<p>If current trends continue (4-5% increase in tuition / year, online programs gaining legitimacy, decreased value of a degree), what will the higher education landscape look like in 10 years? </p>
<p>I just can't imagine an average student paying 20k (in today's dollars) a year to major in English at his in-state university.</p>
<p>Any predictions?</p>
<p>There’s always been English majors and I suspect always will. What I think will decrease is the number of schools. I’d expect many smaller, lesser known privates bite the dust as the number of students willing to pay $40-50K per year decreases as well. I think the in-states will continue to thrive (in numbers of applicants at least) as they continue to represent relative value.</p>
<p>There are students today who pay $20K/year to major in English. That train has already left the station.</p>
<p>Yes I’m also chuckling because that train left the station with regard to in-state publics…the OP must be in one of the less expensive states :-)</p>
<p>hahaha same, momofthreeboys!</p>
<p>Currently $30k+ per year to major in English at a UC. </p>
<p>But I agree w/OP that the landscape will change, likely dramatically. Train is already chugging out of sight and moving too fast for regular folks to catch a ride. </p>
<p>I hear a lonesome whistle.</p>
<p>As the late, great economist Herb Stein said. " if something cannot go on forever, it won’t".</p>
<p>I’ll take a stab:</p>
<p>1) Many bottom-level LACs will fold</p>
<p>2) Many Governors/legislatures will cap/CPI index tuition for state U’s and lean on them hard to get kids through in a reasonable period of time (say, 5 years max) - make classes available, etc.</p>
<p>3) College attendance rates (overall) will have peaked NOW and will be meaningfully lower in 10 years</p>
<p>4) There will be enormous political pressure to make student loans discharge-able in bankruptcy; it’s even money the law changes by then</p>
<p>5) the NCAA will still be utterly corrupt</p>
<p>Unless the economy goes up like crazy (almost inconceivable) I think tuition will have to slow down or stop increasing at the privates and they will cut back on costs in various ways. Fewer professors will get tenure - more lower cost instructors will be used even at good schools. Marginal programs will be consolidated or eliminated. The country club atmosphere of some schools will go away. I think the federal govt will stop letting schools charge whatever they want and still get federal loan money. Also - I really HOPE the move toward standardized testing in college to prove they are doing their job will NOT take off. I’d like to see most of the scammy private for profits to be regulated and disappear. </p>
<p><em>puts away crystal ball</em></p>
<p>I absolutely disagree about governors and state legislatures capping in-state tuition.
I actually think the opposite to be true.</p>
<p>“I think the federal govt will stop letting schools charge whatever they want and still get federal loan money” </p>
<p>How will that be enacted? You surely don’t mean private colleges. Talk about govt over reach…</p>
<p>Community colleges will continue to be choice of the majority of college students. The age of the average college student will rise from its current 24 1/2 to well over 25-26, and the age of the average community college student will increase from 29 to over 30.</p>
<p>List price at the prestige private colleges will rise, though more slowly than the income/assets of the top 5% of the population, so they will continue to be much cheaper than they were 30 years ago. They will then take credit for increasing the percentage of students receiving need-based aid by offering measly $5k grants to students from families making more than $200k a year. </p>
<p>Nursing will remain by far the largest STEM major, and the one with the highest first year salaries, and those salaries will rise quickly. </p>
<p>Some LACs will fold; others will become successful two-year colleges. </p>
<p>People will continue to major in biology for $25k in tuition, with little in the way of immediate job prospects. Engineering jobs will inexorable move off-shore. Accountants will do well.</p>
<p>I think there will be a zombie apocalypse. I’m cancelling my kid’s SAT prep class tomorrow!</p>
<p>December 21, 2012- the day Santorum somehow takes over the US. Doomsday for colleges everywhere.</p>
<p>Our state universities are getting more difficult to get into as more people try to get in those instead of private universities. If people think their children can get just as good an education at a public university, they will go that route. Our area community colleges are bursting at the seams – no place to park, huge classes and classes filling quickly. More high school graduates are opting to go to the local community college and live at home for two years without even considering a four-year university. I know six or seven students within a 1/4 mile radius of our house who are doing that. Five years ago there were none.</p>
<p>I don’t believe that this situation will reverse itself any time soon.</p>
<p>Funny thing is 10 years ago, we heard the same doom and gloom, and 10 years before that, it was the same doom and gloom…</p>
<p>Mini-where do you get that the majority of college students are in community colleges. If you are taking traditional college students, not even CLOSE. Even non-traditional students it doesn’t come close to “majority”. Around here, hardly anyone goes to CC unless they can’t get into a 4 year school or they specifically want a technical career. Stats I’ve seen suggest 36% of all students in college go to CC, and by your own stats, the majority of students in CC are not “college aged” students.</p>
<p>It is seriously out of control. We have all read that tuition has increased throughout this last decade particularly when we were in the worst recession since the depression. One little consideration, I will throw out there for those who are looking beyond the top schools, there are some schools that do keep the tuition at the level that your freshman enters. My son who is now a senior is at one of these schools. It was a great benefit to us. You can find a list of these schools @ US News Report.</p>
<p>Yes, and tuition increased during past recessions as well. Take any 10 year period and you will see similar percentage increases over the last 4 or 5+ decades.</p>
<p>I completely disagree that the small, less selective LAC will fold. As even state schools become highly selective because of their value, these small, local/regional school will boom as community college grads, who still cannot afford to live away, look for places to finish a bachelors. (I know, for me, the nearest in-state public is a 3 hour drive.) They will also attract average and just-above average students who are shut of the admissions race at the good value in-state publics and the pricey privates with huge endowments and lots of aid to give.</p>
<p>"Mini-where do you get that the majority of college students are in community colleges. If you are taking traditional college students, not even CLOSE. Even non-traditional students it doesn’t come close to “majority”</p>
<p>From the U.S. Department of Education. (Actually, it is about 40-60 toward 4-year; the majority of Hispanics and African-Americans are in two-year, and they are the fastest growing proportion of college students.) And call whatever you like “traditional”, but the average U.S. college student is now almost 25 years old. “College-age” students are the age they are going to college. 25-30.</p>
<p>What we are seeing with kids in our area this year is that more and more kids are going to second and third tier schools that are FAR AWAY from their homes – mostly because it seems that this is what it takes to get merit aid. I’m wondering if eventually everyone will just apply to 50 or 100 schools using the common ap, go wherever the money is best, and as a result, the norm will become going to school on the other side of the country. This will get really interesting if people stay in the area where they went to college, marry people rom the other side of the country, etc. I foresee a big disjuncture between the way college educated people end up living, and non-college educated people if mobility becomes routine for anyone desiring a BA.</p>