Irvine511 said:
it seems to me that there's very little of the middle left, the middle that someone like Yolland appears to be in (too rich for aid, too poor not to go into debt) has all but disappeared. when i was in school, i noticed this. there seemed to be the "rich kids" who's parents could pay for everything, and the "poor kids" who were there through grants and loans and sometimes full scholarships. so you have half the population who aren't affected, really, and the other half who are in theory, not all that affected because they get the money they need. and then the middle class kids who feel the genuine squeeze are too busy working their assess of day and night to have much time to organize.
Well for starters, like I described above, I've a long way to go yet and several professional hurdles to jump (most importantly making tenure, which I'll have to start over from scratch on if I don't make it here) before we'd get anywhere near too-rich-for-aid territory. That said, I think there are VERY few students today who are getting anything resembling a full ride, including those whom must of us would unequivocally call poor. I was (in retrospect naively) amazed enough that I didn't qualify for full aid when I started college, as (so I thought) my FAF ought to have shown clearly that there was NO, absolutely NO, family money available to help me pay. I did get some aid plus a scholarship, but it wasn't enough to pay for everything by a long shot, and grad school was the same story, only worse. Plus of course, this still left basic living expenses to worry about. I could've saved a *little* more money by going to college in NYC and living at home, but that wouldn't have been an option in grad school, given my specialty. In fact, part of why I worked full-time in college was so I could save up a bit for grad school.
So I think the reality in most cases is that *anyone* whose parents CAN'T afford to pay the whole thing is very likely to wind up being saddled with significant debts. That wouldn't be such a bad thing if more good-paying jobs were available for freshly minted BAs, but they aren't. *Plus* as I alluded to earlier, the student loans industry (Sallie Mae, Citibank, etc.) are notorious for crushing already struggling indebted young people further into the ground by imposing what, given the state of the economy, are absurdly punitive payoff plans (subject to soaring interest rates, fees and penalties that, again, can easily leave you ultimately winding up paying twice what you originally owed over the course of your debt). IMO, the first focus of any organized movement that might emerge ought to be these companies.
As far as public universities go at least, it is hard to be optimistic about the tuition spiral slowing anytime soon. While our state could spend more on higher ed than they do (and budget what they do spend more wisely), the fact is that like so many other states, they are more or less strapped and really can't afford to give the kind of money that might in theory be able to reverse the tuition trend. Plus, like a lot of other states, we have the problem where relatively few of our highest-educated students wind up staying here ("brain drain") so there is that much less incentive for the state to focus on making things easier for students financially. But most financial aid, of course, is federal, so perhaps that ought to be the second focus of any prospective organized movement.
Another factor that any such movement ought to consider is a more concerted national effort--which would have to start at the high school level--to make sure that what aid and scholarships are available does not go to waste, and that all students are getting all the help and guidance they need to secure every last cent of assistance available. One thing I found highly galling in college was that some students from *far* more well-off backgrounds than myself, had received almost as much aid as I because their families had been able to hire lawyers and financial planners to help them pad their FAFs with various proofs of why their parents' base income level didn't tell the full story of how much family money was really available to help them pay their way. I had no access to such assistance and wonder how much more aid I might have gotten if I had. Also, I probably could have gotten a few more (small) scholarships if someone wiser than I had been available to help me identify what I might be a good candidate for amidst the bewildering array of them out there. However, in the end these kinds of piecemeal efforts (i.e, scholarships) are *probably* not as worthwhile a focus for any movement as going after the student loan industry and the financial aid program.
And again...though this is beside the point for many in here...things only get worse when you go on to grad school, probably particularly in the humanities. I assume that statistically, it's a little easier and faster for
*most* MBAs, MDs, JDs, (and MAs/PhDs in sci-tech fields?) etc. to pay off their expenses, but I don't really know.
, devoted 30 years of his life to the system.
Yeah...
) until I was 20 or 21. The first couple years I was able to cover the cost of books and fees with grants etc. because the tuition at the two year school was so low, but once I transferred to the four year school I quickly learned how to pass many of my classes without ever having the books for them. I simply couldn't afford it.
