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Who'd Go To University Today? (spiked-online.com)

Are students being short-changed by their $60,000 degree courses? And does a university education in 2018 represent good value for money? A slew of recent government and think-tank reports aim to tackle these questions. And the answers they give are not encouraging. From a report: The Public Accounts Committee announced this month that the value of the UK's student-loan system is falling. Last year, the government sold a tranche of the student-loan book at a major loss. The portfolio had a face value of $4.4 billion, but was sold for just $2.1 billion: a return of 48p in the pound, according to the public-spending watchdog. Clearly, the current method of funding higher education represents a bad deal for the taxpayer.

But do universities offer good value for students? Not when you consider the fact less than half the money that students pay in tuition fees is actually spent on teaching, according to a report by the Higher Education Policy Institute. The rest of the money from tuition fees goes into other services and parts of the administration. These include admissions procedures, marketing, vice-chancellor pay and programmes to boost access for poorer students, as well as therapeutic services like mental-health provision and exam-stress counselling.

Universities today have far too much bureaucracy, fat-cat VC's salaries are far too high, and a great deal of what administrators spend money on is a hindrance to education. University bureaucracy is often at the forefront of coddling students, encouraging them to see exams and hard work as threats to their mental health. It is troubling to see that students are not only plunging themselves into debt at such a young age, but also that much of that debt does not go towards their actual education.

83 of 500 comments (clear)

  1. Another bubble by zippo01 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I truly think we are starting to see the edge of an education bubble. For many years, high school pushed college so hard people got worthless degrees that did nothing to prepare them for the job market. This devalued the mostly none stem degree. Think about it. I can get a degree in communications and come out with 60k in debt and make 40k a year. Or go into a trade and make 80k with little to ne debt. Second, when politicians say make school more affordable they just mean make it easier to get loans.

    1. Re:Another bubble by Drethon · · Score: 4, Informative

      Yeah, I'd like to see a link on the trades with entry level $80K

      He didn't say entry level, so I'm assuming he is talking high end for both jobs with or without degree. Some numbers for good paying jobs without a degree: https://careers.workopolis.com...

    2. Re:Another bubble by godamntheman · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Not entry trade job. A trade job after 4 years experience instead of a college education, tough, $80k is on the low end where I live. And replace the student debt for a small income during those years.

    3. Re:Another bubble by AmiMoJo · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It used to be that a degree would get you good money, and many well paid jobs required one. The subject wasn't that important - my mum did Latin - it was a demonstration of your ability to learn independently and reach a high standard.

      As the economy shifted from manual labour to services the demand for graduate level education rose. There are actually two problems here.

      1. Employers want highly educated employees instead of offering training like they did with manual workers.

      2. The economy does need a lot of highly skilled workers, but it also needs a lot more medium skilled workers. Extremely expensive degrees are geared towards the former who have a chance of earning enough to pay them off, but need the high numbers of medium skill people to make universities economically viable.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    4. Re:Another bubble by Immerman · · Score: 2

      Of course, you have to get an 8% annual return to pull that off, which seems to be considerably above the average.

      And, once you adjust for inflation, that 1.3 million is only going to be worth 366k in today's dollars. So the gains aren't nearly as dramatic as they seem

      The benefits of Investment have dried up considerably, probably in large part to high frequency trading and other mechanisms by which unscrupulous actors game the system to steal profit from real investors.

      --
      --- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
    5. Re:Another bubble by 110010001000 · · Score: 4, Funny

      How many criminals have you served with justice so far?

    6. Re:Another bubble by blahplusplus · · Score: 3

      I truly think we are starting to see the edge of an education bubble. For many years, high school pushed college so hard people got worthless degrees that did nothing to prepare them for the job market.

      I'm sorry to tell ya but the education system is there to maintain the class system and give the illusion that you live in a meritocratic society, the fact that you'd mouth talking points without any kind of evidence at all speaks volumes about the average american. The "job market" is just a bunch of big corporations and small businesses and they are always looking for ways to fuck people who work for them.

      The reality is modern society is a big scam.

      George Carlin said it best:

      https://youtu.be/ILQepXUhJ98?t...

    7. Re:Another bubble by Bengie · · Score: 3, Insightful

      You're conflating "highly educated" with "highly trained/skilled". Or as the head of the Computer Science department told us freshmen, "We're here to teach you how to learn for yourselves. We will present you with common and novel problems and expect you to figure out how to solve them on your own. You will have plenty of time in the real world to learn practical skills that will quickly fall out of style to the next computing fad, but what you learn here will last a life time."

      Quite a bit of teaching and homework was done in pseduo-code and tests were open-book with internet access, but not open neighbor. The teacher didn't grade your ability to code, they graded your ability to reason. I do wish they spend time on coding in the sense of writing clean code and refactoring.

    8. Re:Another bubble by Anne+Thwacks · · Score: 3, Interesting
      degrees that did nothing to prepare them for the job market.

      In "the good old days", University was not about getting a job - it was about learning about civilisation, plus a bit of specialisation. If you wanted to "learn a trade" you got a certificate, or diploma (HNC, HND, City & Guilds) this meant you knew how to do a job. A degree at a University meant you understood the theory, and, as everyone here probably knows, in theory: theory and practice are the same, In practice: they are not.

      However, one of the advantages of democracy is it give the votes to illiterates - who know neither theory nor practice, and vote for Brexit/Trump and "everybody needs a degree to get paid what people with degrees are earning".

      Obviously, if the Universities select the 15% most academically minded of the population, they can teach them to a higher standard, than if they have to accept 50% - which implies accepting people with below average intelligence, since some of the more intelligent won't go to university - have dropped out to start million selling businesses, or become rock stars, or take drugs. If a degree no longer implies above average intelligence and education, why would it imply above average pay?

      To the employer, a degree no longer guarantees someone with above average intelligence and education, and possibly comes from "the elite" - it implies they have a piece of paper and a lot of debt, and tells you nothing about their social background. As an employer, I would set more value on someone who appeared bright and determined on the basis of stuff on their CV, and having the determination and will-power to avoid being forced into debt (except for certain types of knowledge - eg: a maths degree from a reputable university still probably means something).

      --
      Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
    9. Re:Another bubble by geek · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Friend of mine went into HVAC and was clearing 120k a year with over time only 2-3 years into the job. I know a couple of guys doing the same or similar as electricians, probably closer to the 80k mark. It all really depends on where they are and what kind of work they put in. It usually all boils down to overtime though and they spend some of that on union dues and in the case of my HVAC friend he is expected to buy all his own tools/gear. I don't think 120k a year is anything near normal but even in lower income areas I know HVAC people easily clearing 50k in just the first year.

    10. Re:Another bubble by jbengt · · Score: 3, Funny

      How many criminals have you served with justice so far?

      I prefer to serve my criminals with some fava beans and a nice chianti.

    11. Re:Another bubble by Hognoxious · · Score: 2

      He could be comparing by equivalent ages, so the one who went into a trade would already have three or four years under his belt when the college grad starts.

      It's not exactly clear what he means. Perhaps he should get that degree in communications?

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  2. College degrees are great... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    If you want to become a Socialist with a minor in Feminazism.

    1. Re:College degrees are great... by Type44Q · · Score: 2, Funny

      Mod the fuck up... and re-watch PCU!

  3. People in countries where education is not $$$$ by ffkom · · Score: 3, Informative

    To answer the question quickly: There are still a lot of countries where education, including at universities, is free or very inexpensive. People there will continue to visit universities in large numbers.

    1. Re:People in countries where education is not $$$$ by jbmartin6 · · Score: 2

      It is a truism that when you subsidize something you get more of it.

      --
      This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
    2. Re:People in countries where education is not $$$$ by ffkom · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Sure. Get your "free" education and then go elsewhere to make your money. Seems reasonable.

      That's exactly what large corporations expect me to do. It's basically the blue-print for most of their activities: Take something (subsidies, raw materials, knowledge) from somewhere for free, then move on to the next tax haven.

      But maybe it's just nice to live where I am, and I'll stay.

    3. Re:People in countries where education is not $$$$ by Brett+Buck · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Education costs are out of control because of the existence of the student loan program. They couldn't cost $60000 if the individual was paying for it, that is entirely and solely because people can get a loan for that much.

  4. Wages by fluffernutter · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Not to mention, you get into the workforce and you have large corporations doing everything they can to keep wages down. Free internships, H-1Bs, etc etc.

    --
    Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
    1. Re:Wages by fluffernutter · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Besides, you don't really need a study to see what is happening. Companies are saying they cannot find enough workers, yet wages are not increasing. That is completely contrary to how market forces are supposed to work. If it is not H1-B's suppressing wages, then something else is overriding the market that I was supposed to have a fair shake in.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
    2. Re:Wages by fluffernutter · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Companies are supposed to act independently and not collude. Should all of them deciding to pay the same thing for the same job in order to prevent an arms race not be considered collusion?

      Also, I reject your idea that a company only pays the value of an employee to the company. There are companies that make a million a year and there are companies that make billions a year. A company making billions pays much the same for a developer as a company making millions because that is what the market dictates. You cannot tell me that a larger company will hire an exact number of developers relative to their profit. A larger company will take advantage of economies of scale, and hire less developers relative to their profit. I guess I need to see your sources because it does not seem to be the case that employees increase linearly in line with a company's profits at all.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
    3. Re:Wages by fluffernutter · · Score: 2

      You are trying to make it more straight forward and linear than it is. Many companies raise stock dividends every year while keeping their employee base the same, or shedding employees. I doubt there is any such correlation as you suggest.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
  5. But they will get free healthcare by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Who cares if your universities have problems when you're getting free healthcare??? U.S. sucks! Go Europe!!

    But in all seriousness - I think that if universities were required to clearly and cleaning break their "fees" into components as to what they fund, it would really open some eyes. A yearly invoice might look like this:

    Tuition (funds professors and classroom activities: $XXX
    Student Extras (funds clubs facilities that all students can use): $XXX
    Privileged Student Extra (funds clubs and facilities that only SOME students can use): $XXX
    Outreach (general recruiting and student support): $XXX
    Specialty Outreach (recruiting and support for only SOME types of students): $XXX
    Athletic Teams (anything funding the school's athletic teams - not all students can play): $XXX
    Building & Grounds Maintenance: $XXX
    Utilities and Related Operational Costs: $XXX
    Administration (people not doing maintenance or teaching): $XXX

    When people start to see their own dollar figures going to some of this shit, maybe they will care about it.

    Then again, may not.

    1. Re:But they will get free healthcare by fluffernutter · · Score: 3, Funny

      $XXX

      Agreed, the only way university adds up is to make porn and sell it while you are there.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
  6. College should be training for a career or job by scourfish · · Score: 3, Insightful

    If the job or career path can't reasonably pay back, then unless you have extra cash, a different path should be taken. Trade schools can be gateways to decent jobs and cost a fraction, and even if you do take college courses, things can be done to make them cheaper: A community college has a lot of inexpensive, transferable, General education credits. In my engineering program, one of my classmates was simultaneously taking engineering courses at my university and driving to a nearby community college for the Calculus courses.

  7. Much of it is because students want that stuff by jfdavis668 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Living at college used to be closer to living in the military. Dorms were spartan, you didn't have a choice at meal time, you ate what was served. Now, no one would go there unless they had a choice of on-campus coffee shops. Students are demanding housing that graduates couldn't even afford in the past. They want every kind of service imaginable. If the school doesn't provide it, they go elsewhere. So, schools are competing to offer great service and living conditions. If they don't, they don't attract the best students. Schools aren't investing the same way in the actual quality of teaching. Only the most dedicated students actually make their decision based on that. All this drives up the cost, and for some reason students are willing to pay.

    1. Re:Much of it is because students want that stuff by obenchainr · · Score: 5, Interesting

      "Students are demanding housing that graduates couldn't even afford in the past." My university has three students living in rooms that were built for one. This is true for most of the state college system (which also happens to be one of the best in the nation and the world). But let's not let facts get in the way of a good "cardboard box in the middle of the road" rant.

    2. Re:Much of it is because students want that stuff by lkcl · · Score: 5, Insightful

      All this drives up the cost, and for some reason students are willing to pay.

      ... you mean, they're willing to go massively into debt without realising the consequences on the rest of their life...

    3. Re:Much of it is because students want that stuff by jythie · · Score: 4, Interesting

      It varies from school to school, but 'amenities' is the fast growing cost among the expensive schools.

    4. Re: Much of it is because students want that stuff by physicsphairy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      ^This is exactly what we have discussed at faculty meetings about recruitment. As for why students are willing to pay, because they aren't the ones financing it -- it's banks, scholarships, and their parents. There is some good news about the high fees, which is that partly they are there to subsidize poorer students (a campus of only wealthy students is uninteresting and makes for poor recruiting) and it's not expected that an average would actually pay them. Of course, some people (e.g. with wealthy parents who have no intent of offering financial assistance) neither have the funds nor qualify for assistance.

      My recommendation is this: go to a community college for the first couple years, then transfer to a small public school. While there are great teachers out there, for the most part Calculus I is taught the same way from the same book no matter where you go, and that's true for almost all core classes. So go to community college to get that education at a tenth the cost (or probably free) and then transfer to finish a four year program. A small school will give you the most options for getting help from your pofessors, buffering your credentials with TA and research opportunities etc. and be cheaper (esp. if you don't play sports and it doesn't have sponsored sports teams).

      If you stick around for grad school, then that's where you should look at bigger schools. At that level you'll have a small group that you're working with and direct mentorship anyway no matter where you go. If you're STEM you will probably earn a stipend instead of incurring more debt even at the expensive schools, and when you're doing research is when you actually care about having multimillion dollar NMR machines on campus.

  8. I would by 110010001000 · · Score: 4, Funny

    I went to University for the same reason as everyone else: the women. There is a reason it is called "the best time of your life".

    1. Re:I would by 110010001000 · · Score: 2

      Ah, poor Millennials. Well you did it to yourselves.

  9. Value for money by sjbe · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Are students being short-changed by their $60,000 degree courses?

    Sometimes yes. Sometimes no. I think a better question is whether we are doing a good job directing people into schooling options appropriate for both the needs of the individual and society. For some reason we tend to look down on trade schools and anything else besides a 4+ year degree despite the fact that many jobs really don't require such education. Not everyone needs a 4 year college degree but we funnel a lot of people into college who probably don't need to be there.

    And does a university education in 2018 represent good value for money?

    It certainly can. The lifetime earning increase from a college degree very often substantially outweighs the cost of tuition. Not to mention that there are quite a few jobs you simple cannot get without having earned a college degree. I'm an engineer (among other things) and good luck getting a job as an engineer without a college degree. It's possible but really, really hard at most companies.

    But do universities offer good value for students? Not when you consider the fact less than half the money that students pay in tuition fees is actually spent on teaching. The rest of the money from tuition fees goes into other services and parts of the administration.

    That's kind of a dumb argument. Educating a large student body inherently comes with a lot of overhead. Let me use an analogy closer to the heart of many people here. Only about 10-25% of the cost of developing a piece of software is the actual engineering and code writing. The overwhelming majority of the cost to the company is in sales and administration. This isn't a good or bad thing, it's just how the numbers fall out. When you have a student body of 50,000 students, you need a lot of administrative staff to manage that. There is a lot more to teaching students than just doing a few lectures. That's not to say all schools manage their money effectively but the notion that administration isn't going to be pretty substantial at a large university is absurd.

    Not to mention, teaching is only part of what universities do and arguably not even really their main purpose. They also are in many cases research institutions which has little to nothing directly to do with educating students but still carries very real costs. Part of student tuition often goes to pay for part of this even though the students may see little to no direct benefit from it.

    1. Re:Value for money by fermion · · Score: 2
      Some schools that are really not that good have built a reputation with gullible high school personnel that these schools are the only ones to go to. The gullible school personnel convince gullible parents to take out large students loans to pay for the school. This is bad.

      In many ways the high cost of college simply reflects the need of these schools to keep undesirables out. Almost every school will give kids they want to attend a full free ride. Most qualified students will get at least a partial scholarship.

      The question here is what do we do with the 50% of the students who are not qualified to attend a university. Clearly these students, no matter what ignorant high school personnel say, should not be encouraged to take on any debt. There are lower costs options, and we should increase these options.

      --
      "She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
    2. Re:Value for money by keithdowsett · · Score: 2

      There's so much interesting history behind this issue.

      The thing which bugs me most is that when student loans were introduced they were index linked, which meant that in real terms the value of the loan remained constant. This made student loans significantly cheaper than most other forms of finance. Gradually the interest rates have crept up to the point where they are approaching the price of regular bank offerings. But the other terms imposed by the government can make them much more onerous than a similar commercial loan. Indeed, I would suggest that in many cases they are more like a 'graduate tax' than a loan because they will never be repaid and can't be escaped short of leaving the country. Just an unending deduction on the payroll slip.

      Whether a degree represents good value for money is another matter entirely, and to some extent depends on the quality of the degree. A first in Engineering from a good university will usually represent a very good investment, while a third in Sociology and Irish History is less likely to be good value. But, for the average student, maybe a degree is no longer a passport to a good job, but an attempt to avoid a really bad one.

    3. Re:Value for money by Ol+Olsoc · · Score: 2

      It certainly can. The lifetime earning increase from a college degree very often substantially outweighs the cost of tuition. Not to mention that there are quite a few jobs you simple cannot get without having earned a college degree.

      That "often" is the operative term. There are some degrees that do have good value. Your engineering is a good example.

      But not everyone is cut out for that. I'm sure you remember spending nights in the lab or library while the cool kids were out punishing their livers.

      If Universities were to eliminate all of the useless majors, they'd be a lot smaller of places. I'm not suggesting that they be eliminated, more that people choose their majors more carefully, and not expect to make a non-academic career out of say, a doctorate in Philosophy.

      --
      The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
    4. Re:Value for money by pz · · Score: 4, Insightful

      When you have a student body of 50,000 students, you need a lot of administrative staff to manage that.

      Ah, you've hit the nail on the head there. The EFFICIENCY of management and administration has tanked over the last few decades. When I started my undergraduate degree, my university, one with a name you would certainly recognize, had 4000 undergraduates, about the same number of graduate students, and about 2000 administrators. When I left a decade later (after getting bachelors and then taking my time getting a separate masters and passing the qualifying exams for a doctorate), the student body was about the same size, but the tuition had gone up by almost double and .... wait for it ... the number of administrators had doubled.

      Where, exactly, do you think that extra tuition went? I'll give you two guesses, and the first one doesn't count.

      --

      Put my fist through my alarm clock with its ding-dong death inside my ear. - The Blackjacks.
    5. Re:Value for money by wisnoskij · · Score: 2

      When you have a student body of 50,000 students, you need a lot of administrative staff to manage that.

      You seem to be saying that the more students you have the greater the cost PER STUDENT the administration is going to be. This simply extremely non intuitive, typically you see saving in scale, and if the inverse was true you would simply see Universities fragment into smaller universities.

      What we are seeing here is when you put the administrators in charge they hire more administrators, inflate administrators budgets, and continually vote to increase their own salaries. It is the same thing that happens in businesses around the globe. The second you hire someone with the job title of HR, you see the power of the HR department increase every year. Every year that cooperation will be saddled with a bigger and bigger HR department as the number and size of women the corporation hires increases.

      --
      Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
    6. Re:Value for money by rl117 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The explosion of administration staff is both surprising and absurd. For many years, I wondered what they all did! Lots of make-work, by the look of it. Lots of meetings, training, reading and sending emails to each other. But how much actual productive work? Precious little, IMO. How much "administration" do students and staff actually need to run a university? In the '90s, my department was run by three people, two undergraduate admins, one graduate. They handled admissions, collecting coursework, and all the other stuff. So three people for about 500 students. And some departmental secretaries/lab managers. It didn't seem too unreasonable. But a decade later, they increased their headcount by one or two as the department grew, while the central university administration had expanded from one building into four separate office blocks! W T F is all that for?! It's a bit of a mystery. I suspect that when they take ~£10k per student per year, they are so awash with cash (hundreds of millions, plus gouging overseas postgrad students) that there is simply no restraint upon their spending or expansion. They are charging such obscene amounts, which doesn't get spent on education for the most part; the amount going to lecturers, lab space and other teaching resources is a fraction of that, so where does it go? I can only guess onto admin, with liberal budgets and salaries to match. But where is the oversight of this, with someone to question the necessity of it all? I find the whole thing rather unsavoury and obscene, with vice chancellors on £500k and up, while students are fleeced and saddled with a lifetime of debt. Value for money, it isn't. While I have been fortunate to do an undergrad, postgrad and doctorate, it's most likely that I would not go today; it's not affordable given the cost, and hard to justify for the benefits it provides.

  10. Reading comprehension failure by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    You missed at least half the story. Less than half of spending goes towards teaching. It is a huge pot of money without accountability and is getting "stolen" by administration. "Free" education just makes this problem worse.

    Many degrees are not getting students jobs anywhere near what the degree costs. Again "Free" education doesn't solve this, it makes it worse.

    Its almost as if you fixed these issues, the problem of if its "free" or not becomes moot. Price goes down by half, and you get something worthwhile. If you can get a STEM degree that pays $100k a year for $30k, are you going to throw a fit because you had to pay for it and it wasn't provided by the government?

    1. Re:Reading comprehension failure by ffkom · · Score: 2

      I responded to the question in the headline, not to some economic efficiency consideration inside the story. And btw., there are people who consider education worthwhile for reasons other than economic efficiency.

    2. Re:Reading comprehension failure by jythie · · Score: 2

      Yeah, but the author's idea of 'stolen' is pretty much anything they do not like. The author (and site) single out health services as esp evil and 'destroying the youth'.

    3. Re:Reading comprehension failure by Immerman · · Score: 4, Interesting

      One interesting take on "Free" university I've seen, that *does* address the problem, is to do away with grants and loans and have the university itself eat the cost of your education, and then claim a substantial percentage of your income for 5-10 years afterwards. Gives them great incentive to both give you a useful education, AND help you find jobs that will leverage that education into as much short-to-mid-term income as possible.

      Admittedly I would assume such a university would drop a whole lot of the arts, humanities, and other largely financially useless "Renaissance" education, as well as refusing students whose high school performance doesn't speak well of their potential - but that's probably for the best all around. At least so long as universities are being marketed as white-collar trade schools.

      --
      --- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
    4. Re:Reading comprehension failure by magarity · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Yeah, but the author's idea of 'stolen' is pretty much anything they do not like. The author (and site) single out health services as esp evil and 'destroying the youth'.

      When the football team coaches are paid in the millions (the top 25 coaches' salaries are 5M+) then yes, money for supposedly class tuition is being stolen.

    5. Re:Reading comprehension failure by ConceptJunkie · · Score: 2

      as well as refusing students whose high school performance doesn't speak well of their potential

      Well, there goes affirmative action. I don't see that happening.

      But seriously, it sounds like a good idea. Getting an education for the sake of having an education is a great idea, but in today's climate that's not going to get you a job, nor is it going to get you an education since Universities are largely just indoctrination machines these days. I think we all agree the system is seriously broken, and it's getting worse, not better, because everything is incentivized except what's in the interests of the students.

      I was served well by my BS in Computer Science from Virginia Tech in the 1980s. If I were 35 years younger, I don't know path what I'd choose.

      --
      You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
    6. Re:Reading comprehension failure by bob4u2c · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Working at a CSU for about 5 years in the IT department I was able to gleen some insight into how the whole California University System works, financially.

      Problems really start at the top. The Chancellor for 26 universities sets the budgets and target enrollments per campus. So right there you have someone who controls all the money but often never sets foot on a campus.

      I know what your thinking, the Dean for each University is on top of their campus and it's needs. Well, no. See the Dean is there to raise as much cash for the University as they can, because the more they raise, the more they earn. How much you ask? At the University I attended (which was about middle of the pack for the 26) he earned about $300,000 in base pay, plus up to another $300,000 if he brought in the funds. To put this in perspective, the secretaries that worked for him earned maybe $30,000 with no chance for a bonus. So if you could just ignore the University and focus on getting funds from wealthy alumni to doubling your pay, would you?

      Another problem, Calpers! A retirement program for the state of California that is usually 2.5/55 for CSU staff, which means that each year of service earns you 2.5% of your highest paid salary for life when you retire at 55. Sounds good, but people have found loop holes. For example, a Director was hired and started by earning about $80,000, not bad considering how much a secretary was paid. Then for the next couple of years their pay increased to about $90,000, still nothing wrong. Then in their fifth year, the pay jumped to about $150,000, in the sixth year about $280,000, in the seventh year their pay went down to about $120,000 and they left. Now they have 7 years at 2.5% or 17.5% of the highest pay, or about $49,000. So when they reach retirement age they will earn that amount for 7 years of service, until they die plus any other retirement they have money in (ie 4 grand a month for life for just 7 years of service). Also Calpers allows you to change jobs and add to existing years of service. So if that person goes to work anywhere else that has Calpers, they will add more years of service, still at the $280,000 amount. Ie if they take a job cleaning erasers at $5.00/hr and stick with it for a few years they add an extra $7,000 per year to their retirement pay. So the trick, get at least a year of obscene pay, then move on and retire like a king. (Compare that to someone who earns $80,000 consistently and works for 20 years would only get $40,000 at retirement, and each additional year would only add $2,000).

      Next biggest problem, everything is budgeted for. Each major area of the University has Directors who guess how much they will spend on each category. A category is something small like: phone services, Internet services, heating/cooling, water, paper costs, legal costs, travel costs, yard maintenance, key cost, janitorial costs, paper towel costs, staple costs, paper clip cost, etc etc etc. Each department has about 1000 of these categories. At the start of the year each department has all these set buckets of money. Then as expenses come in they are paid out of a specific bucket. At the end of the year any funds left over in any bucket are given back. Well they would be, but departments usually go nuts in May and June to spend these down. Why, well lets say you had $5,000 for paper costs, but you only spent $3,000; you would have to give back $2,000 and next year your budget would only be $3,000 for next year automatically. So to prevent that in June you buy like crazy so you don't get your budget slashed. Why would they do this, see the first problem, the Chancellor only sees the tops of each departments budgets, not the details. So if you spend your budget wisely over the course of a year, or if you just panic spend at the end the Chancellor never sees that detail, only the final dollar amount.

      The next problem, budgets themselves. You can't transfer money from one category to another without a ton of paper work and usually a year wait. So its bet

  11. Oh is this the thread... by Jahoda · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Where the rugged individualists of the Slashdot meritocracy, much smarter than their normal peers, decry the value of a college education even as their jobs are outsourced to H1B coders with multiple advanced degrees and willing to work for less, and corporate management who won't touch you without that bachelor's?

    1. Re:Oh is this the thread... by pz · · Score: 2

      I went to a good college. One with a world-wide reputation among the best. I learned a lot by myself before getting to college, and thought I was pretty smart. I aced the SATs. I won every STEM prize offered at my high school. I graduated from high school early. And I was rewarded in college with a course load that was an order of magnitude harder than I had previously experienced. As just one example, in the introduction to electronic hardware design class, we needed to learn six -- SIX -- different programming languages. For a hardware course. As a CS student, I matriculated being at least competent in probably two dozen computer languages, and, more importantly, with the skills to pick up new ones over a weekend. I was lectured by people who were not just good, but tops in their fields. People whose videos you have probably watched online. I worked as a student intern in laboratories that have changed the world, doing peon-level stuff sure, but still, it was incredibly cool. In those four years, I learned so much more than I could possibly have learned on my own.

      The currently popular belief that you can get as good an education outside of college as in, without the cost, might be true for run-of-the-mill schools, but not for mine. Was it worth the high cost, having to work during summers, and take on student debt? Hell, yes. It got me into world-class graduate schools, and landed me a job at a top-notch research institution running a lab doing incredibly amazing stuff.

      Now, if I want to hire a programmer, I don't care if they have graduated from college. I want them to be IN college, so that I can offer the same sort of opportunities to the current batch of young turks that I had.

      --

      Put my fist through my alarm clock with its ding-dong death inside my ear. - The Blackjacks.
  12. breakdown in society due to crippling debt by lkcl · · Score: 2, Insightful

    i was the last year (1988) in the UK where grants were available. i still had to work thursday evenings and all day saturday at sainsbury's, cromwell road, to stay out of debt. an older friend shared an insight with me, that it is the young people who have all the vitality, energy and enthusiasm. the younger people are the ones that will be creating the wealth and (directly or indirectly) looking after the older generation. .... so what the HELL are we doing by destroying their enthusiasm and vitality by CRIPPLING THEM WITH DEBT?

    the older generations should be going, as a community, "these are the people who are going to be looking after us when we're older. buy them some land, GIVE them a home to live in and get them the resources they need to build a stable future, for us *and* them, for god's sake!"

    1. Re:breakdown in society due to crippling debt by registrations_suck · · Score: 2

      the older generations should be going, as a community, "these are the people who are going to be looking after us when we're older. buy them some land, GIVE them a home to live in and get them the resources they need to build a stable future, for us *and* them, for god's sake!"

      Only the dumb ones.

      The smart ones are going, "I'm going to make, save and invest enough money so that I don't have to depend on these people to look after me when I'm older".

    2. Re:breakdown in society due to crippling debt by AmiMoJo · · Score: 2

      The smart ones are going, "I'm going to make, save and invest enough money so that I don't have to depend on these people to look after me when I'm older".

      That's a fairly dumb approach.

      For a start it's very risky. Maybe you are lucky and save up enough, maybe the economy tanks just as you are reaching retirement and your savings and investments go down the drain. Maybe you are just unlucky and get laid off at 50 and can't find another job, maybe you get cancer and lose everything.

      And the thing is, even if it works out you still need highly educated young people to look after you. Your body will start to need maintenance and repairs, and your mind might start to go too. This is already screwing over many older people who saved but now can't afford care because there aren't enough young people wanting to do it and the cost has gone way up.

      --
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  13. Lack of good alternatives in the US. by jellomizer · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Colleges and Universities really shouldn't be Job Prep institutions. They are academic institutions who's job is to educate people, for the most part for a job in academia, where their research findings are often published, sold, or given to the public. Or received grants to do such research.

    However the problem became the mantra "If you want a good job then you need a college degree" So people got college degrees, and businesses also bought into this and made job requirements to require college degrees, even for jobs that really doesn't require them.

    American Vocational training seems to be limited to mostly Blue Collar jobs, which are good paying and often rewarding jobs, but white collar work still requires a college degree, even though the work has little to do with what you have learned in college with the exception of some soft skills, such as time management, being able to stick to getting a degree, interacting and learning about other cultures. However there are a lot of jobs out there that don't need a degree. An computer programmer doesn't need a computer science degree, but it needs more than just knowing what the commands do. There are a lot of principals of computer science that needs to be taught, but not a 4 year degree, mixed with classes in liberal arts classes.

    --
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  14. Re:$60,000? by Joce640k · · Score: 2

    Please, tell me where University still costs only $60,000...

    Some countries actually pay you to go.

    Even foreigners, you can can to a country and get your degree and get paid to do it.

    https://www.google.com/search?...

    --
    No sig today...
  15. Anyone with any sense by rsilvergun · · Score: 2, Insightful

    at least in America. Here in the States you can't even get your foot in the door if you don't have a degree. Thanks to work visa programs like H1-B companies don't have to train and they get to pick and choose exactly who they want to hire. You won't even make it past the computerized HR filter with a bachelor's.

    If you don't want to spend your life at Walmart or (if you're lucky) earning $15/hr doing welding/HVAC (with no raises and ever decreasing pay due to inflation) you need a degree.

    If I may rant like a crazy man for a bit here: This comes off as more anti-education propaganda pushed by an increase right wing media whose corporate masters are tired of paying for schools in the form of taxes.

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  16. Clearly my *** by plague911 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "Clearly, the current method of funding higher education represents a bad deal for the taxpayer. " Governments of all kinds receive a MASSIVE ROI on education. By having you know, an educated workforce the government expands its tax base probably an order of magnitude over what it would have otherwise, dramatically increasing its revenues. The quote represents nothing but a short sighted conservative hyperbole. It amounts to "OMG I CANT IMAGINE ANY BENEFIT OTHER THAN A DIRECT INSTANTATIOUS PROFIT, I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT DELAYED GRATIFICATION IS"

    1. Re:Clearly my *** by plague911 · · Score: 2

      " Sending a stupid person to college doesn't make them any more useful" That is a bit of an assumption

      " And if the government stopped backing education loans, those loans would only become available to smart people " That is also a big assumption.

      Your points also belie and a series of even more critical, unspoken, and at best debatable assumptions.

      You imply private loan companies would efficiently (assumption) target those that can pay back the loans(assumption) and that the nimbleness of smaller private enterprises would be more efficient than the economics of scale enjoyed by a government (very very big assumption)

      That all comes out a bit more harsh than I would like in this case, but so many libertarian/conservative ideas depend on an idealist faith in the free market that even economists completely disagree with.

      As a great example here, A near infinite number of professional economic papers and studies have discussed the idea and statistically validated concept that loan originators intentionally target those who CANT pay back loans (predatory lending), often because they are a very lucrative source of late fees etc. This comes from market protection mechanism absorbing downside risk that we have deemed necessary to insure the safe functioning of an economy (privatized gains and public losses) and sheer greed and willingness to abuse the uninformed/easily manipulated (assumption discussed in academic studies).

      Additionally due to the fact that many of the positive impacts of an educated workforce are positive externalities (assumption discussed elsewhere) a private enterprise based system would dramatically under invest in the sector.

  17. Root Cause by Puls4r · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The root cause of current higher-education problem is government backed student loans. Why is that? Well it's fairly simple. Student loans can not be discharged by bankruptcy. In addition companies that offer student loans have little to no risk - because student loans in the US are fully backed by the government.

    As a result, there is no incentive to means-check people prior to giving them a loan. In point of fact, there is very little means-checking. In addition, because of the government backing of the loan there does not need to be a correlation between what a particular degree is likely to actually pay, and how much the education might cost.

    For instance, an electrical engineer could go to a university on all student loans. As long as that person gets reasonable grades, they will have decent earning potential. Another student could go to the same university and get a degree in basket weaving. It will cost them about the same. But the earning potential afterwards is nil. They are unlikely to pay back the loan.

    This has led to universities charging insane amounts of money for degrees that are near worthless. We can't and shouldn't protect people from getting worthless degrees. That's their problem. We SHOULD, however, remove the liability from the taxpayer for those worthless degrees. That decoupling would result in far more stringent means-testing. It would also mean that loan companies would no longer give students loans for worthless degrees.

    A college degree would be worth more. Trade-schools would likely make a return. People would be naturally funneled toward degrees that are in demand. We would be better off all the way around. Keep in mind, this is very similar to what happened to the housing market. As long as loan companies could gives loans and hide the risk they will do so. In the housing bubble's case it was through the clumping together of mortgages to hide the risk. In this case it's the government hiding the risk.

  18. Oh, and those "fat cat bureaucrats" aren't real by rsilvergun · · Score: 5, Informative

    any more than fancy dorms are the cause of rising tuition.

    Per the article I linked above tuition is going up because we slashed federal and state subsidies. I'm so tired of this lie being repeated...

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    1. Re:Oh, and those "fat cat bureaucrats" aren't real by alvinrod · · Score: 2

      If you bother to look at the data as a whole instead of just state spending per student, you'll see that state spending has been increasing. A more detailed analysis even shows that the cost increases that are being charged to students to offset this, exceed the drop in per student spending.

      What's been happening is that more and more people are going to college and it's got to the point where a lot of them shouldn't be. Here's one university where it was reported that 14% of students were failing an intermediate algebra course, which is for people who can't even get into the first 100-level math course.

      You're not going to fix the problems with education by throwing even more money at it and the current financial model that gives loans to anyone who wants them regardless of likelihood of succeeding or the likelihood of being able to pay that loan back.

  19. Top 5 school, $8,000. Ferrari isn't the only car by raymorris · · Score: 3, Informative

    You don't have to drive a Ferrari, and you don't have to go to Yale. You can choose a car and a school that's affordable.

    I'm about to start my Master's degree at Georgia Tech, one of the best schools in the country for my field. It'll cost $10,000 - 20% tax credit = $8,000.

    For my bachelor's I could have spent less for the same school I went to. I paid a total of $24,000 - $6,000 tax credit = $18,000.

    A lot of schools have a cap on the tuition per semester so you can do 24 credits for the same price as 12. Many allow credit by examination. What I suggest to people now is to spend a 6-12 months studying before you officially enroll, then take the tests or submit the work so you get 9 credits in your first month of paying. Those kinds of strategies can bring the total cost for a bachelor's degree down to $9,000 after the tax credit.

    I got my bachelor's at WGU, which is a state school. Halfway through school my income doubled partly because the final exams for some classes are industry certs like Cisco CCNA. So as a junior I had already earned several well-known certs as part of my classes.

  20. Re:$60,000? by Drethon · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Please, tell me where University still costs only $60,000...

    I got a degree for $20k in the early y2k at the local state college. The cost is a bit more than double that now but worth it for a job that paid $55k starting out of college in software development, and has gone up from there. The degree also included a full year of internship that paid $15 an hour which helps a lot with costs. This doesn't include housing costs as I lived from home and commuted so YMMV.

  21. Re:$60,000? by Geoffrey.landis · · Score: 3, Informative

    Please, tell me where University still costs only $60,000...

    I got a degree for $20k in the early y2k at the local state college.

    Got it.

    The first hit on google: "According to the College Board, the average cost of tuition and fees for the 2017–2018 school year was... $9,970 for state residents at public colleges."
    https://www.collegedata.com/cs...

    --
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  22. Careful with the UK/US comparison by damn_registrars · · Score: 4, Informative

    Americans love to rant about how they think money is wasted in higher ed, but this article is from the UK. Not everything compares directly as their costs are a bit different.

    As a full-time staffer at a major public research university in the US, I'd like to mention one cost that was not in the summary: building and grounds costs. Even if you don't want perfectly manicured lawns, you still need to maintain a level of safety on the grounds and make sure the buildings are collapsing on themselves. Many schools have faced year after year of reduced state and federal funding, and they have to pay these bills somehow. This isn't just an image thing either; a lot of grounds maintenance is about safety.

    It is also worth noting that tuition helps pay for the costs of keeping the lights on, maintaining temperatures in rooms and labs, etc. Even as we go to smart(er) thermostats it is still not a trivial matter to provide efficient heat in the winter and cooling in the summer. Schools aren't allowed to bill these costs to grants.

    Are executives overpaid at our schools? Almost without question. But the amount of the tuition revenue that goes to their pay is pretty small compared to other costs that the schools have to face.

    --
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    1. Re:Careful with the UK/US comparison by 110010001000 · · Score: 2

      Many public universities are sitting on billions of dollars in endowments that generates significant income. For example University of Texas has a $30 billion endowment that generates $2 billion a year in cash. They aren't hurting.

    2. Re:Careful with the UK/US comparison by 110010001000 · · Score: 2

      If you work at a major public research university you have a massive endowment. Universities are not hurting for money and they are tax-free. They like to claim otherwise.

    3. Re: Careful with the UK/US comparison by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I work as researcher at a university inthe UK, and it seems i also need that grass because the university bites _at least_ 50% of my research money. I got £1 million grant.... £550,000 straight to the University's pocket.

      Probably if vice chancellors weren't paid £x00,000 a year...

  23. Re:Easy fix for university costs by fropenn · · Score: 3, Insightful

    A dirty little secret: for the vast majority of students, admissions is a total guessing game. It is pretty clear who is the top of the top (and who is the bottom of the bottom), but for 95% of students, we really don't have any good pre-college measures that indicate whether someone will be successful in college or not.

    High school GPA is the best measure we have, and it only accounts for 10-20% of the variance in college performance. If we really want to limit college enrollment, we'd be better just setting a minimum bar (e.g., high school GPA of 2.50), and then randomly selecting from everyone who meets that minimum bar.

  24. Sadly, a bad value by Ol+Olsoc · · Score: 3, Insightful
    There are some degrees that will enable payback, biology, EE ME, Chemistry, and a few others.

    So many others might best be described as pecuniary extraction. Unless one is planning on going the whole way to a doctorate, then replacing instructor, you're getting nothing of worth.

    As well, the single minded obsession with getting a degree allowed some amazing tuition inflation.

    The tuition inflation allowed adding multiple layers of middle management, and as the story notes, groups that had nothing to do with education.

    So there is the price gouging.

    Some other things started happening as well. Universities were a place where ideas and different opinions were allowed to flourish, and tolerance of different outlooks was encouraged. But they hit a real pothole in the road by tolerating people who promoted intolerance of a far left wing variety.

    So people like Anne Coulter, and Bill Maher were uninvited from some places they were to speak at after the far left kooks demanded they be excluded.

    People such as Bill Maher, Jerry Seinfeld, Chris Rock, and Larry the Cable Guy all stopped playing college campuses because of the political correctnes demands. As Maher put it (paraphrased) "When a lily White guy, a Black guy, a Jewish guy and a Redneck agree that colleges are a bad place, they are probably on to something".

    Toxic environment.

    Being a male on a college campus is a rather unpleasant experience. You have to pay for "classes" where you are told just how evil a rapist you are, and that your future depends on your strict obedience. What is more, those things that can get your future destroyed are rather ambiguous. To cap it off, there is no due process. If you and a female engage in anything while both drinking, she cannot give consent. But for some reason, you can. The results are a confusing mine field for male students.

    So at this time, we are seeing something like a 67 percent female enrolment in college. The males have made their decision to avoid that toxic environment. As male attendance drops, the people remaining get angrier and angrier, and the way a man sits is now worthy of outrage and hatred. You mean I'm supposed to pay for that abuse? The interesting part is that as some of these career women hit their mid to late 30's they want to settle down, find a man, and start fertilization therapy. But they find that there are no men "worthy" of them. DDG "where have all the good men gone" to see the laments of modern professional women.

    They want to settle down, but unfortunately, there are no men that measure up. In true far left feminist fashion, they are trying some of the same tactics that drove men away in the first place.

    Reminds me of the old saying "The floggings shall continue until morale improves"

    So back to the original part of my post, outside of a few majors, college is not remotely worth it. As well, it takes advantage of many women who after its over, find themselves in possession of worthless degrees consisting of giving your opinion, and that only inflate their egos, then deprives them of normal life relationships and activities.

    --
    The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
  25. Re:Easy fix for university costs by davidwr · · Score: 2

    I'm not sure I buy the "95%" number, but your point is valid.

    If we could group applicants into 3 groups:

    1) A group in which each student has a 90% or better likelihood of graduating within 150% of the time it normally takes to graduate
    2) A group in which each student has a less than 10% likelihood of graduating within 150% of the time it normally takes to graduate
    3) everyone else

    you are talking about the "everyone else" group.

    If you exclude very rigorous programs and very easy programs, I'd say the "everyone else" group at most schools is probably closer to 30-60%, not 95%.

    --
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  26. My Kid's in Nursing by rsilvergun · · Score: 2, Interesting

    and the last 2 years is basically on the job training I'm paying for. Not that I have much choice, but I can tell you that if you're in STEM the workload is nuts. You come out of college ready to hit the ground (or you don't graduate). You are most certainly prepared for the job market after that gauntlet.

    Now, the diploma mills might be another thing. The last administration was trying to reign them in, to the point where big ones like the U of Phoenix were almost put out of business (good riddance). But the current admin... not so much. Hell, the current Education Secretary, Betsy DeVos is openly trying to shift public funds into religious schools (of her particular denomination, of course)

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  27. Services and Bureaucrats real in Private Schools by Koreantoast · · Score: 4, Insightful
    If you read the full article, they concede that this is only impacting public universities (i.e. state schools). For private universities, where some of the worst tuition bloat is happening, it's very clear that its services and admin.

    The picture is a bit different at private schools, which do not receive state funding but have nonetheless seen substantial tuition increases. At private nonprofit colleges, the spending categories described above — student services and faculty and administrative salaries — together explain most of the tuition increase over the past two decades.

  28. Lifetime increase literally history by SuperKendall · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The lifetime earning increase from a college degree very often substantially outweighs the cost of tuition

    That used to be true but why would you think it would be true any longer?

    In fact I would argue such a thought is DANGEROUSLY wrong.

    Why? Example. Say someone took a year to live near a college, take some courses in audit, and take a WHOLE bunch of online courses in any field, which you could lean on local student study groups to understand.

    After that year you easily will know enough to get an entry level job in a field you have been studying. Now instead of paying tuition, you are working while studying further,

    Take that four years out. Instead of debt you have three years worth of earnings (I'm assuming you only studied that first year). Such a person may well be able to have 20-40k of savings they can invest when they are around 20, and three years of solid work history to pursue more advanced work opportunities.

    So how can you possibly think the person with $200-$500k of debt can ever catch up?

    The thing that totally tears down the "lifetime earnings" argument is that workplaces no longer seriously consider degrees. Even Google which famously used to require graduate degrees had to chuck that requirement out the window in order to hasten the build of the Don't-Be-Evile Empire.

    The other side benefit of an early work approach is that you can find out what work in your chosen field is REALLY like. There are a huge number of students that spend four years to get a degree and find that they don't want to do what they have spent four years prepping for. Madness.

    On a side side note, another benefit of not being an official student of a college you are near is that you can pick any one to stay near without having to be accepted, and get the same caliber of student interaction.

    --
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  29. They still are by rsilvergun · · Score: 5, Insightful

    except for the rich kid's dorms. I just put my kid through the dorms (moved her to an apartment after yr 1 because it was cheaper and nicer). Yes, there are "nice" dorms. They're crazy expensive and only for the rich kids. They're a profit center for the schools, and my kid got nowhere near them.

    I've already put this link in the thread but it deserves repeating. Once again, Fancy dorms are _not_ the problem. Cutting state and federal funding so we could cut taxes on the rich is. And the rich don't care because you're expendable. They don't need you or your kids to be educated. They've got H1-Bs for that.

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    1. Re:They still are by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I'm skeptical of the analysis done by 538.

      If it was true that US colleges cost so much due to cutting of state and federal funding then I would expect annual budgets at those colleges to increase - at most - by about 3% per year to keep pace with inflation on average. However, the local (big) land-grant college here has increased its annual budget by about 10% per year for the past 11 years. Based on the tuition rates of other large land-grant institutions throughout the US my guess is that they are increasing their budgets annually by a similar percentage.

    2. Re:They still are by 110010001000 · · Score: 2

      Baloney. You just have to visit a US college and see why. There are cranes everywhere and new buildings going up. US colleges are expensive because borrowing money is relatively cheap.

  30. Re:Top 5 school, $8,000. Ferrari isn't the only ca by Dayze!Confused · · Score: 3, Informative

    I've averaged 20 credits a quarter for six quarters, finished my community college in 1 year, and am on track to finish a double major in CS and Math by the end of my third year. What allowed me to do that was already having a strong foundation in programming from years of experience, and being good at Math. I also went into it focused, and knowing what I want to do. No credits wasted on switching majors, or exploratory classes.

    Similar to the GP's suggestion I spent about a month or so refreshing on mathematics and taught myself trigonometry so that I tested straight into Calculus. This has meant that every credit I have taken has gone towards my degree, no need to build up taking low level college math credits that don't count for anything but electives.

    My toughest quarter was 23 credits, with 3 math courses, physics, and assembly programming and maintained a 3.97 GPA. Nothing particularly savant, and have never cheated, but I have made sacrifices and prioritized my education. Some classmates go out and get drunk on the weekends, showing up to class with hangovers, and I spend my time studying my subjects in more depth, or exploring other subjects of interest.

    --
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  31. Re:Why are you spending 60K? by bobbied · · Score: 2

    "There is no need to spend $60K or more and certainly no need to borrow all of that..." Um, yes it can be. What if you can't live at home? Sounds like you don't understand at all. If your kids were not living at home you would be spending $60k or more, even with your numbers. What is the difference if you pay $40k vs $60k? You would be better off spending the extra $20k now if it means you can go to a better school.

    I disagree with you on the last point. As long as your school is accredited, it will do nicely, forget spending $20K more, just get the degree. Unless you are talking "ivy league" schools, where just having gone there opens doors for you, why spend more? It literally WILL NOT matter after 2-4 years of employment. Nobody looks at your GPA or cares what school you went to once you have a professional work history. Sure, it might be an interview conversation starter, but it literally doesn't matter which school you went to, unless it's someplace with huge name recognition, like Cal Tech, or something. There is no advantage, don't spend the $20K if you don't have to.

    Again, my kids are lucky. The school they will graduate from is in the top 50 for each of their degrees, but let's be honest, even that won't matter one bit once they have kept their first professional job for a few years. I seriously doubt that extra $20K is worth it, but look at the numbers to prove it to yourself. As long as the local schools is accredited, chances are staying local is the best cost/benefit you can have.

    --
    "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
  32. It is average for right risk profile by SuperKendall · · Score: 2

    Of course, you have to get an 8% annual return to pull that off, which seems to be considerably above the average.

    If you are looking at the averages of all mutual funds, you are getting a number skewed very low because of the presence of a ton of funds that are for very low risk investors.

    Someone very young should be putting funds into a much more volatile fund, so that over time you have a better return - if you look at this list of funds from Vanguard, you'll see that returns of 8 over ten years are not uncommon (look at Traditional and Target-Risk). You just need to keep your money in for a while.

    You are also totally not factored in the opportunity cost of loss of possible investment that goes to student loans instead. You laugh at someone having 366k in "today's dollars" in retirement but that person is probably a lot happier than someone who lives in our neighborhood who is having social security garnished to pay off student loans, to the point she has to take. job for extra income (the wages of which ALSO are garnished to further service the loan). All the sudden 366k starts to look super awesome.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  33. Re:Top 5 school, $8,000. Ferrari isn't the only ca by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 2

    I advise you to slow down and relax a bit, particularly in your last year. 20 years later, I look back at this and wish I had taken more time. I had reasons, and perhaps you do too but take time and examine them. If one of them is a hot new job paying big bucks, think harder. Either that job will still be there next year, or, and this is important, you really didn't want it anyway. This is particularly troublesome in technology.

  34. Re:Bigotry by postbigbang · · Score: 2

    Horse poop.

    Look at the successful economies today, and look at the quality of their educational infrastructure. There are vocational schools and academic institutions, ranging from 2year programs to PhDs. Some are poorly rated, some overly expensive.

    And some will get you through life with a sound beginning.

    Mostly, the profiteers do what profiteers will-- cut out quality to meet the minimums. The VA fed ITT, UofPhoenix, and many others a boat load of students, all subsidized, and didn't audit the quality of the school. They just wrote the check. Today, an ITT degree is essentially worthless. It surprised the hell out of me that Purdue would by Kaplan, but its president, Mitch Daniels, is a neo- Tea Part ex-governor and wants to cut the "fat" from higher ed.

    Lots of great junior colleges through great state universities graduate students who will do well. Others will not. The only nugget of truth in your assertion is that we don't review curriculum and outcomes with sufficient rigor. Lots of mundane educators out there.

    --
    ---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
  35. Actually it is, low-cost on purpose by raymorris · · Score: 2

    My program is has unsually low costs because it's designed to, and it doesn't involve a lot of new cutting-edge research. They did the OMSCS for several years and it worked, so they've expanded those approaches.

    Are you by chance familiar with Eddie Woo? He's a mathematics professor, mainly calculus, who has over a million subscribers on YouTube. He's been named Teacher of the Year by several organizations and there is even a postage stamp with his face on it. In other words, he's a really good teacher.

    There are two ways to get the lecture part of learning calculus:
    A. Sit in a lecture hall and watch some random math prof's lecture.
    B. Watch Eddie Woo lecture, from your house. He recorded it two years ago.

    How much does each cost? Constrast the price of a lecture hall (and associated parking lot) vs YouTube. Woo is probably a significantly better teacher, and the cost for the one of the best teachers in the world is approximately zero.

    You may br familiar with the Artificial Intelligence course taught by Peter Norvig (Director of Research at Google, former head of Computational Science at NASA Ames Research Center) and Sebastian Thrun, former Stanford CompSci professional and founder of Google X and Google's self-driving car project. These are the top experts in the field. Their lectures are roughly free, simply because they are recorded rather than live.

    Georgia Tech also does cutting-edge research, and those are paid for by grants or other external money from the people who want the research done. If SpaceX wants Georgia Tech to develop a new nano-material for their rockets, SpaceX pays for that. The two main funding sources for Georgia Tech are tuition and sponsored projects.

    Where I worked before, an agency within the Texas A&M system, sponsored projects paid for not only their own direct costs, but also the cost of the buildings where those projects were done. In other words, the things we did for companies and other governments helped pay the regular classes for in-state students (which were sometimes free). Out of state paid more tuition than they cost; out of state students produced a profit. So much so that rather than cost the taxpayer money, we generated money for the taxpayer m

    My program doesn't have a lot of original research, so the primary source of revenue is tuition. Government money is a pretty small piece. I'm an out-of-state student, so Georgia Tech is probably making a profit on me - I'm paying more than the cost. They've gotten their costs low by using appropriate technologies and processes.

  36. Sure by rsilvergun · · Score: 2

    Here you go

    If you think she's talking about Islam or even Judaism when she says "God's Kingdom"... well, I don't know if I'd call what you have naivete....

    --
    Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
  37. SpaceX is not the federal gvt. Neither is Exxon by raymorris · · Score: 2

    >The F&A costs are typically a percentage of the direct costs, for awards from federal agencies

    Yes, with the US federal government, the way to get more money is to increase your expenses. You get more by wasting more. It's pretty much only the federal government that is that stupid. Roughly nobody else does that. Not even the Mexican government.

    When SpaceX, ExxonMobil, or Mexico wanted something, we quoted them a price. If we found ways to do it more economically, such as moving from paper-based workflows to computer-based, the savings went in our pocket. If we wasted money by sticking with paper, the federal government would have paid us more to be wasteful, but we had only one federal grant. 90% of our deals were with sane people. Wasting money meant we'd be out that money.

    Sometimes they bought instruction - we have a thousand Mexican government employees come for two weeks per year. Sometimes they bought a result. Sometimes they rented our specialized facilities for a day or a week. I don't think they ever did 1xx% of costs contracts, paying us more the more money we wasted. That would be dumb. That would be federal.