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Obama Seeks New System For Rating Colleges
PolygamousRanchKid writes "Targeting the soaring cost of higher education, President Barack Obama on Thursday unveiled a broad new government rating system for colleges that would judge schools on their affordability and perhaps be used to allocate federal financial aid. But the proposed overhaul faced immediate skepticism from college leaders who worry the rankings could cost their institutions millions of dollars, as well as from congressional Republicans wary of deepening the government's role in higher education. The new rating system does not require congressional approval, and the White House is aiming to have it set up before the 2015 school year. But Obama does need support from Congress in order to use the ratings as a basis for parceling out federal financial aid. In addition to tuition, schools will also be rated on average student loan debt, graduation rates and the average earnings of graduates. Under Obama's proposal, students attending highly rated schools could receive larger grants and more affordable loans."
Where is the actually written bill?
He loves going place to place and telling that audience what they want to hear and then passing the actual work to Congress who he knows won't/can't do it.
The cost of college will expand to consume the available student loans, grants and financial aid. This has been true since the invention of student loans.
I suspect your ROI calculation would serve only to raise the price of an economical college quickly up to the price of the most expensive schools, because the ROI would prove them to be a much better deal, and as they draw all the students they can handle the price will rise.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
What I simply don't understand is why US universities are so expensive. It's gotten to the point where it seems that any sort of education can only be gotten my pretty much taking on so much debt that you will be lucky to pay it back - which then forces the government to start putting in copious amounts of scholarships/funding to keep students there.
Degree Costs in Australia
Over here, a degree (not counting the really expensive ones like medicine) costs $15-30k and a masters $20-37k.
The average cost (excluding the notoriously expensive universities) in the US is $28k per year.
Seriously, why?
Moved to http://soylentnews.org/. You are invited to join us too!
It's the free market, son. That's what makes America great.
Seriously, it's the insane near religious stance that everything has to be a) profit making b) run like a widget company and c) expand financially forever. Coupled with fair degree of rent seeking, a terrible method of allocating money to people who cannot afford it on their own (Pell grants, the student loan system), massive expansion of physical plants for sports and near complete collapse of the vocational / technical college.
The Perfect Storm, if you will.
Same problem in medicine to some degree. Add a for profit stance to something that should not be run for a profit, stir in a generous heaping of incompetent government bungling, sprinkle with freebies to insulate the end user from economic consequences of their decision and bake slowly in a hellish furnace composed of hot air from insurance companies and Wall Street (the old profit thing) and you have a sticky, toxic mess that's impossible to clean up.
I think I'll go cook dinner now.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Want the potential of college without the risk of massive debt due to picking the wrong major or flunking out?
Try Oregon's new College tuition bill "Pay Forward" (bill passed, but not yet implemented). The government pays for the full cost of tuition over 4 years. You pay them 3% of your salary for 24 years. Is it more expensive for the student? For good jobs, sure. But it gives a peace of mind that you aren't going to be hurt too badly financially, and reduces the penalty if college just didn't work out for you.
There was an article about this a few years back. Basically, the costs of college are so high that families are disassociated from the costs of repaying them if they're taking out government-subsidized loans. So, there's no difference between a $5K/semester school or a $7.5K/semester school when you have to borrow and won't pay off for 4 years anyway. People think, "damn this is expensive" which includes a wide range of prices. Schools have figured this out and know that whatever they charge for tuition they'll get from the government to some extent. It's not like profit-motivated banks are going to stop giving out loans. It's in the interest of the government to educate the workforce in a technical age. Add to that a crappy market where even secretary positions ask for college educations. Schools know how valuable their diplomas are, so they dangle them over our heads on a platinum barb.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
What I simply don't understand is why US universities are so expensive.
I suspect it's the same reason our healthcare is so expensive, yet sub-par.
No, the cost of staffing is increasing -- not the cost of salaries, the cost of healthcare programs. That, coupled with the winnowing amount of state dollars that can be given to public universities, is forcing universities to charge more for tuition. It's not to get rich, like with private for-profit institutions like Phoenix University, that provide minimal benefit if any.