Hurray New York! They really seem to have stepped up in response to Drumpf.
I hope other forward-thinking states get inspired by this example. Maybe after a while, red states will realize why all the opportunity, the capital, and the popular culture exists in blue states.
We need education badly, especially in the future when most jobs will be highly-skilled jobs. We need art! We need a lot of things that are not immediately profitable.
I think California got such a long term boost when they had, not free, but very low-cost University education in the 60's - 80's. I think it basically was a huge contributor for the computer tech industry in SV today and as well as other high-tech industries such as aerospace. It's pretty sad that they've been slowly allowing that promise to decay.
It's also so odd that tech employers decry the 'shortage' of engineers and stay silent when budget fights come up as they affect education & university tuition.
Cheap university means it's low-cost to start, learn what you need and make some connections, and drop out, not just that it is cheap to get a full degree.
Conversely, rapidly increasing tuition increases the perceived cost of dropping out to try something, if failure may mean you want to go back and finish a degree.
> I think California got such a long term boost when they had, not free, but very low-cost University education in the 60's - 80's.
Technically, tuition free for in-state students for most of that time, though there were some incidental fees, and a small general "education fee" established in the early 1980s.
That and free community college was killed largely by Prop 13, which both killed existing property tax revenue (with both hard limits I on rates and a calculation methodology that guaranteed a much value would be untaxed) and made it procedurally much more difficult to raise other taxes.
It's pointlessly divisive to make this a red vs. blue issue.
Tennessee, (a red state) has had free community college for its HS graduates for a few years now via last dollar scholarships, and a very good scholarship for four year schools.
Georgia has had a similar program since 1993. It's not necessarily 100% for everybody, but it is for some since it's merit-based. Otherwise, covers something like 80% to 90%, or so, of the tuition. It's been a while since I've read anything on it so I don't know the current state of the program.
If your grades slip too much though, it goes away- hence the saying "Don't lose HOPE" (I didn't go to school in Georgia though and only heard this secondhand through a colleague).
> Maybe after a while, red states will realize why all the opportunity, the capital, and the popular culture exists in blue states.
More likely, it will just perpetuate this cultural divide that exists between states with opportunities and those without. I would be much happier to see this news from Alabama, Mississippi, Kentucky, or even Texas. Perhaps the success of this program will inspire those states to institute similar programs.
Maybe the Federal Government can step up with a mechanism to help low income states finance similar programs.
This is neat, but I wish education wasn't expensive to begin with.
Or better yet, just simply make education free via making the cost be capped at 5% of your yearly (before-tax) wage for Y years, or a total of $XXX,XXX, whichever comes first.
This is simple to implement and effectively shields those who have "useless degrees" as well. Everyone wins.
So middle class people should pay more taxes to subsidize the wealthy? Remember, college grads make several times more over their lifetime than high school grads.
Perhaps you misunderstand. Those attending the school would be the ones to pay. The policy I proposed wouldn't require anyone to pay any additional taxes.
They're not very wealthy if they haven't attended the college and earned a lifetime's worth of money yet, though. And if they do go on to do so, they will (or should, rather) pay more tax than the people who subsidised them and thus contribute back. Also not sure how you define the middle class as high school grads.. that sounds more like working class to me.
Programs like edX are making this a reality. Education does not have to be expensive and the sooner we realize that most college degrees are worthless in their practical application in the workforce the better off we will be.
Detail lost in the headline: Room & Board are not included.
What I foresee as a result: schools hiking Room & Board charges because "people can afford it." This step would've been far more effective if the state covered everything and price-locked it as a result; now schools will see the balance not paid by students on tuition as room for Room & Board charges to grow.
As an on-campus student I didn't know any off-campus students except one who went to my high school, and he didn't have many new friends from university that he kept in touch with. It is difficult to overestimate the social aspect of universities, which has led in part to other changes such as a common core curriculum for all undergraduates, for instance.
I'm not claiming that students should live on campus, but there are clear advantages if they do so to both those students and other on-campus students.
In theory, the argument is that it creates initialisation conditions of greater social and academic engagement that increases the likelihood of staying in college and completing a degree. The idea is that clueless freshmen who have never lived independently before and are unleashed for the first time will just get lost to the party if you set them loose off campus. This way they are given some structure and discipline during their first year or two in college, ideally creating a healthier template they more likely to adhere to in some measure even after they move off-campus.
Practically, it's more likely just a revenue measure...
Yes, but living off-campus isn't free either. That may get one out of hiked room/board/meal plan fees, but not out of the basic obstacle of affordability that stops many low-income people from going to college. Total cost of attendance can be prohibitive with or without tuition.
Yeah, there are more ways around it. One can work part-time. But my experience is that this is all a bit mythologised and represents a kind of superhuman best-case scenario.
Admittedly, I'm biased as a native Russian (in US since early childhood). In our part of the world, making school and university-age children work is still often regarded as a kind of violation of their human rights. "They need to learn financial responsibility" doesn't resonate strongly in cultures without this national folklore of individual self-reliance.
However, as far as I can tell, "working through college" isn't as easy as it's made out to be. In the real world, a good chunk of the kids that have to work enough alongside school to actually _support_ themselves (housing, food, necessities), rather than just earn some discretionary "spending money", don't end up doing well in school, for obvious reasons of nonlinear tradeoffs in human activities. After a 6-hour shift on my feet at the pizza joint, I'm probably going to want to come home and veg, not soar to the snow-capped summits of my survey of Western intellectual history until 2 AM ...
Being in tech, I got so engrossed in my work I dropped out to pursue my (at the time) meteorically ascendant career! :-) But that's a different — and decidedly luxurious — problem.
Good point. Some of the SUNY schools do require students to live on campus, although I think most students in NY could either live in off-campus apartments (which tend to be cheaper) or with their parents if they're local.
This is true. But also, in New York City at least, it will still be an opportunity for those who live in the city to attend college locally while still living at home.
I suspect this could happen due to market forces as well. Now students in other states simply need to move to NY to establish residency in order to qualify. Most likely they would move to the area near their college campus of choice, driving up rents there.
The net result of highly affordable college will not be better employment opportunities for those who cannot afford college today. The net result will be increased competition for a limited number of quality jobs.
The value of a degree largely lies in its exclusivity. The increase in people going to grad school, particularly Master's programs, is a response to the increasing number of people with bachelor's degrees in the workforce.
This is not to say affordable college is a bad thing by any means.
The net result of highly affordable college will be, at the very least, a better educated populace. In theory, this will make a workforce that is better at doing more valuable jobs.
I've often fantasized about the possibility of a deluge of rich philanthropists just up and deciding to establish institutes modeled after IAS, Boyce Thompson or HHMI Janelia en masse to soak up the excess scholars produced by universities (Boyce Thompson might be a bit of a black sheep in that list, but I include it anyways since it's technically independent to some degree). Unfortunately, I don't see that occurring within my lifetime.
An expansion of gov't labs would have a similar effect, but that's a real stretch in these times.
I'm not convinced. As more mediocre students get accepted to colleges the curriculum has to be dumbed down to accommodate them.
And, as others have noted, this is really pushing on a string. We're not doing anyone any favors by having them spend five or six years studying a field in which they'll never be able to find a job.
I don't see anything about expanding the acceptance rates, just making it more possible for some people pay for it without going into debt. It's perfectly possible to not get accepted to a SUNY or CUNY school.
The perceived value of a degree may live in its exclusivity, but real value is any degree as still to this day a degree is a checkbox for many decent paying jobs.
The net result will indeed be better employment opportunities, as it opens up a large section of the job market requiring degrees across the United States.
They will be competing for better jobs than the ones they currently can get without a degree
People should do their homework, Louisiana has had a program to provide free tuition to its citizen's since 1998. To be fair, its been hit hard in the last few years, but it still around.
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[ 6.0 ms ] story [ 107 ms ] threadI hope other forward-thinking states get inspired by this example. Maybe after a while, red states will realize why all the opportunity, the capital, and the popular culture exists in blue states.
We need education badly, especially in the future when most jobs will be highly-skilled jobs. We need art! We need a lot of things that are not immediately profitable.
It's also so odd that tech employers decry the 'shortage' of engineers and stay silent when budget fights come up as they affect education & university tuition.
(a university, after learning what they needed; clearly there was merit)
Conversely, rapidly increasing tuition increases the perceived cost of dropping out to try something, if failure may mean you want to go back and finish a degree.
Technically, tuition free for in-state students for most of that time, though there were some incidental fees, and a small general "education fee" established in the early 1980s.
That and free community college was killed largely by Prop 13, which both killed existing property tax revenue (with both hard limits I on rates and a calculation methodology that guaranteed a much value would be untaxed) and made it procedurally much more difficult to raise other taxes.
Tennessee, (a red state) has had free community college for its HS graduates for a few years now via last dollar scholarships, and a very good scholarship for four year schools.
http://tnpromise.gov/about.shtml https://www.tn.gov/collegepays/article/tennessee-hope-schola...
More likely, it will just perpetuate this cultural divide that exists between states with opportunities and those without. I would be much happier to see this news from Alabama, Mississippi, Kentucky, or even Texas. Perhaps the success of this program will inspire those states to institute similar programs.
Maybe the Federal Government can step up with a mechanism to help low income states finance similar programs.
Seems like you're making an argument that it's a good thing Trump was elected.
Or better yet, just simply make education free via making the cost be capped at 5% of your yearly (before-tax) wage for Y years, or a total of $XXX,XXX, whichever comes first.
This is simple to implement and effectively shields those who have "useless degrees" as well. Everyone wins.
What I foresee as a result: schools hiking Room & Board charges because "people can afford it." This step would've been far more effective if the state covered everything and price-locked it as a result; now schools will see the balance not paid by students on tuition as room for Room & Board charges to grow.
http://www.uno.edu/housing/residency-requirement.aspx
Other schools in system have a similar policy.
> All First Year students are required to live in on-Grounds
http://housing.vt.edu/contracts/apply/first_year_students.ht...
> All incoming first-year students are guaranteed, and required to live in, on-campus housing for their first year;
And that's just Virginia.
Do we know what lead to this policy becoming commonplace?
I'm not claiming that students should live on campus, but there are clear advantages if they do so to both those students and other on-campus students.
Practically, it's more likely just a revenue measure...
Yeah, there are more ways around it. One can work part-time. But my experience is that this is all a bit mythologised and represents a kind of superhuman best-case scenario.
Admittedly, I'm biased as a native Russian (in US since early childhood). In our part of the world, making school and university-age children work is still often regarded as a kind of violation of their human rights. "They need to learn financial responsibility" doesn't resonate strongly in cultures without this national folklore of individual self-reliance.
However, as far as I can tell, "working through college" isn't as easy as it's made out to be. In the real world, a good chunk of the kids that have to work enough alongside school to actually _support_ themselves (housing, food, necessities), rather than just earn some discretionary "spending money", don't end up doing well in school, for obvious reasons of nonlinear tradeoffs in human activities. After a 6-hour shift on my feet at the pizza joint, I'm probably going to want to come home and veg, not soar to the snow-capped summits of my survey of Western intellectual history until 2 AM ...
Being in tech, I got so engrossed in my work I dropped out to pursue my (at the time) meteorically ascendant career! :-) But that's a different — and decidedly luxurious — problem.
The state owns much of the real estate around campuses across the state.
Give away the content, make your money back on rent and living fees.
Similar to their StartUP NY program which offers income tax relief in exchange for leasing state owned office space.
The value of a degree largely lies in its exclusivity. The increase in people going to grad school, particularly Master's programs, is a response to the increasing number of people with bachelor's degrees in the workforce.
This is not to say affordable college is a bad thing by any means.
(I still wonder as to what kind of rube can get that wrong. I clearly said 'SOY MOCHA.')
We have plenty of qualified people. What we don't have are jobs where their qualifications are valued. See: the job market for hard sciences.
I've often fantasized about the possibility of a deluge of rich philanthropists just up and deciding to establish institutes modeled after IAS, Boyce Thompson or HHMI Janelia en masse to soak up the excess scholars produced by universities (Boyce Thompson might be a bit of a black sheep in that list, but I include it anyways since it's technically independent to some degree). Unfortunately, I don't see that occurring within my lifetime.
An expansion of gov't labs would have a similar effect, but that's a real stretch in these times.
And, as others have noted, this is really pushing on a string. We're not doing anyone any favors by having them spend five or six years studying a field in which they'll never be able to find a job.
The net result will indeed be better employment opportunities, as it opens up a large section of the job market requiring degrees across the United States.
They will be competing for better jobs than the ones they currently can get without a degree
Classical economics suggests this will lead to increased spending, growth, and higher employment. More money spent should also lead to higher wages.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrick_F._Taylor#Taylor_Oppor...