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Posts Tagged ‘Higher Education’
Wednesday, May 19th, 2010
This is the time of the year when almost everyone is involved in a graduation ceremony either as a guest, a relative or friend of a graduate, or someone who is walking up the stage to get their diploma. And, at most of these gatherings, the guest speaker will stick to some tried and true topics including how a college degree will get you further in life than no degree at all.
I really hate when people say that because it’s an oversimplification of a very real, complex economic situation. A college degree, in and of itself, does not advance a person’s earning potential or professional advancement opportunities. In fact, anyone who believes that simple statement probably would like to buy some beans that I picked up the other day…
What a college degree does do is grant a person access. It is this access that is the most important part of receiving a college degree. The piece of paper that your degree is written on is good and might help you to secure a larger raise or a higher starting salary, but most importantly it gives you access to professions and organizations that you might not have otherwise been able to access. This, of course, doesn’t mean that those folks who decide to stay away from college cannot attain the same level of access. Not at all. It does mean, however, that the person with the college degree might find a more favorable way through the employment door and a more attractive compensation package, though.
The New York Times published an article about this topic yesterday and this portion of the text caught my eye:
Among the top 10 growing job categories, two require college degrees: accounting (a bachelor’s) and postsecondary teachers (a doctorate). But this growth is expected to be dwarfed by the need for registered nurses, home health aides, customer service representatives and store clerks. None of those jobs require a bachelor’s degree.
Professor Vedder likes to ask why 15 percent of mail carriers have bachelor’s degrees, according to a 1999 federal study.
“Some of them could have bought a house for what they spent on their education,” he said.
Now, with all of this being said, I still want to make the point that going to college at some point (maybe not the first year after high school) is still a great thing for people to do. In fact, the New York Times article from yesterday agrees with this passage:
There is another rejoinder to the case against college: People with college and graduate degrees generally earn more than those without them, and face lower risks of unemployment, according to figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Even those who experience a few years of college earn more money, on average, with less risk of unemployment, than those who merely graduate from high school, said Morton Schapiro, an economist who is the president of Northwestern University.
“You get some return even if you don’t get the sheepskin,” Mr. Schapiro said.
He warned against overlooking the intangible benefits of a college experience — even an incomplete experience — for those who might not apply what they learned directly to their chosen work.
“It’s not just about the economic return,” he said. “Some college, whether you complete it or not, contributes to aesthetic appreciation, better health and better voting behavior.”
It’s a proven fact that a college degree helps people along, but my spin on the story is that it helps by granting access. Benefits don’t magically appear to those with degrees – you still have to work hard to achieve success.
Posted in College & Fraternity Life | No Comments »
Tuesday, May 18th, 2010
Finals are over and some of my students are getting ready to walk across the stage during graduation this week. It’s pretty cool to say that I’ve now taught college graduates. However, with the end of the semester comes a bit of a pain in the ass. You see, I’m one of these professors that puts out a syllabus and then (gasp) sticks to it. In other words, when the syllabus says, “Cell phones use is not permitted in the classroom,” that means (get ready for it) that you can’t use your cell phone during class. Shocking, right? When I write that not participating in class discussions can negatively impact your class grade by dropping it more than a full letter grade, guess what that means?
That’s right! It means that if you opt to have a blank stare on your face during the entire semester then you get pretty close to 0 of the 25 points allocated for participation!
Let’s face it – many of today’s college students were whisked through high school and really not properly prepared for the rigor of college-level study. To make matters worse, these students were typically pampered all of their lives by hyper-protective parents, teachers that opted to teach plain vanilla course content as opposed to creating an engaging classroom, and an overall failing educational system that doesn’t mind giving students a higher grade for their “effort.”
That crap doesn’t fly in the real world. If you miss a deadline for your company or submit work that is riddled with spelling and grammatical errors, you get fired. Period.
You might say that if it is the job of the secondary education system to prepare students for the rigor of college study, then it is the job of the college system to prepare students for the rigor of higher level occupations. That’s my job as an adjunct professor. In fact, I believe that my job as an adjunct professor is to bring outside experience into the classroom and show my students what happens in the real world through the scope of the course that I’m teaching. It’s a tricky game, but I enjoy doing this type of work because I see the quality of students coming out of most colleges and they’re just not prepared to be engaged employees. It’s a damn shame, really.
To some degree, I think that for most students I unwillingly represent the exact opposite of what they’re used to from their high school teachers. I stress “unwillingly” because I don’t think that I’m doing anything outlandish or crazy in my grading. I think that when a student does not engage herself in class discussion because she is clacking away on her BlackBerry device for the majority of the semester in a class that places 25% of the final grade on participation, then the best that student can hope for is a 75 in the class. Okay, maybe if she engages in a few discussions throughout the semester, she can find herself with a 78 or 79.
Too often, the pampered generation of students expects that if they receive a B average on their written submissions and have spotty attendance and no participation, then they’ll just get the B average. I’m not sure on what planet that would make sense, but it doesn’t work in my classroom. I create a grading matrix in an Excel spreadsheet and detail for each student how they can receive an A in the course. In fact, I give them a copy of the spreadsheet so they can track their grades throughout the semester. I also suggest to the students when/if they need to be more engaged in class discussions so they can get some participation points. There’s not much more that I can do to help these students other than resemble some of their pampering high school teachers and I’m not interested in that at all.
Thus far, about 15% of my students have questioned their final grade and I’ve suggested that they lacked on the participation requirement. None of the questioning students have responded to my replies on their participation, but I expect that in a generation that has rarely been told, “no,” or “bad job,” that a few of them will lash out at my responses. Unfortunately for them, I don’t have to worry about getting tenure or receiving any type of accolades from my students since I’m given teaching assignments when/if the college needs help.
If you’re a college student out there contemplating complaining about your final grade, I would suggest that you get out your syllabus and look at how your grade is calculated. If participation is 15% of your final grade, then ask yourself if you participated in each class session. If not, then do you think that you deserve those 15 points? If you answer, “yes,” to that question, then you’re probably the result of a pampering system that doesn’t teach you in the context of the real world. If you answered, “no,” to that question, they you probably wouldn’t complain about your final grade anyway.
Posted in College & Fraternity Life | No Comments »
Saturday, May 16th, 2009
As a follower of movements in higher education I love this story. The New York Times recently reported on a new phenomenon in higher education – namely the increasing number of community colleges that are offering Bachelor’s Degrees. I think that this is a great story because it shows how community colleges are bringing the same type of competitiveness that is found in the private market into higher education.
This is long overdue.
Florida leads the way, with 14 community colleges authorized to offer bachelor’s degrees, and 12 already doing so, in fields as varied as fire safety management and veterinary technology. But nationwide, 17 states, including Nevada, Texas and Washington, have allowed community colleges to award associate’s and bachelor’s degrees, and in some, the community colleges have become four-year institutions. Others states are considering community college baccalaureates.
In most cases, the expanding community colleges argue that they are fulfilling a need, providing four-year degrees to working people who often lack the money or the time to travel to a university. But some of those universities are fighting back, saying the community colleges are involved in “mission creep” that may distract them from their traditional mission and lead to watered-down bachelor’s degrees.
Personally, I think that the traditional four-year colleges have too-long enjoyed the monopoly of giving that small piece of paper that so many people need to reach the next levels of their current careers or break in to the career that they want. And what’s great about the community colleges offering these degrees is that they are offering super specialized versions of the traditional degrees.
For example, instead of the generic “public administration” degree students can now get a “public safety administration” degree, specialized for their specific discipline. It’s brilliant.
Posted in College & Fraternity Life | 4 Comments »
Thursday, March 12th, 2009
While playing around on Facebook the other day, I came across Robert Applebaum’s “group” called Cancel Student Loan Debt to Stimulate the Economy. On the group home page, Applebaum goes into detail on how canceling student loan debt would stimulate the economy in a variety of ways. Here is only a sampling of what this lawyer-turned-advocate suggests:
Forgiving student loan debt would have an IMMEDIATE stimulating effect on the economy. Responsible people who did nothing other than pursue a higher education would have hundreds, if not thousands of extra dollars per month to spend, fueling the economy NOW. Those extra dollars being pumped into the economy would have a multiplying effect, unlike many of the provisions of the new stimulus package. As a result, tax revenues would go up, the credit markets will unfreeze and jobs will be created.
Let me be clear. This is NOT about a free ride. This is about a new approach to economic stimulus, nothing more. To those who would argue that this proposal would cause the banking system to collapse or make student loans unavailable to future borrowers, please allow me to respond.
You can go read Applebaum’s group page to see how he responds to the obvious criticism. What strikes me is that that aggregate student loan debt in America is roughly $600 billion. The government passed $700 billion in stimulus spending last October (which has been a failure) and another nearly $800 billion last month. Plus there is a spending bill currently before the Congress that would increase the number of dollars being spent on ridiculous earmark projects. By some estimates, in total we could be spending $2.3 trillion on stimulating the economy…with little of that actual money going directly to benefit the middle class.
Applebaum’s suggestion is an interesting one and given the personal nature of the suggestion, each person who supports or rejects it will have specific reasons why. Many of those who reject it will project their life experiences on the stories of those who support it (a common, aggravating problem in the student loan world). Likewise, many of those who support the proposal will have a level of debt that could likely be paid off after a few years of hard work and saving. But there were always be exceptions that drive the argument forward in some people’s minds. You can find some of those exceptions by reading the a petition currently on The Petition Site calling for Applebaum’s plan to be put into action.
I signed the petition and added a little bit of my story, which I think suggests why enacting a student loan forgiveness policy would be beneficial for me. Here is my little blurb, reprinted for your reading:
I graduated with $118,000 in student loan debt. Without taking out these loans, I would have never been able to receive the high quality education that I did. All I did was pursue the American Dream…and now I pay about $1,000 each month because of those student loans. I have a great job and I still can’t buy a home – heck, I can’t even buy a new car! I’m still making my payments and I’m still paying down my debt (down to $104,000 now). But if I could use that extra money each month to buy a home or a new car, I would do it in a heartbeat. However, on the path that I’m on now – neither purchase will be possible for at least the next ten years. Great…
I’m not sure if either purchase won’t be available for the next ten years, but repaying at the rate that I’m currently going (which is above and beyond the minimum monthly payments) will certainly put me on that timetable. Something needs to be done and though I have a few different ideas about how I plan on addressing this debt (can’t keep a good man down!), it would be so much more effective if the government stopped collecting it’s 4.75% interest rate off of the $50,000+ that I owe it in principle.
I don’t want a handout and I know that if things don’t change, then I’ll be able to payoff my student loans in due time. But during a time when Wall Street executives are getting million dollar bonuses for failing and when banks, insurance companies, and the automakers are getting money hand over fist from the government, you would hope that – at some point – someone in Washington steps back and says, “Whoa! What are we really doing here?!” If somebody would do that and champion this cause over the current bailout causes, I think it would truly stimulate the economy.
Posted in Money, Jobs, & Finances, Student Loans | 5 Comments »
Wednesday, February 25th, 2009
President Obama gave his first address to the Congress last night and he addressed a variety of topics. The one topic that piqued my interest was his discussions about education and higher education specifically. Higher education affordability for all Americans is one of my major issues as a voter so I thought I’d offer some comments here. The text from Obama’s speech:
I know that the price of tuition is higher than ever, which is why if you are willing to volunteer in your neighborhood or give back to your community or serve your country, we will make sure that you can afford a higher education. And to encourage a renewed spirit of national service for this and future generations, I ask this Congress to send me the bipartisan legislation that bears the name of Senator Orrin Hatch as well as an American who has never stopped asking what he can do for his country – Senator Edward Kennedy.
You know – that’s a very inspiring thought and a good idea. I wonder about how realistic it is in action, though. For example, what will the cost be to the government if High School Student A volunteers X amount of hours in his or her hometown and thus meets the requirements of this program? Will the government pay all of their tuition at a public school? Half? A quarter? What is the number that makes college affordable for a student?
Further, what happens if High School Student B – who is from a better off family than Student A – does the same amount (or more) of volunteering than Student A? Since Student B is from a well-to-do family, then does he or she get anything for their community service? The same end was achieved – citizens served their community. Right?
And what happens when High School Student C needs another 50 hours of community service by the deadline date to qualify for whatever this grant money will be? Are we to believe that if Student C’s family knows people who know people that they won’t write-up false letters showing all of the service hours that Student C volunteered?
I don’t want to sound like a negative guy on this proposal, but it seems like it’s a bit too nebulous right now. I’m all for college affordability so long as 1) it is a program with no discrimination (income included), and 2) it’s fiscally responsible. We didn’t get that information last night. Other than that, I thought the President’s speech sounded more like a campaign speech than anything else, but I had no major fundamental problems with it.
Posted in College & Fraternity Life, Student Loans | No Comments »
Sunday, February 1st, 2009
The New York Times ran a great article a few weeks ago talking about how college students are now shouldering more of the costs of their education. To me, this is good news! Students paying more of their education expenses means fewer student loans are being taken out and fewer student loans means a less stifling debt burden on tomorrow’s college graduates. As someone who is spending the bulk of his monthly income trying to pay down a six-figure student loan debt, I wish that I would have paid more of my own expenses when I was in college…but hindsight is twenty-twenty, I guess.
The article in the Times is based on a study that also found more tuition dollars going to pay for administrative expenses as opposed to instructional expenses. For me, I find this to be a bit of a concern since I always want to see more dollars spent on instructional expenses and not administrative costs, but anyone who knows how to run a good business knows that you have to retain good talent administratively if you want to keep things moving smoothly. That said, I can take some of the increased administrative fees so long as it leads to better instructional results.
I’m glad to hear that students are shouldering more of their college costs, though. The current economy has so many problems that citing any one of them as “among the worst” puts it in the company of dozens. However, one of the worst problems that some young professionals are facing is their lack of ability to live on their own. In other words, there are college graduates out there who are living off of an allowance from their parents. No, the allowance isn’t their only form of income. There are young twenty somethings who actually have a job in this economy, but are still living lifestyles that are outside of their means.
As someone who spent the last 6 years advising college students around New Jersey, trust me – I’ve seen these folks! They are the ones who are still driving around in brand new cars and purchasing homes as the economy is going to shit – and they’re doing it on an entry-level salary? I don’t think so. These kids have the luxury of getting their car payment, gas expenses, and mortgage payments financed by the national bank of Mom and/or Dad.
Don’t get me wrong. I don’t begrudge those whose families have enough money to pay for these expenses, but let’s look at the long-term prospects of this scenario. You have middle class parents who are subsidizing expenses which their children are incurring that their children really can’t afford. This means that the parents are saving less for their own retirements, which ultimately leads to parents turning the tables and needing their children to give them an allowance at some point!
Again, I’m not totally opposed to this structure, but my problem exists in the fact that those young professionals who fall into this category are not being trained properly on how to manage their income and expenses. Improper financial training and irresponsible financing are the EXACT same problems that led to the mortgage meltdown in this country. By not allowing young adults to either make it or break it on their own, the problem will only perpetuate itself in a different form.
That’s why I was glad to read the Times article linked above. Let college students begin this new revolution in financial education by learning how to shoulder the burden of their education expenses. It’s a great way to kick start their lives in the real world and while it may be stifling at times, learning to manage money and live on a strict budget will only help – not hurt – the entire financial system.
Posted in College & Fraternity Life, Money, Jobs, & Finances, Student Loans | No Comments »
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