Universities Should Lower Tuition In Light Of The Pandemic
Juana Garcia/The Cougar
As universities begin the fall semester, their prices and tuition remain the same. This lack of change in tuition is turning out to be problematic for many students.
Due to the pandemic, most students are taking online classes, so it doesnt make sense for them to have to pay normal tuition since they arent getting their moneys worth of a full college experience.
Many of them and their families are also currently facing financial hardships and arent able to pay off their bills, let alone tuition.
College tuition need to be lowered.
Students are unable to receive a full college experience
Full college tuition typically comes with multiple features that make the cost worth it. From getting to take advantage of your campuss numerous study spots and resources, to the valuable face-to-face interactions with your peers and professors.
These are just a few vital reasons that make paying a college tuition worth the expense.
Unfortunately, the pandemic has taken away and decreased these interactions with our campus and the people in it, as well as the overall value of our education.
It seems as though everything has changed, except tuition that is.
Teachers who are used to giving a full in-person one to two hour class are now being forced to squeeze their material into bad quality online calls with way too many students.
Families are struggling financially because of the pandemic
Its the least they could do.
What If You Could Not Afford College
Reducing tuition would eliminate the possibility of student debt for most attendees. It would also open up more opportunities for people who could not afford college to attend. Eliminating student debt would allow attendees to focus more on their school work and everyday life, Better preparing them for the future.
Discount Tuition Model Fails To Serve First
Colleges use a discount model to price tuition, meaning the sticker price has little relation to what most students and families pay. For this reason, some argue that the college affordability crisis is not as bad as it appears.
Colleges intimidating sticker prices can deter prospective applicants.
Financial aid packages and scholarships help bring the actual cost of college down and can even make it free. For example, some students with great financial need are eligible for full-ride Pell Grants.
While the discount model is intended to flex to meet students’ needs, it’s often not helpful to first-generation college families. For individuals unfamiliar with the complexities of the higher education pricing system, intimidating sticker prices can deter prospective applicants.
As colleges become more serious in their efforts to diversify their student bodies, it will be incumbent on schools to make their pricing models more understandable and affordable for students from lower economic backgrounds.
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What Do We Do
Bennett suggests that there is still a place for the government to offer aid in the form of grants for very low-income students, and that school eligibility for student aid should be linked to default rates and tuition increases. Surely making colleges more invested in the success of their students is one place to start increasing the value of college.
Aside from public policy, there is a more immediate way you can change the higher education industry, and that is simply by voting with your dollars. If more and more families put their dollars behind universities that are making an effort to reduce costs while at the same time increase educational quality, more colleges will change their ways.
Whether college pays off for your child depends on many factors, including how affordable the school is, what major they choose, if they are able to graduate on time and more.
Unsurprisingly, not all colleges are equal when it comes to ROI. Perhaps more surprisingly, some schools actually have a negative ROI after taking into account the costs of attending.
The real test is whether the higher wages are enough to offset the investment in time and money associated with college. By that standard, college education does not look nearly as good. In fact, the financial return from attending many colleges actually appears to be negative.
Arguments Against Lowering Tuition
It makes sense that making college free isnt an easy thing to do. Firstly, you have to pay the staff and administration, as well as the overhead costs to keep the campus running. Secondly, many universities are for-profit and run as a business. Therefore, profits are of utmost importance.
Some arguments against lowering college tuition include the following:
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Discounts Disguise Unreasonably High Costs Of College Education
Asking whether colleges should lower tuition raises another question: Why do colleges charge so much in the first place? Offering discounts obscures the real issue of college affordability. In fact, the very availability of discount pricing, financial aid, and student loans have allowed college tuition rates to balloon.
The default rate for the 2004 cohort of college students could reach 40% by 2023.
Colleges have been able to increase their rates without losing students because of the attractive window-dressing supplied by discounts, as well as loans that don’t cost anything until after graduation.
According to the most recent data available from the National Center for Education Statistics, the average cumulative loan amount for bachelor’s degree-holders is $28,600 for graduates from public institutions, $33,900 for graduates from private nonprofit institutions, and $43,900 for graduates from private for-profit institutions.
Schools raise prices in order to capture additional federal financial aid and to offer more amenities to lure students and climb college ranking lists. Additionally, a lot of money goes toward supporting administrative costs. The number of administrators hired to help faculty has risen sharply in recent decades.
Meanwhile, the default rate on student loans is also on the rise. A 2018 report from The Brookings Institution predicted that the default rate for the 2004 cohort of college students could reach 40% by 2023.
College Students Are Being Played Like Pawns In A Cruel Monopoly Game And Its Just Not Fair
Grey Gordon, an assistant professor at Indiana University says Youve got to somehow tie aid to lowered tuition if you want to give money to students. You have to somehow structure it so colleges cant just increase tuition and capture that money. That means some sort of regulation by an agency or governing body.
Other critics deny this train of thought. In fact, David Feldman, an economics professor at the College of William & Mary and author of Why Does College Cost So Much?, says that increasing federal aid will rarely change how high a college sets its tuition. A colleges sticker price is set by its wealthiest students ability to pay and the wealthiest students never take out loans.
But that doesnt mean colleges never use federal aid to their advantage. Especially at private colleges, Feldman said, federal aid may replace existing scholarships. Take a student who would have gotten $20,000 from a college. If she gets an extra $1,000 in Pell Grants, she may get $19,000 from her college instead. The student pays the same, but the college pays less. At public universities, increases in Pell Grants typically lower net tuition. Its a very different system, Feldman said. Thats the nuance thats missing.
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Essay On Lowering The Cost Of Tuition
Lowering The Cost of TuitionCollege tuition needs to be lowered. The fear has set in for the new coming and current students with receiving a higher education. The amount people are paying compared to the inflation rates and where the money is going is unfair to the students of America. The United States was once ranked the top country for education, now ranks 14th.. As a country we need to catch up to the world new standards on correct education. Why people are against lowering the
Tuition Should Be Lowered
-College tuition costs are generally higher each year, meaning more money coming from your pockets.
*Higher Student Loan Debt
-Although theres a six-month grace period after you graduate, youll have to pay back your student loans. Higher tuition means that if you dont pay anything while youre in school, the amount you pay back will be higher.
*Discouragement
-If tuition continues to increase, students would be more discouraged to go on to College. Even with grants and other kinds of scholarships, students still will have a lot to pay for.
Advantages:
*Better Staff and Faculty
-To ensure that your college is staffed with good professors and good people, the administration needs to pay them properly.
*Motivation
-Typically if a student is paying a great deal of money for something, they will be much more likely to take it serious and appreciate it.
*Possibly Better Buildings and Classroom Equipment
-With better equipment and buildings, it could increase the amount to experience as well as knowledge that students are receiving.
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Why Colleges Should Not Cut Tuition Prices
FILE- In this March 14, 2019, file photo students walk on the Stanford University campus in Santa… Clara, Calif. Before student loans, people who couldnt afford to go to college usually didnt. Even though tuition was cheaper, it was still cost-prohibitive for many, who turned to solutions such as working through school, getting help from their parents or finding scholarships.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Most private colleges could lower their tuition prices. But they should not.
First, lower tuition prices would not help students as much as you may think. And second, it wont help schools at all. On the contrary, it may really hurt.
Lowering tuition wont help students because students already pay pretty low, pretty steady tuition rates. Despite what youve heard, the cost of college is not skyrocketing or whatever hyperbole headline misinformed writers want to use. As I wrote about a year ago, as a whole, college is not much more expensive than it was a decade ago. While it is true that sticker prices are going up, so are aid packages and discounts, keeping the overall net cost the amount students actually pay pretty flat and reasonable for the deal of a lifetime.
But the increased discounting at college that has kept real costs flat also means that if colleges cut their ticket prices, theyre certain to cut their aid offerings in kind, leaving little or no net change in what students pay.
Debt Forgiveness Affirms College’s Value To Low
Reducing tuition costs promises to improve college access and graduation rates. But many students and graduates have already taken out big loans to get their degrees. While often introduced alongside free-college plans, large-scale student debt forgiveness may actually top the wishlist of progressive education policymakers.
For one, research indicates that canceling student debt would boost the economy. The expanding costs of college take a bite out of education’s return on investment. And the longer it takes to pay the loan off, the bigger the bite.
College debt is also one of the stickiest forms of debt. While it’s not true that student debt is impossible to discharge through bankruptcy, Congress has made it difficult to do so.
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Doing More To Focus On Student Outcomes
Cost and debt are only part of the storywe need increased focus on student success.
Addressing growing college costs and debt is absolutely critical. Many more students need access to vastly more affordable and quality higher education opportunitiesincluding tuition- free degree options. For too long, though, America’s higher education system has focused almost exclusively on inputsenrolling students in collegeand too little on outcomesgraduating from college with high-quality degrees. We must reset the incentives that underpin the system so the focus is on the outcome that matters: completing a quality degree at a reasonable cost. Otherwise, we will merely be finding better ways of paying for an unsustainable status quo.
The most expensive education is one that doesn’t lead to a degree.
While graduating with high levels of debt is holding too many borrowers back from reaching their full potential, the even more damaging outcome is for students who take on debt but never complete their degree. In fact, students’ ability to repay their loans depends more strongly on whether they graduate than on how much total debt they take on.
Choose The Right Major
Many students and their parents try to analyze the job market or take average salaries into account when determining what to choose as a college major. It is wise to consider all the data you have, but its difficult to predict future job markets.
So what is the right major to choose? Think about the long term, and opt for a degree that will teach you transferable skills and stress critical thinking. If you think you might transfer majors, make sure there are plenty you are interested in to choose from.
College Factual has a free tool that will help you choose a major based on your natural strengths and interests. This means a degree that will capitalize on your strengths giving you skills to aid you in lots of career paths. Find your major now.
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It’s Simply Not Worth It
With the debt the students are left in along with the struggle of managing a house/apartment, keeping a car, and finding a better job. To make up the money lost and piling on is stressful, and for some, nearly imposable. A college degree doesn’t get you as far as you use to. To work without any degree use to get you by comfortably, now, if you don’t have any college experience, you will barely make it day to day. If you are even able to obtain a good college that gives you a chance to get a good job, you then have to work instead of study to keep up on the pile of looming debt they throw at you.
A Few Silver Linings Despite The Crisis
Zumeta said that while the coronavirus presents plenty of challenges for colleges, there’s room for growth. Forced to adapt to virtual learning, institutions may come out ahead in some areas.
“The positive side might be that there will be technological jumps forward,” he said. “Faculty and institutions will invest more in learning how to teach effectively with online technology, so you’ll see better versions of that. The advantage of having a big, complex system is that you’ll get a lot of experimentation, and some might lead to improvements.”
He also anticipates a temporary shift in enrollment at online colleges, which can be more affordable.
According to a 2018 study by Arizona State University, attending online colleges saves students up to 50% of the average per-credit-hour cost.
Because the public health outlook could mean delays in students returning to campus, enrolling in programs unaffected by the coronavirus could be a better short-term solution.
Higher waitlist acceptance rates might be another byproduct of the coronavirus. Kantrowitz said colleges dealing with reduced enrollment would be more likely to accept waitlisted students.
Depending on the public health outlook, colleges and universities could be vastly different. Still, not everyone believes students will be worse off.
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College Tuition Should Not Be Free
. Despite these high graduation numbers, students still decide not to attend college. So why should the public strive to provide free tuition if students do not go? More negatives than positives will come about from free tuition in public colleges and universities.B. Through extensive research on the pros and cons of free college tuition, I have come to be agaisnt free tuition. Being a college student, I know how difficult it is to find the money to go to school, but as good as it may
Government Loans & Grants Incentivize High Prices
Grants and low-interest loans are supposed to make college more affordable, right?
Well, think again. Colleges know that the majority of students will have an easy way to come up with money . Thus they can easily raise prices knowing students will just apply for more loans to pay for them. Without the easy access to college loans, students would be forced to choose lower-priced alternatives or simply demand lower prices, and colleges would have to follow suit.
The theory that more federal aid drives up college tuition prices is known as the Bennett Hypothesis. In an interview with the NY Times, Bennett says
If the federal government gives money, tuition goes up. If the federal government doesnt give money, it goes up. Now, I think the availability of federal funding drives it up more quickly and more surely. Federal student aid makes it easier for colleges to do what theyre going to do anyway, which is raise tuition. Theres more money available.
Federal loans were meant to help poor students achieve an education that would lift them out of poverty. Too often today they serve as a way to hold college graduates back from economic milestones such as getting married, starting a family or buying a house. Sometimes the fear of debt can keep students out of college altogether. One study found that debt above a certain level was associated with higher dropout rates .
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Why Private Colleges Reset Tuition
Colleges reset tuition for myriad reasons, but administrators cite cost transparency as a top goal. Families often dont understand that many high-cost private colleges offer significant tuition discounts to eligible students, Gilbert says.
That was the case in Sides’ family. Her husband suffered sticker shock with Seattle Pacifics prices, but Sides had researched its merit scholarships and suggested her daughter apply anyway. The scholarship Seattle Pacific awarded put the colleges price close to that of an Oregon public university.
Tuition discounts reached a record high in 2019. Yet, more often than not, a conversation to explain available financial aid and scholarships never happens because many lower and middle-income families walk away before understanding their specific cost, says Stephen Thorsett, president of Willamette University in Oregon.
Willamette is reducing tuition by 20% starting next fall, part of the universitys new vision as it shifts its identity to a national liberal arts university. The reset should make costs easier to compare with public universities, Thorsett says.
In 2018, Birmingham-Southern made the decision to cut tuition and mandatory fees , to $17,650, to be transparent about costs and to put it closer to neighboring Alabama public university prices in hopes of attracting new applicants. Boosting enrollment is often a key goal of a reset, particularly for private colleges competing with nearby public universities, Gilbert says.