Haves vs. Have-Nots at Public Universities

[groovedaddy]

The University of California, which has already received $716 million in federal stimulus funds to offset a $1 billion budget gap, announced on Friday that it is raising student fees by 32 percent. That works out to about $2,500 per student a year.

Student protesters said that the higher costs will make it even harder for middle class and poor students to go to college, and will widen the education gap between the haves and the have-nots. But the students at the 10-campus California system are, on average, from far wealthier backgrounds than the average household in the state. This gap is pronounced at other prominent public universities, like Michigan and Virginia.

As they deal with tighter budgets, what should public universities do to balance fiscal responsibility and equal opportunity?

http://roomfordebate.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/11/22/haves-vs-have-nots-at-public-universities/?th&emc=th

[wtmusic]

1. Ahnold is destroying the state of CA nt

[Buzz Clik]

2. No, Californians are doing it all by themselves.

And they've been doing it for decades. They want everything but don't want to pay for it. They tie the hands of the legislature and the governor, get pissed, and run a bunch more initiatives to make it worse.

[wtmusic]

4. The governor's hands are hardly tied.

"California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger informed lawmakers in his state Wednesday that he will not sign any budget-balancing plan that includes a tax increase, period."

http://www.politicsdaily.com/2009/06/18/Safety%20Net%20Failure%20in%20California/

I guess "Californians are doing it all by themselves" by electing morons like Arnold, but by the same token Americans started the Iraq war by electing Dubya.

[Buzz Clik]

5. Gray Davis suffered the same fate.

It will not end anytime soon.

[Craftsman]

3. Please explain this to me

A neighbor of mine will gradualte his youngest child from University of Houston Clear Lake next month, we live out of teh local community college district (San Jacinto College) she he had to pay higher rates but it cost him $6K total, for 2 years there then I quote about $20K for the last 2 years. This kid studied engineering has has a job lined up with a oil company. Texas can make this happen for under $30K total why can not CA? As a disclaimer he did stay home and not in a dorm but he lived under 10 miles form both schools

[Buzz Clik]

6. It has to do with the funding base of the school.

It costs about the same amount of money to educate a college student for 4 years at a full-blown university no matter where they go. Some schools have more expenses due to higher salaries, more building, etc. It it is all privately funded, the cost is about $20,000 per semester. If some student at a full university is paying less, it is because costs are being defrayed, usually by the state.

[wtmusic]

7. Prop 13 got Californians used to the idea that they didn't have to pay

for anything.

Either coast on what people had paid before, or float bond issues so their kids pay later.

Elect a governator with no fiscal foresight who goes along with the plan.

Voila! Disaster.

[mike_c]

8. remember too that California has a 3-tiered university system...

...and that UC is the top tier, supposedly targeted at the top ten percent of prospective students. It was designed to be somewhat "elite" in that respect, although in practice it is not as restrictive as that makes it sound (and it was supposed to be nearly free to attend, like all California universities). The California State University, or CSU, fills in most of the need for the rest of the state's university students, and its fees are considerably lower. Direct costs for non-resident students (i.e. not including dorm costs) are still under $2000 per semester if I'm not mistaken, even with the recent 32% fee increase we've seen, too. This is highly state subsidized, of course-- the last time I checked, student fees paid about 20% of the total cost of tuition at the CSU where I work.

The third tier is the community college system, which is extremely inexpensive to attend. At any rate, my point is the the UC system is not the benchmark for the cost of higher education for most californians, not by a long shot.

[LWolf]

9. If it weren't for the CA community college system,

nobody in my family would have attended college.

Getting the first 2 years done affordably means a BA is not out of reach.

The massive amount of debt required for the working poor to attend college leaves it out of reach for too many.