<p>Here is a somewhat political article on the subject of higher costs
Center</a> for College Affordability and Productivity: Universities and Contempt for the Middle Class</p>
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One reason college intellectuals don't push tuition containment is simple -- it might reduce their income.
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<p>Treetopleaf: If prices continue to rise consumers(students) will eventually start substituting and competition will start coming in to play soon enough.</p>
<p>IMO, most people hear some griping, but have no idea as what is going on with college costs unil 3 things happen:</p>
<p>1) They get sticker shock when looking through guide books as their oldest child gets closer to college age.</p>
<p>2) They are forced to complete their fafsa and get their EFC.</p>
<p>3) They receive the financial aid packages, see the bottom line to their own wallets, and see that their bright child is not getting a full ride to the state U (the exception there might be FLA).</p>
<p>online institutions usually don't have the facilities to build/maintain/provide water and electricity for; they also have many, many part-time faculty members who get paid less than full-time faculty members and who don't get the same paid benefits (health care, tuition remission, retirement plans) that traditional schools pay for. and they don't offer a lot in terms of need-based financial aid in the way that many traditional (and private) colleges and universities do. usually, the largest single line item in a college's budget is cost of instruction - this is broken into salaries and benefits for faculty and professional staff, facilities, funding for research and materials, etc...,. running a college is extremely expensive and federal support to americqan colleges and universities (and students, in the form of federal financial aid) has not kept up with these escalating costs, or inflation for that matter. second largest line item in many schools' operating budgets: financial aid.</p>
<p>AdOfficer: Although faculty is the most expensive part of a college budget, doesn't necessarily mean that online institutions won't work. Just think, the normal prof routine is to lecture and then take questions from I don't know 5 percent max of the class. In theory, an online class could have multiples of a normal class because the prof only needs to worry about those with questions. </p>
<p>I would be willing to bet that online institutions start to take off and will eventually be a healthy alternative to normal university style education.</p>
<p>In 1975 Wellesley's tuition, room and board was $5000 for the academic year and we were asked to budget $600 for books and personal expenses. At the time, a neighbor of ours thought this cost was outrageous and stated that if I were his daughter he would not allow me to attend such an expensive school.</p>
<p>jclay - there were no value judgements being made in my previous post re: whether online institutions "will work" or not. personally, though, i think that <em>some</em> online institutions are doing great jobs, particularly because they are using a lot of accountability tools to make sure that their students are actually learning and improving by taking a particular class. the university of phoenix, for example, has a very structured evaluation system in place to measure student outcomes based on faculty performance. my post was simply to explain why "traditional" colleges are so much more expensive to run than online programs, although with increased competition for students, i think you are going to see online schools' budgets increasing more and more (especially for things like advertising and curricular development). nevertheless, online programs are expanding rapidly nowadays and part of the reason for this is that they are cheaper to run. they are, however, very different from "traditional" colleges in one big way that makes many people uncomfortable: they are for-profit organizations, primarily accountable to stockholders.</p>