Chile is introducing free higher education

#54

Post by wordbank »

MCRed wrote: post #47

I lived in Chile for several years. I think this is a bad idea for several reasons. First off, one of the things that makes Chile great is that its education system is independant of the government. It results in chileans who are markedly better at critical thinking than americans. (While there one of the things I did was work with high school and college students and of course got to know a lot of chileans.) Their s…

Excuse me, but you're too fast on making conclusions. Also you're totally ignoring the lack of vertical social mobility in the Chilean society because poor people have no chance for education and better jobs for their kids.

> It results in chileans who are markedly better at critical thinking than americans.

This statement is too generalized. But even if it's correct then you can't pinpoint it to education. There's a whole culture behind

> Consequently the government runs a surplus does a great job of providing services

That's simply not true. Chilean government is criticized a lot and the president has very low ratings.

> Chile is the south american economic miracle as a result.

Chile is resource-cursed country with quite small population and low corruption. It's not the government's achievement.

Re: Chile is introducing free higher education

#55

Post by the_af »

MCRed wrote: post #47

I lived in Chile for several years. I think this is a bad idea for several reasons. First off, one of the things that makes Chile great is that its education system is independant of the government. It results in chileans who are markedly better at critical thinking than americans. (While there one of the things I did was work with high school and college students and of course got to know a lot of chileans.) Their s…

Is the government truly paying the bills, or the population?

If public university is autonomous, like in Argentina, you won't have this problem of the government calling the shots.

Re: Chile is introducing free higher education

#56

Post by jasonmp85 »

My first thought was "only 27%? The US has a 35% corporate rate and can't afford this".

My second thought was "oh, right, the US effective rate is around 12%".

How will they actually guarantee they collect this rate, as opposed to just scaring off corporations or having them offshore/tax-haven their way to maintaining profits?

Re: Chile is introducing free higher education

#57

Post by germanier »

rhino369 wrote: post #27
philippnagel wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, it is not that selective. According to the "Bildungsbericht 2014" 50% of all persons eligible to enter tertiary education do so [0]. In 2013 51.7% of people in the relevant age groups (18 - 21) were eligible for enrollment in a tertiary education program [1]. These are just some quickly researched numbers. Feel free to criticize! On a personal note: I am a german student and trust me, even at institutions regar…

25% going to college seems low. In America 63% of people have done some college, higher among those who are younger.

You have to keep in mind that Germany has strong apprenticeship programs which include practical on-the-job training half of the time and vocational school the other half. Those are not included in the numbers above.

Re: Chile is introducing free higher education

#58

Post by mburns »

the_mitsuhiko wrote: post #35
crimsonalucard wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There is no proper selection. Unless you're trying to filter out poor people, removing tuition makes selection MORE fair. Intelligence and capability should be the only criteria for selection, not money. Free higher education is not some imaginary ideal that doesn't exist yet. Take a look at universities in Sweden. If you're a citizen can attend great universities for free, No Strings Attached.

> Unless you're trying to filter out poor people, removing tuition makes selection MORE fair. You can have tuitions and financing options for poor people. As far as I understand Harvard and other universities operate schemes like that. > Intelligence and capability should be the only criteria for selection, not money. More than intelligence and capability it should be motivation. Make the access to university too eas…

>As far as I understand Harvard and other universities operate schemes like that.

Harvard is one of the richest non-corporate entities in the world, currently holding a ~$30 billion endowment. Saying "well, Harvard manages to do it" is not useful when talking about higher education on the whole, particularly public education.

>Make the access to university too easy and you have idiots like me taking up valuable resources because they were not forced to make a proper decision about what's good for them.

Even in for-pay schools, intro classes are full of idiots. People willing to sign up inherently have the motivation. If they don't also have the intelligence they should fail and not get to take subsequent classes. If your complaint is that dumb people are allowed to take classes, I don't think that's a problem, unless schools are somehow forced to grade on a curve or otherwise pad the work of students who are not performing well enough.

Re: Chile is introducing free higher education

#59

Post by nico »

wordbank wrote: post #48
nico wrote: post #36

Many problems with the article: 1) There's no way Chilean education is the most expensive in the world. Tuition for an engineering degree at the best universities in Chile is around USD 5k/year, which is way cheaper than pretty much any university in the US. (edit: in fact here's a ranking, and Chile is not even mentioned on it http://www.businessinsider.com/hsbc-australia-is-the-most-ex... ) 2) The tax hike was a bu…

It's the most expensive compared to the average salary in the country. In response to your other points: Chilean government fails a lot and the president has 25% rating. So at least they're trying to reset the government. Also you're looking at "virtual" education from NA/EU perspective but Chile is digitized very poorly compared to "on the edge" countries. Online services are like 2001-2003 US ones.

It's the most expensive compared to the average salary in the country.

Source please.

Chilean government fails a lot and the president has 25% rating

Exactly! so most likely the whole thing will fail before it even begins.

Chile is digitized very poorly compared to "on the edge" countries

Completely agree. So why not start with free Internet access for everyone instead (which should be way cheaper), and then negotiate with organizations like Coursera, MITx, KhanAcademy, Duolingo, Classroom.tv (Chilean), eClass (Chilean), etc to provide access to quality content, in spanish to all of Chile.

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