On the Issues

Even though rising tuition seems the norm at many colleges and universities in the U.S., the idea of a free college degree is not just a pipe dream. As a recent piece from Consumer Reports points out, there are colleges in the US that charge no tuition and some that even provide free room and board for all students.

The push for doing education on the cheap has led to a number of “innovations” nearly always touted as ways to “do more with less.” But the data on these experiments increasingly present a more complicated picture of their efficacy.

For instance, more and more research suggests that MOOCs, which stormed the higher education scene a couple of years ago, just don’t work well for most students.

The staggering level of college loan debt in our country finally seems to be getting some long-overdue national attention.

Among the proposals for how to deal with this issue is one called “Pay It Forward,” a program that would substitute after-graduation payments based on earnings for up-front tuition.

The proposal has been attractive to students facing huge loan payments and to conservatives looking to decrease even further the public investment in higher education.

The dramatic increase in college tuition and fees over the past dozen years is justifiably big news. Few doubt that the massive disinvestment of public dollars is responsible for much of the rising cost of higher education, skyrocketing student loan debt, and the massive use of low wage contingent faculty.

What is less well known is that a significant number of states, pushed by broadly based citizen coalitions, have begun bending the cost curve back in the direction of public support for higher ed.

The increasing awareness of—and outrage about–the size of the debt crushing college graduates is, we must hope, a sign that meaningful action to address it may be possible.

The numbers alone are staggering.  According to recent reports, the average student debt for graduates with bachelor’s degrees is now $29,400—roughly 80% of a young person’s average income in this country. (See more at http://www.edcentral.org/student-debt-review/.)

In a recent article, Derek Bok, former President of Harvard University, pinpointed several misconceptions about higher education that are driving our national discussion and policy.

He tackles, for instance, the almost exclusive emphasis on college as an agent of economic growth that has led to President Obama’s strong push for more college degrees and to a variety of “completion” agendas.  While these goals and the measures of success they have spawned seem self-evidently valuable, Bok argues that they are warping our conception of higher education in dangerous ways.

Today’s graduate students are caught in the swirl of several current trends that, if unchanged, lead toward a difficult future for them and for higher education.

As students, they shoulder their share of the growing $1 billion in student loan debt and the daunting problems that burden carries.  (In fact, as some colleges have worked to limit increases in undergraduate tuition, they have often made up the difference through larger increases in graduation tuition.  Reduced financial aid for graduate students adds any more to their debt load.)

Kudos to Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), a senior member of the House Education and the Workforce Committee, for his recent call to investigate what the increasing use of so-called “adjunct” or contingent faculty means for these faculty members and for the learning conditions of their students.

His comments certainly hit the mark:

Many colleges and universities around the country are cutting programs (or have already done so) that just a few years ago were considered at the core of any college or university.

The case of one campus highlights the price paid for these cuts.

Officials at Elizabeth City State University, a historically black college in North Carolina, recently announced plans to cut several programs, including history.

If you sometimes feel like many of the higher ed “reforms” being pushed today are leading to the demise of public colleges, you may be right.

And if you are frustrated that few voices are being raised in alarm, Steven Ward’s piece, “A Machiavellian Guide to Destroying Public Universities in 12 Easy Steps,” may help you understand the reason for this inertia.

A recent report, “Separate & Unequal,” released by the Georgetown University Public Policy Institute, is introduced with a provocative statement: “The higher education system is more and more complicit as a passive agent in the systematic reproduction of white racial privilege across generations.”

The study goes on to detail ways in which the United States is moving toward an entrenched two-tiered higher education system based on race/ethnicity.

We urge President Obama to discuss his plan for higher education with faculty, staff, students and parents.

A White House fact sheet released in support of President Obama’s plan notes that “declining state funding has been the biggest reason for rising tuition at public institutions.” Any plan to rescue college affordability simply must begin by addressing such harsh facts as these:

Big $$$ Foundations Are Driving The Policy Train

We like to think experts who weigh in on the direction of American higher education are steeped in research about what works and have real-world experience with actual students. We like to assume that elected officials, who are accountable to the public, listen to those experts—particularly those who labor in the educational “trenches”—when they make their decisions.

Alisa Messer
President
AFT Local 2121

Dear Alisa:

A bill was recently introduced in the Florida legislature that would bypass the established system of accreditation and allow local state officials to accredit MOOCs and other online courses, including those from unaccredited for-profit providers. A similar bill introduced in the California legislature was reported on in “On the Issues” on March 29, 2013.

Although the details are shameful, it’s good to see the mainstream press publicizing the facts about higher education faculty appointments and compensation.  A recent NBC report highlights these facts from the most recent annual survey on faculty appointments and compensation conducted by the American Association of University Professors: more than 3 out of 4 faculty members in American higher education today work in low-paid, insecure (often part-time) appointments that usually offer no health or other benefits.  The median pay in these positions (often called “adjunct”

Kudos to the New York Times for another important editorial on higher education.  This one, “Resurrecting California’s Public Universities,” chides the California state legislature for slashing higher education funding and then pushing online courses as the “solution” to reduced access.

Here’s what they conclude:

The passage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) was an historic extension of the basic right of healthcare to all. It was a recognition that access to medical care, like access to education, is fundamental to a just society.

MOOCs may prove to be another “bubble” like the online for-profit universities are proving to be, but their widespread adoption could be a much bigger threat to higher education than the University of Phoenix and Kaplan University ever were or will be.

Amid all that enthusiasm for MOOCs these days, it’s important to remember the educational importance of interaction between individual professors and students-and not just for students at elite universities.

The Campaign for the Future of Higher Education held a national meeting last weekend in Michigan, where it discussed action plans to save the nation’s system of higher education for future generations.

CFHE adopted the following statement on federal student financial aid:

Demand for college is at an all-time high and student debt has reached a devastating one trillion dollars. Despite this, Congress is debating whether to cut student aid.