High tuition: government is a source and a solution

-- Nancy Yang

Tuition increases have exceeded inflation for at least four decades, including times when state funding and private support were increasing. Part of the reason is that running a college is labor intensive. More students mean that more teachers are needed. More teachers mean more salaries need to be paid. Having better technology doesn’t make a difference because teaching is a personal service. Most people would agree that increasing class sizes is not a good option.

As the economy grows and more people want to get degrees, rising tuition costs will be a fact of life. Richard Vedder, professor of economics at Ohio University, argues that one of the problems of rising tuition costs is colleges are not like private businesses. Private businesses have profits to measure success which pushes them to save money by product improvements. There is no accountability for how well a college does. He also believes that rising third-party payments, like federal and state loans and grants, are part of the problem. He states, “When third parties pick up the tab, customers become far less sensitive to the price.”

Changing nonprofit colleges into businesses geared for making money would be a radical change that doesn’t seem like it would decrease tuition. Getting rid of third-party payments would increase the burden on students and their families to pay the full tuition. Vedder’s idea would also increase inequalities because the students who need financial assistance will not be able to go to college. Colleges would once again become places where only elite and upper-class people could afford to go. Colleges would also become factories, churning out as many graduates as they could without caring about the quality of their schooling.

Metropolitan State University is a state-supported college. Tuition will rise as state support declines. Right now tuition costs $138 per credit. So a full-time student taking 15 credits would pay $4,140 a year, not including additional fees like technology and student life activity. Yet the real cost of college includes opportunity cost, four years that could have been spent working. The real cost of college is around $17,280 a year because a student could work full-time and earn $9 an hour.

Is a college education worth the cost? Many people would say yes. A college graduate earns nearly double the pay of a person who had only earned a high school diploma, based on census data and reported in the Chronicle of Higher Education.

A college education doesn’t just benefit the college student; a state with more college graduates enjoys more per capita income. The higher the per capita income, the more public revenue is available through taxes to improve life for all residents of the state. Wouldn’t you like to finally get all those potholes in the streets to be fixed?

Yet what can you do if you don’t have the money to pay tuition? Utilize financial aid, which can help you with scholarships and loans. There are many scholarships available that can help take the load off tuition. You just need to take the time to look and apply. Getting federal loans is great because you don’t need to pay off the loan until after you graduate. Many people also go to community colleges and then transfer after two years to a university. Metropolitan State also has a great option called the FACTS tuition management payment plan, where you can pay your tuition off monthly or in installments.

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