The cost of college is out of control. What you suppose we do about it?

<p>Taxes are expected to cover more and more of our services but we are always angling for ways to reduce taxes.</p>

<p>Community colleges often have dorms/apts nearby to reduce housing/commuting costs.
Workplaces, although fewer than five years ago, may still give incentives or subsidize continuted education.</p>

<p>Enlistment still helps with higher education expenses.
As does other volunteer type commitments like Americorps.
My father worked his way through university- that is more difficult now- but for someone who is committed, who has reduced needed college credits by AP tests/college courses in high school, you can shave the time/money down to two additional years or so.</p>

<p>We are a blue collar family whose kids are currently enrolled in university/graduate school.
Lots of ways to accomplish this- but if you prefer to spend more time complaining than finding a way around obstacles, you have lost sight of the goal.</p>

<p>"You don’t send you students to a college or university they/you can’t afford. Period. "</p>

<p>can you afford what FSU would cost if the good people of Florida were not helping to pay for it? </p>

<p>Can anyone imagine a housing forum, where public housing residents were the leading complainers about the irresponsibility of taking out subprime mortgages?</p>

<p>The non elites will keep the high prie tags (makes them seem elite) and just continue to up the discounts aka merit scholarships.</p>

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<p>Actually, you’ll find them cheap in California when you arrive in Palo Alto in the fall. But yes, Maryland charges quite a bit more; thus, the solution is to lobby your state legislature to lower your juco rates.</p>

<p>Maryland’s average is about $85 per credit. Where I work, it’s going up to $80 in the fall.</p>

<p>In California, it’s <$30/semester unit. Of course, this helps explain why we also have massive deficits. :)</p>

<p>Economics 101 - supply vs demand. If less people go to college or number of colleges increase, than price will go down. Not much more we can do about price of college / gasoline / milk / houses / cars / clothes or anything else.</p>

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<p>What support do you have that affordable options are decreasing? The cost increases of the elite schools are irrelevant to that point. At least around here, CC’s are still very reasonably priced.</p>

<p>Yes, not every area of the country will have a CC in its own backyard - but such is life. Small rural areas, etc. won’t ever be able to support lots of options, whereas bigger metropolitan areas will be able to.</p>

<p>I’m taking summer classes and at my community college in Massachusetts (and it’s already cheaper than at other community colleges in the area), it costs $120-150/credit</p>

<p>Not only are community colleges affordable, but there are tuition credits available to pay for it. The first $2000 of your education is 100% eligible for the credit and 25% of the next $2,000. That will cover most of a cc education for a year.</p>

<p>For some, summer classes are much more expensive since they are not covered by Merit Scholarships. Also, if one is thinking about Med. School in a future, it is strongly recommended NOT taking Medical School reguired classes in a summer. For both reasons, D. successfully avoided taking summer classes.</p>

<p>“What support do you have that affordable options are decreasing? The cost increases of the elite schools are irrelevant to that point. At least around here, CC’s are still very reasonably priced.”</p>

<p>my impression was that the com college issue wasnt so much increasing costs, but availabilty/quality as the numbers who want to attend increase dramatically, esp in states like Calif where the state u systems are cutting enrollment.</p>

<p>Here in Maryland, part of the CC problem is declining state and county contributions. Tuition revenue has been paying about one-third the cost of attending our local CC.</p>

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<p>Mostly anecdotal. Firstly, the cost of public education is increasing much faster than the rate of inflation in many states, and thats problematic because it means in-state publics are getting more expensive. I’m not sure about whertre you live, but here, the commmunity colleges aren’t pricey… but my local community college is becoming a four year college, and costs are skyrocketing.</p>

<p>I agree that there are affordable options and that everyone should take advantage of them - for me, Stanford was the most affordable option (well, WashU was possibly better). That’s not the case for everyone, and it doesn’t have to be. And there can be good community college educations, but they don’t exist everywhere. The community college in the county next to mine is very good, but my local community college is laughably poor. Community colleges aren’t created equally. Ideally, we’d funnel some cash and effort into improving all community colleges, so that they become more viable options.</p>

<p>As for why public colleges are less expensive, there are a lot of reasons. They are tax-subsidized at a higher rate. But more importantly… They often, but certainly not always, have fewer “perks” for students, or they have less available perks. Most of these perks aren’t education related, but that doesn’t mean it’s not important for some students. I don’t need leather seats, but hey, it’s nice. It’s certainly true that some students can learn the same in small groups and in lectures, but not everyone prefers that and not everyone can learn in one environment or another. The services aren’t identical by any means, but that doesn’t mean one is inherently better than the other.</p>

<p>If you want something that is more highly sought-after then you pay for it, end of story. College enrollments in general are rising as more view college as essential. What I find hilarious about these threads (rising costs and rising enrollments) is those arguing for lower costs or fewer people going to college are never speaking of their own situations. Obviously you thought Stanford is affordable; if you didn’t, you shouldn’t have picked it. Everyone else makes exactly the same choices given their options and means.</p>

<p>Scale back the need based financial aid. If there were not students there paying little or nothing to attend then others wouldn’t have to pay $50,000 to do so.</p>

<p>" It’s certainly true that some students can learn the same in small groups and in lectures, but not everyone prefers that and not everyone can learn in one environment or another. "</p>

<p>well thats what I mean. Its one thing to say, that if you cant afford champagne, you need to drink beer. Its another to say that beer IS champagne, with a different label. </p>

<p>And since this is an education we are talking about not alcoholic beverages, I find it very offputting to be told over and over that wanting the right education for MY child is a luxury, and I am a prodigal spendthrift, no better than someone who bought a mcmansion for zero money down, because I have reviewed my DD’s ability to perform in larger and smaller classes, in different settings etc and decided that my states flagships were not the best choices. </p>

<p>Also, of course, the subsidy is there too, which is often overlooked. </p>

<p>Folks who otherwise beleive there is no such thing as a free lunch, take a different tack wrt to State universities.</p>

<p>"Scale back the need based financial aid. If there were not students there paying little or nothing to attend then others wouldn’t have to pay $50,000 to do so. "</p>

<p>Ha. And what would that do to applications, admittance rates, yield rates, etc? </p>

<p>But my heart goes out to you, it must be so sad having an EFC of 50k. ;)</p>

<p>“What I find hilarious about these threads (rising costs and rising enrollments) is those arguing for lower costs or fewer people going to college are never speaking of their own situations”</p>

<p>The most vociferous are like this “I sent my kid to DrunkenState U, at a nicely affordable cost of 15k a year, thanks to the taxes extracted from all my neighbors. But my neighbor across the street is sending HIS kid to WeGyp U, at a cost of 50k a year, and his kid will have 150k in student loans. In 2018, all them loans are gonna default, I will have to pay for my neighors kid out of MY TAX DOLLARS, which is socialism, or something. Plus the kids at WeGyp U look down on the kids at DrunkenState, which is not very nice”</p>

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<p>Well, in a way. I wasn;t complaining about the cost of Stanford. Plenty of people complain about the cost but find a way to pay it anyway, for better or for worse. That is a problem in and of itself.</p>

<p>Brooklynborndad, Im not trying to say that college shouldn’t be cheaper, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t a luxury. And luxuries come on different levels. Technically it is a luxury to go to a school with challenging peers, but I consider it basically a necessity and was willing to pay for it one way or another. This is why I said that I wish private colleges would either lower costs or increase financial aid, in order to augment our choices - but that won’t happen until we opt out, so it’s a vicious cycle.</p>