Public Universities: Dishonesty Starts with YOU! (cost, school, salary, private)

[mm_mary73]

I must be really slow. What exactly is the point you're trying to make?

[artsyguy]

That is a really biased and arrogant stand point. Blame the students. Oh wait, the students are the customers and the college is filled with highly educated but unethical professors, advisers, and counselors trained to "help" and "guide" students. Yeah right! It's a joke on the students. They like dumb students, it makes the colleges look good.

Originally Posted by hsw

Starts with dumb, irresponsible parents who have kids they can't afford

Then, dumb and irresponsible kids and parents often don't plan and prepare for how to enter top colleges and choose specific majors (and achieve high grades) to increase odds of a decent starting job upon graduating in 2-3 yrs (takes a wasteful moron to need 4 yrs to earn any undergrad degree)

IIRC, Harvard's undergrad class of '09 had a ~40% rate of lacking any job offer at graduation....a stunning testimonial to lack of relevance of a lib arts degree, even from a prestigious college, in a challenging economy in which leading employers expect job-relevant quant skills that nearly all lib arts majors (incl economics) fail to provide, despite 4 yrs and ~$250K wasted

[sponger42]

Originally Posted by K-Luv

The national average for tuition increase at public universities for 2009-2010 is around 6.5%. Private colleges are at an average of 4.3%. Since this is an average, some are less and some are more, but you can't lump them all together as 'unethical' without looking at each one individually.

You are correct. I only have in-depth knowledge of one specific example, but I prefer not to name the University. I then did a search for other Universities in similiar situations but did not fully examine each individual case. This might be an ill-posed opinion since it may only--in actuality--apply to one specific case. However, I believe that this sort of behaviour is widespread among Universities. That is a belief and not a fact.

However, per your statement about research, donations, and grants; the specific case I have examined carefully defines a very narrow range of activities supported by student's tuition. Tuition income pays for some things, donations, grants, and other sources of income pay for other things, and the two are not mixed. So it is easy to define the shortfalls and additional expenses in the tuition-funded section. The net result is that the university in question has a ~10% increase in revenue, mostly due to a ~15% increase in tuitions.

Besides, something can only be unethical if it goes against an individuals personal belief system.

No, ethics is defined by laws and societal norms, not individual belief systems. Just because you personally believe that murder is ethical does not make it so.

[John23]

I think it's very unethical, but its really just a small part of this much larger baby boomer power grab over the last 30 years.

What highschool "counselors", helpers, SAT prep advisors fail to tell students is that all the valuable degrees were earned 30 or 40 years ago! They're 30 years too late.

I think its incredible how boomers continue to extend their power, consolidate media, consolidate thought control for gen x and y, and poor brainwashed Johnny highschool student is taking advice from a highschool counselor about a $50 k a year degree. With no experience in handling debt! The most he's ever borrowed before was $1,500 or $3,000. This is just insanity. Students are oblivious (on purpose IMO) about the much larger picture going on.

Some degrees are still rock solid like engineering or the hard sciences, I dont think anyone would disagree. But that applies to a small fraction of students. What happens to the other 70%?

I think it's about mediocrity being indentured for life while boomers and the higher ups continue to enjoy life. It wont be fun in 10 or 15 years when the two meet. There'll probably be an overthrow of the govt if things continue on this path.

[rubber_factory]

John23, your post is delusional.

The part I really enjoyed is when you say that all the good degrees were earned 30 or 40 years ago. I LOLed very hard at that. Good work.

[rubber_factory]

Originally Posted by sponger42

The REAL reason universities are raising tuitions is because they can. With high unemployment, workers are attempting to go back to school to retrain or update their knowledge to improve their skills when they return to the workplace. The increased demand puts universities in the enviable position of being able to charge whatever they please and still fill their rosters.

You say, "the REAL reason universities raise tuition is because they can" - and I agree that it is an issue of high demand. However I am not convinced this high demand has much to do with unemployment. Tuition has been rising rapidly for almost a decade, back when we had good employment figures.

Tuition has been rising because Americans buy into the idea that federal subsidies make education more affordable. In reality they make education more expensive. Without the pricing power from federally-funded loans, universities would not be able to charge the tuitions they do.

The more "free money" you throw at universities via student debt, the higher they will raise tuition. It is simple.

However, raising tuition in a recession is dishonest and sews the seeds of a dishonest workforce of tomorrow. While individual responsibility plays the key role in whether a student, researcher, or employee displays the traits of honesty (willing to be a whistle-blower, unwilling to cook financial books, unwilling to "adjust" the data to give positive results), a primary driver of dishonest behaviour is a lack of investment in society. A recent graduate under a $50,000 load of debt has literally "nothing to loose" and therefore will be much more likely to look the other way when his or her boss or coworkers do something unethical for money.

This makes no sense. Raising tuition is not "dishonest".

Accepting state funds is an implicit social contract for state-sponsored schools. They should strive to improve the society which supports them, and that means NOT screwing their students for every penny they can squeeze out of them. Such dishonest and immoral behaviour in the name of "business" will only come back to haunt us all when todays graduating class becomes the enablers of future Enrons, banking collapses, or other financial scandals.

I will go ahead and save the suspense -

This graduating class, along with every other one before it, is an "enabler" to such scandals. Financial scandals are not a recent phenomenon, and behavior by his/her past university administration is no excuse for any individual.

[beachmouse]

Bob Graham weighs in on George LeMieux and Frank Brogan

"Do you know that since 1990 on inflation-adjusted dollars the funding per-student in our state university system has declined $4,500? That's had a horrific effect."

Making up that $4500 per student has to come from somewhere.

[rubber_factory]

beachmouse, I think your article is only for the state of Florida.

[city_data91]

Originally Posted by John23

I think it's very unethical, but its really just a small part of this much larger baby boomer power grab over the last 30 years.

What highschool "counselors", helpers, SAT prep advisors fail to tell students is that all the valuable degrees were earned 30 or 40 years ago! They're 30 years too late.

I think its incredible how boomers continue to extend their power, consolidate media, consolidate thought control for gen x and y, and poor brainwashed Johnny highschool student is taking advice from a highschool counselor about a $50 k a year degree. With no experience in handling debt! The most he's ever borrowed before was $1,500 or $3,000. This is just insanity. Students are oblivious (on purpose IMO) about the much larger picture going on.

Some degrees are still rock solid like engineering or the hard sciences, I dont think anyone would disagree. But that applies to a small fraction of students. What happens to the other 70%?

I think it's about mediocrity being indentured for life while boomers and the higher ups continue to enjoy life. It wont be fun in 10 or 15 years when the two meet. There'll probably be an overthrow of the govt if things continue on this path.

Baby boomers are already in the process of retiring and will continue to retire in large numbers, opening jobs for young people.

[beachmouse]

Florida is particularly bad for not keeping funding increases up with enrollment increases, but it's also a problem in many other states as the percentage of college-bound high school students has significantly increased over the past 20 years.