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Tuition Should Be Lower For Science Majors, Says Florida Task Force
Hugh Pickens writes "Jordan Weissmann writes that a task force commissioned by Florida Governor Rick Scott is putting the finishing touches on a proposal that would allow the state's public universities to charge lower tuition for studying topics thought to be in high demand among Florida employers including science, technology, engineering, and math. The hope is that by keeping certain degrees cheaper than others, Florida can encourage students into fields where it needs more talent. For some, it might seem inherently unfair to send dance majors deeper into debt just to keep tuition low for engineers, who are already poised to earn more once they graduate, but task force chair Dale Brill says tax dollars are scarce, and the public deserves the best possible return from its investment in education and that means spending more generously on the students who are most likely to help grow Florida's economy once they graduate. Brill also argues that too few young people consider their career prospects carefully when picking a major. 'We're trying to introduce some semblance of a market dynamic information in an environment where there is none,' Brill says. 'Most students couldn't tell you what they pay in tuition. In economics, pricing is all we have to determine and work out supply and demand. So, when the consumer is completely separated from the cost of a product, then the cost rises.'"
Remember when everyone was supposed to become an aerospace engineer and then the industry collapsed in the early 90s?
You'd be surprised how many Republican-leaning voters are not social conservatives at all...I'd say 1/3rd of the total...hence the mediocre showing for deeply religious candidates :D
That being said, I paid my blood and my first born, thank you very much, and I don't support the next generation getting the free ride, particularly for students who are the most likely to have no trouble paying their loans back! This is silly popularism striking again.
The real path to male liberation
Great idea. Wrong implementation. There are many pitfalls with making science degrees cheaper, like for example what happens when you switch majors?
The best implementation for this is to leave tuition prices alone and reward students who graduate with a degree in a preferred field and who then go on to work in that field with loan forgiveness. So for instance, if you get a CS degree from the University of Central Florida (like I did in '91), every year you work in the CS field you would fill out a form and the government would pay off a certain dollar amount of your student loans, up to a prescribed maximum. Say for instance they pay off $2500 a year in loans for 10 years.
If you want Americans to study STEM, you need to provide jobs for them. Why get a degree in engineering just to train to your H1B replacement, or to have you job offshored.
Did he just say they were trying to introduce "market dynamics" by artificially tinkering with tuitions?
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
Oversimplification. You can have low tuition, limited acceptance and high entry requirements, and the quality of new students will rise, because tuition will no longer be the reason why a poor but talented student doesn't take a slot, which then becomes available for a lower quality but wealthier student. Or you can have high tuition, low entry requirements, and the quality of students will rise, because it will be determined by how much they can pay, not by their ability.
Actually, I'm having trouble thinking of a scenario where taking tuition away as an obstacle to getting an education reduces the quality of education. You have some 'splaining to do, Anonymous Coward.
Tuition should be zero. It works in Germany.