My D22’s college here in the UK is pretty spartan in terms of amenities (with dinner served strictly between 6:20pm-7:05pm and limited menu choices!) and it’s generally accepted by students and parents alike (of course, some do gripe). COA is much lower than in the US, for which I am extremely grateful.
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In some places with highly concentrated populations (e.g. Arizona, Hawaii, Canada) and desired universities in the major population areas, lots of students commute to school, so residential living and dining (luxurious or not) is not a concern for them.
However, they still have students from more remote areas who may need to attend school residentially because no college or university is within reasonable commuting range.
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Exactly. There’s a cultural aspect to all this cost. Students here expect a certain level of amenities - fancy dorm, lots of food options, Starbucks on campus, well equipped fitness centers, sports teams, etc. - that students in Europe and Asia do not. And many schools are trying to outdo each other to attract students. (It’s so cool to have a lazy river!).
Not saying it’s necessarily bad - it’s just the reality of American college life, and contributes significantly to the overall cost.
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We have the bulk of our extended family still living in Europe. Everyone lived at home and commuted to their universities. There were no dorm options. If someone wanted to live closer to school, they needed to rent a regular apartment (which no one in my family can afford).
Throw in that some countries track from an early age for college and create entirely different road blocks other than money.
It’s a very different model in the US.
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I worked at a very small school. We didn’t have enough staff for the work required to run the school, so a very small but dedicated group of us worked far more hours for far less pay than we should have earned (or would have, had we moved into a different field). This is what it took to run a school. It’s unbelievably complicated to run a college. It costs money to do it.
And the argument that federal loans leads to higher tuition is not backed up by hard data. Federal loans do, however, provide assistance to many students, including middle class students, who would not otherwise be able to pay for college.
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This is interesting to me because at my daughter’s well-resourced university, the undergraduate amenities don’t seem particularly nice to me at all. The dining services hours are limited in location and times (or so she claims, I take it with a grain of salt), the dorms aren’t luxurious, and the recreational facilities seem pretty basic at best.
Given its endowment, I assume that the university is pouring its money into other areas, research facilities and various opportunities including the quite robust (no loans) financial aid program which serves over half of the student body. So I am not complaining, but I don’t think lots of money is going into things like accommodations, dining or even maintenance. I actually wonder if highly selective schools with high yield rates can get away with blah undergraduate facilities because people will attend regardless. Or maybe it is a fluke with her college and other similar colleges have nicer undergrad amenities.
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Colleges have to compete for a shrinking pool of students. I suspect that some colleges do find that nicer amenities will convince students to choose them over similar schools. I dealt with students basically demanding more in the year or two before I retired, even though we made it clear during the recruitment phase that we weren’t promising anything that we didn’t already have. There has been an increasing demand from students (and parents) for things that cost money. If a school can afford to say no, as a school with many more applicants than spots to fill may be able to do, they will … the schools that have to compete for students may have a harder time attracting students without certain amenities.
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The downward pressure will/would come when students head off to Berea (and its ilk) and leave the Disney/Country Club type campuses bare. And yet all around me I see parents taking on insane amounts of debt (HELOC’s, essentially using their biggest asset as an ATM machine) to send little Johnny and Susie off to a mediocre private college with gorgeous recreational facilities. I’m going to assume they are rational- so yeah, folks are going to spend their money the way they want, and aren’t listening to Blossom rant about educational rigor being one of the few things worth paying more for. Rigor- they don’t want that.
I’m not disagreeing with the observation that colleges have become a lot more “fancy” than they were when we were in college (and certainly our parents generation). It’s the notion that “cutting the fluff” will make college more affordable for everyone. Because my experience IRL is that folks WANT the fluff- that’s what they want to pay for. A nanotechnology lab? Naah. Kid wants to major in recreation or sports management. Why the hell would a parent pay for the expertise of the folks who run a nanotechnology lab which their kid will never use?
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I think they do have alternatives like online classes. What works for NYC isn’t going to work for Wyoming or Montana or even Texas. Wyoming is huge, but the population isn’t. It has one 4-yr university and that school has satellite campuses in some of the cities (Casper, Sheridan, Cody) but even those are too far for some so there are online classes. NYC doesn’t need to set up that way (and are probably more concerned about public transportation to campuses).
U of Colorado is pretty expensive, even for instate, and the COL in Boulder is crazy so it really is out of range for a lot of people. But there are a lot of other schools students can go to so I, as a tax payer, don’t feel there is a need for CU to ‘be more affordable.’ On the same campus in downtown Denver there is Denver community college, CU-Denver, and Metro State U. One of those will be right for many students and it can be reached by public transportation (not a lot of on campus housing). Not every student can commute to a public school, but those who can’t can access online courses. There is no way to open enough campuses that every student who lives in a state as big as Colorado can get to a college within an hour from their homes (or ranches), in the snow, across mountain passes, but I don’t think they are underserved.
If a state isn’t serving its residents with affordable public higher education options, residents should take it up with their state legislators. Other states seem to figure it out.
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The correlation is available. The Department of Education (federal) keeps cited-data on the relationship between skyrocketing tuition, COA, and the expansion of the federal student loan programs available on their website. There is a succinct graph depicting the correlation here with the heading “Average Annual Borrowing for Active Borrowers”:
This graph tracks with a similar graph depicting COA/tuition hikes. A reference is given in the article.
Why are there two different public 4-year universities colocated on the same campus?
That link has the following image that shows that student loan borrowing increase is mainly at the graduate level. I.e. education like medical, dental, and law school.
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This makes sense given that student borrowers are limited in terms of what they can borrow in their own names. I skimmed the article and one of the things that stood out is that while student borrowing for undergraduate education hasn’t increased significantly (as per the chart), parental borrowing has increased by a sizable amount.
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There is actually a lot of downward pressure on the market, just not at the elite schools that we are all so fond of discussing on CC. Lower tier schools are suffering from declining enrollment and that is going to continue but for the elite there is no pressure or need to control costs.
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Metro is part of the state college system and CU is part of the 4 campus CU system. CU Denver was pretty small year ago, mostly being an urban engineering and business campus in downtown. Metro was more of a part time or evening school, non traditional campus. I think CU also did the administrative work for the undergrad programs at the medical campus (which is about 7 miles away) but now the medical school campus is much bigger too so I think they are separate now.
There are some things the schools share like a book store, and I think the library system is combined, but other that those the schools are separate for most things like sports, Greek life, administration, housing. It’s a big complex right at the edge of downtown with several light rail stops, huge parking lots that can also serve the Bronco stadium and the basketball/hockey arena, is very close to the theater district, has lots of bars and restaurants on and near the campus.
CU is still a business and engineering campus with some specialties like music production. Metro has some specialties like meteorology, pilot training (and maybe FAA?) and I think its engineering is a tech degree, but they have one in architectural design that is popular.
Seems to work to have three schools sharing the same physical space.
I suspect you’re right. My D’s college requires all first years to live on campus (and most live in college housing throughout their undergraduate years) - the rooms are clean and relatively modern but basic (no fridge/microwave, etc in the rooms and not allowed to be brought in - there are kitchens for students to use).
Personally, I am fine that my D’s college living situation is relatively spartan so long as there are no safety issues, her dorm/room is clean and she is able to sleep/study. And I sense I am not alone in feeling this way.
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I’m sure schools can reduce costs by reducing administrators.
The fact that there is a correlation doesn’t mean that increased loan limits caused the price increases.
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And who will do the administrators’ jobs? I’m amazed at the fact that people assume college administrators are unnecessary. Where is the evidence?
I probably just need to bow out.
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There are plenty of schools in the states where dorm accommodation is basic. D20 had 50’s era cinder block dorm her first year with communal bathrooms. Her second year she was in a newer dorm that did have air-conditioning but her small double was 180 sq ft (huge improvement but still very basic), again communal baths.
D23’s dorm is also very basic, the one big amenity she has is air-conditioning. But again, small double with communal bathrooms.
There are definitely schools that have made new housing a big priority in the last couple decades but most of the ‘fancy’ dorms are school/private business partnerships where those new housing units are rented out by/paid to the private businesses that financed and built the dorm housing. Also why those unit are usually much more expensive.
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