This suggestion isn’t bad, but it is cou ter to the biggest problem in higher education in that it doesn’t do much to control costs.
If government is to be on the hook for all this higher education (which is a whole problem in itself), it should have a quota system on what it’s paying for. Each year, have some administrative body publish a list of what majors and how many bullets are authorized for funding across the nation. Mechanical engineering majors have x number, maybe 10,000... theatrical dance? Maybe one or two. Publish the list and make it a political football.
Also, make it competitive, students reapply each year and if the GPAs aren’t meeting a threshold, no more funding for that year, either pay for it yourself or work until you can afford the next semester of credits. It wouldn’t close off the pursuit of higher education, students with the financial means to pay themselves, or be funded by the college or private donors would be allowed to do so, but it would tighten up the spigot of subsidies to majors that contribute nothing to the public good, and reduce the overall student debt.
This suggestion, in my mind, also allows the universities a say in their fates, say if Harvard feels like it’s women’s studies program is so important, it can fund scholarships out of its massive endowment. If they don’t want to pay for them outright, they have the means of backing private loans that could (unlike student loans today) be dissolved in bankruptcy or written off as bad debt.
This was the case which established that tests which have "disparate impact"(fewer minorities pass) are unlawfully discriminatory. Prior to this, many companies would just hire people straight out of high school, give them tests, and those with higher IQ would be put on management training tracks.
With one decision, we could undercut the entire rationale for needing a college degree. Companies could go by independently administered tests of literacy and math ability. If you got through four years of college without acquiring the ability to understand what written instructions say, or write a coherent paragraph, you would not get hired regardless of degree. Meanwhile, a home-schooled 18 year old with no degree (but with objectively demonstrated ability) could apply and be hired.
I would also mandate that colleges supply the government with a list of graduates, their majors, and social security numbers. The IRS could then publish post-graduation statistics, by college and major, of average income a year after, and five years after, graduation. It would become painfully obvious which colleges were not worth their tuition costs.
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This suggestion isn’t bad, but it is cou ter to the biggest problem in higher education in that it doesn’t do much to control costs.
If government is to be on the hook for all this higher education (which is a whole problem in itself)...
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Why should it? When you have the TAXPAYER ‘piggy-bank’ (I really wish the (R)N(C) would keep on point & correctly point out “GOVT” doesn’t own a DIME it hasn’t taken from another) and an elected class more than happy to give ‘em every penny they so want (’cuz everyone is for “education”...until THEY have to pay for it).
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if Harvard feels like it’s women’s studies program is so important, it can fund scholarships out of its massive endowment.
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The “fix”, like most things wrong in this country, is getting GOVT out of the mix and back into its A1S8 box.
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If they don’t want to pay for them outright, they have the means of backing private loans that could (unlike student loans today) be dissolved in bankruptcy or written off as bad debt.
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Again, biz/institutions/etc. can “give away” and “teach” anything they wish, the Free Market will decide. But, until the taxpayer is out of the loop, ‘students’ shouldn’t be able to write-off their own folly.
Each year, have some administrative body publish a list of what majors and how many bullets are authorized for funding across the nation. <<<<
Do you realize you’ve slid 1/2 down the “slippery slope” with that statement?