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Dear Class of ’13: You’ve been scammed

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Re: Dear Class of ’13: You’ve been scammed

#71

Post by purplelobster »

Morphling wrote: post #9

I get that paying for your education is pretty bad, but as someone who is enjoying free bachelor level education in Finland I can tell that the amount of quality teachers is pretty low, our small campus has maybe 4 teachers I'd consider competent. I'm also the kind of guy who'd enjoy extracurricular clubs, but sadly out of the few hundred students at our campus total of 3 of us (me included) are interested in club ac…

Go to most of the small colleges in the US and you'll probably see the same thing. I don't know what it's like in Finland, but from what I've experienced at Swedish universities it also varies a lot. Uppsala, Lund, KTH etc have great student life and I didn't feel that people took it less seriously than at the american university I've been at.

Sure, we don't pay tuition, but usually parents don't pay for their childrens' living expenses during college either. I have about $50k in debt (very low interest loan), all from living expenses for 5 years. That plus the loss of income during this time means you can't really slack off.

Re: Dear Class of ’13: You’ve been scammed

#72

Post by demallien »

purplelobster wrote: post #69
codva wrote: post #16

I really have little sympathy for somebody that attends an out of state or private school and racks up $100K in college debt getting a sociology degree. My son just finished up his freshman year as a history major. However, he is going to the perfectly good public school located 15 minutes from home, and living at home. It's costing me $5000 a semester in tuition, which isn't chump change, but isn't going to bankrupt…

You have little sympathy? So for someone who doesn't live near a university, doesn't have daddy pay his tuition for him and provide free housing and food, it's just tough luck? Like another commenter said, that's $40k in tuition, probably another $40k for housing, food and other expenses during that period of time. Your attitude is not productive, and sounds to me like the typical "fuck you, I've got mine" attitude.

Noooo, not what the GP is suggesting at all. The GP is saying that local public schools generally pay subsidies to instate students, so that's not a very expensive proposition. He's saying that it shouldn't be $40k + $40k, but rather $10k + $0k (live at home with parents). Racking up an unnecessary $70k/annum debt is something of a self-infliceted wound if that more expensive option isn't going to pay itself off through increased earnings later in life.

Re: Dear Class of ’13: You’ve been scammed

#73

Post by vinceguidry »

The hack overuse of makes this article very difficult to take seriously.

The real military industrial complex and the regulatory capture it described was far more serious and dangerous than this ever could be, producing war after war on the backs of the poor to serve tiny oligarchies.

Compared to that, this is just a schoolyard tussle.

Re: Dear Class of ’13: You’ve been scammed

#74

Post by [deleted] »

michaelochurch wrote: post #43
sid6376 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you think once "we level up on technology and education and outperform these assholes", we will not become assholes ourselves? Tangentially related, but this[1] is one of my favorite articles from Less Wrong. A quote from that article "The young revolutionary's belief is honest. There will be no betraying catch in his throat, as he explains why the tribe is doomed at the hands of the old and corrupt, unless he…

This is my main reason for preferring to do it nonviolently (Avenue 1). We need to be building things that give power to the currently powerless and decentralize control, not the other way around. If we take power "for ourselves", we find that what we call "ourselves" is infiltrated by the worst kinds of people, and then they push us out. I don't have any moral problem with killing the current global elite. For what…

[deleted]

Re: Dear Class of ’13: You’ve been scammed

#75

Post by ahomescu1 »

michaelochurch wrote: post #15

It's better to understand this as an extortion dynamic than a single conspiracy. Mafia is a good analogy. There is no "Mafia" (except for werewolves, if anyone gets the allusion). There are various crime families and connections between them are loose to nonexistent. "Mafia" is a term people make up to describe what are actually a heterogeneous set of people who just happen to compete in such a way that they get the…

Who is this "global elite" you're talking about? Does it include Obama and the Democrats (most young people I know voted for them)? Does Vladimir Putin also count? Hugo Chavez? Silvio Berlusconi?

Most of today's corrupt and powerful people are in democratic governments, what do you do about them?

Re: Dear Class of ’13: You’ve been scammed

#76

Post by Morphling »

purplelobster wrote: post #71
Morphling wrote: post #9

I get that paying for your education is pretty bad, but as someone who is enjoying free bachelor level education in Finland I can tell that the amount of quality teachers is pretty low, our small campus has maybe 4 teachers I'd consider competent. I'm also the kind of guy who'd enjoy extracurricular clubs, but sadly out of the few hundred students at our campus total of 3 of us (me included) are interested in club ac…

Go to most of the small colleges in the US and you'll probably see the same thing. I don't know what it's like in Finland, but from what I've experienced at Swedish universities it also varies a lot. Uppsala, Lund, KTH etc have great student life and I didn't feel that people took it less seriously than at the american university I've been at. Sure, we don't pay tuition, but usually parents don't pay for their childr…

Yes, it is true that most students in Finland do take the government backed student loan, but I for 't taken it. I get few hundred euros student welfare from the government and rest I make up with part time jobs and working summers + living in a student housing is pretty cheap.

Re: Dear Class of ’13: You’ve been scammed

#77

Post by mikegioia »

AJ007 wrote: post #57
mikegioia wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with you, but you're neglecting to realize how little some people understand about the college process. My dad and I we're definitely in the upper quartile in the college application process, yet even I got stuck with 100k of debt from a private university. Why didn't I go to a public college instead? Who knows! All I can say is that I would have done it differently back then (graduated 2007). Now imagine you…

You don't need any help, its math that any high school student should be capable of. Its the same as any time you borrow money to buy something like a car or house, except with this one your ability to ever discharge the debt is quite limited! When I was starting college none of my friends really knew what they wanted to do. Many switched degrees. Some more than once. While I had only a rough idea at the time, in gen…

This has nothing to do with what major or direction high school students want to pick. I'm talking about the decision of where to go to school, and specifically highlighting the fact that uninformed kids/parents (at least in my case) picked the more expensive, private university because all signs pointed to that being the correct choice.

The answer here is to push lower cost, public colleges to kids who don't know what they want to do (or to even to those that do) instead of accruing 40k/year of debt trying to figure it out. The idea of going to a public school was out of the question when I was applying, when it very much should have been a key option.

Re: Dear Class of ’13: You’ve been scammed

#78

Post by dbarlett »

purplelobster wrote: post #69
codva wrote: post #16

I really have little sympathy for somebody that attends an out of state or private school and racks up $100K in college debt getting a sociology degree. My son just finished up his freshman year as a history major. However, he is going to the perfectly good public school located 15 minutes from home, and living at home. It's costing me $5000 a semester in tuition, which isn't chump change, but isn't going to bankrupt…

You have little sympathy? So for someone who doesn't live near a university, doesn't have daddy pay his tuition for him and provide free housing and food, it's just tough luck? Like another commenter said, that's $40k in tuition, probably another $40k for housing, food and other expenses during that period of time. Your attitude is not productive, and sounds to me like the typical "fuck you, I've got mine" attitude.

The key phrase is getting a sociology degree. While racking up $100K in debt for a Petroleum Engineering degree [1] arguably isn't necessary, it's much more defensible.

[1] http://blogs.wsj.com/atwork/2013/04/29/and-the-highest-paid-...

Re: Dear Class of ’13: You’ve been scammed

#79

Post by Roboprog »

jaxbot wrote: post #11

I'm class of '13 for grade school, entering college this fall at a state university. I've been programming since I was 8, and from what I can tell, my self-teaching has put me at a level above people fresh out of school with a flashy degree that says "hire me." I'm not good with words, but my point is this. I find it terribly concerning that I'm paying $50k to go to a school to learn something I already know, and kno…

Can you find a school that costs less that $12K per year? (In California, the CSU system is about half that for residents, I think, although UC is pretty close to that)

When you go, be prepared to learn about more than computers. Learn to write and speak. Learn History and Philosophy. Lean Psychology and Biology. Learn Art and Music. Learn how other people outside of the sciences think. Take in the abstractions that come with the Math classes that will go with your C.S. studies.

I also knew I was going to do C.S. before I started my freshman year at CSU, having spent some time looking into it before hand, but there is a lot to explore while you are there. (my family couldn't afford a computer in the late 70s / early 80s, so I didn't learn any programming until senior year of high school. I did manage to learn about binary, BCD, fixed precision arithmetic, simple encryption, hex math and a few other things in our grade school and middle school libraries, though, as well as wiring and soldering electronics at home) Use that as an advantage to make sure your class selections are progressing towards your major and degree.

To the author's point, though, when I went to CSU starting in 1983, it was about $500 / year in fees, going up to about $1000/yr when I finished in '88 (yeah, it's been a while). Now, for my university bound daughter, I'm looking at about $7000/yr in fees for CSU. Choose how and where you spend your money wisely

Re: Dear Class of ’13: You’ve been scammed

#80

Post by nostrademons »

Goladus wrote: post #49
Alex3917 wrote: post #18

This article is completely wrong. The basic claim of the article is that according to the College Board, the amount students actually spend to attend college has increased 300% over the last 30 years. Is this actual true? College Board does track the amount students spend, they call this statistic net sticker price -- that is, sticker price minus all grants, scholarships, and tax credits. However, they only track net…

The only problem with the article is overly emphasizing the "you are being scammed" angle. The article actually covers it from two angles, and the "net sticker price" is only the right metric for one of them (an individual student evaluating the ROI of their own personal education). Looking at the system as a whole, average net sticker price is the wrong metric. That's hiding real costs in the system. "Why is there $…

The difference between sticker price and net tuition (I don't understand what you mean by "net sticker price", that seems to conflate both metrics) is usually the result of price discrimination by the colleges. They raise sticker price so they can charge wealthy applicants more, and then offer generous financial aid so they can charge poor applicants less. It is a subsidy, but it's a subsidy within the organization.

Similarly, many of these financial aid grants at elite institutions are often funded through alumni donations and investment income off the endowment. This is also a voluntary transfer payment from rich to poor.

If you want to measure the incoming tuition flows into college, the metric you probably want is net tuition + government funding. That excludes transfer payments within the organization from rich to poor and donations to non-profit scholarship corporations, but includes funding from tax revenues.

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