Posted on 05/16/2014 6:10:58 AM PDT by Kaslin
One possible solution - a PC based or Web based “core” that would allow the users to load instruction modules that would provide instruction. This would be seperate from a centralized testing authority like the testing organizations used by technical companies (Microsoft and Linux certifications, etc).
Many technical, hard arts (math), science and engineering degrees could be completed via this train then test model.
That it’s still legal for a college professor to write a textbook, slap a $150 if not more price on it and then require his students to buy is nothing short of amazing. Plus the little trick of making a few changes to it each semester, thus making the older “version” unusable.
My husband STARTED college at 29 years old. He had to work full time to support himself and still had to borrow.
We married when he was 34 years old. A few days after our wedding he handed me a "coupon book"--his payments for his education. The book started at NUMBER ONE. I asked his: "Couldn't you have paid ONE payment?" :o)
Nothing new in school loans.
I had parents who paid my tuition. They couldn't afford it. I didn't ask how they did it because they SO wanted me to get the college education.
BUT I had to do it in FOUR years.
I did it in four years, worked summers and Christmases for the things I wanted and that they couldn't afford, and have never looked back. They even let me keep all the money I made at work. God bless them.
IMHO both are correct. For scientific fields, the degree demonstrates valuable skills. For fields such as business, marketing, or management, the degree demonstrates that the prospective candidate stuck it out for four years to get a degree, any degree.
One minor thing the pupils can do is stop buying the textbooks. Tests come from lecture material only in 90 percent of the cases, but colleges “require” textbook purchases. Only the uninformed pay so much. Of course, that wouldn’t affect the overall financing of college that much.
indeed! this made me smile :)
Lol. Good!
I look back and am so grateful for their sacrifices and generosity. I was truly blessed.
True, college does need to be more affordable, but based on what I’m seeing regarding the total leftist domination of the course material, I think they ought to focus on making it worth going at all.
Barack Obama is an advertisement for how you can go to Harvard and still come out a complete ignoramus and commie-indoctrinated moron. And now they’re putting “White Privilege” into the orientation program — which is about as disgustingly racist as anything I can imagine.
I really don’t think that a modern liberal arts (i.e. progressive arts) college education is worth the investment of time — at any price.
Scanning the FR posts, my brain read this as, “Making Coffee Affordable.”
I guess I need to splurge and have another cup or two.
On the subject of the actual headline: college is a scam, and a shame (and I’m someone who had lots of it back in the day).
The money the author/professor gets from that $150 textbook is very very small. The publishing company doesn’t have to pay to write the book but charges a high price to print and market the book. The publisher is probably located in a high cost city like NYC. However, the used book market and online course materials lower the sales revenue.
I once worked for a professor who wrote a great textbook. The first year or so, he made a few hundred dollars in royalty payments, which he gave to the students in his class (yes, he gave that money away). After that, he made less than lunch money. It took a lot of time and research to write the book. There are very few authors who make much money on textbook sales.
The frequent revised/new versions of textbooks are scheduled by the publisher to, for one reason, reduce used book sales which generate zero sales revenue for the publisher.
There is vastly more money to be made in consulting and research.
Not to criticize your comment about expensive textbooks—they are horribly costly considering what you get. It is just that the professor/author doesn’t make much money and does it for other reasons.
“The frequent revised/new versions of textbooks are scheduled by the publisher to, for one reason, reduce used book sales which generate zero sales revenue for the publisher.”
This frequent claim is based on a misunderstanding of the market for used, durable goods. The initial price of a new textbook reflects its value in use throughout the textbook's life cycle. Think how much less you would be willing to pay for a car if it were pre-programmed to stop working after three years, or how much less you would be willing to pay for a house if its resale were banned. When a student pays $150 for a new textbook, she does so in the expectation that she will be able to recoup about half that amount by re-selling it. So, the used book market essentially serves an an informal rental market. Interestingly, many college bookstores are formalizing this by inviting students to rent, rather than buy, new textbooks at (typically) half price or less.
I think the “signalling” school is going to lose the argument.
It is scandalous how easy it is to graduate with “some degree, any degree”. If you have money and a pulse you can get a degree and employers know it.
I think Conservatives need to approach the subject, like the left does. Big Education needs to be reigned in. Big education only cares about profit. Big Education hurts the students (consumers). Big Education has a pay gap. The meme could go on and on.
When I was searching for jobs in the past, often one of the requirements was a minimum education of a BA in any subject. It was a way for HR departments to weed out a bunch of probably otherwise highly qualified candidates, just so HR didn't have to sift through 10,000 resumes for one job.
Maybe the answer is to make it possible once again for a HS graduate to have the n life and job skills needed to earn a living and be independent.
I agree completely, and what is wrong with learning a skill?
“...and what is wrong with learning a skill?” Nothing as far as I am concerned.
In my opinion current HS education is designed to keep young men and women in a state of perpetual adolescence.
High school is about sports and clubs. If some kind of learning happens along the way, it’s a bonus. It’s real purpose is obedience training and a jobs program for over educated bureaucrats. High school is a little artificial society that teenagers are forced to center their lives around. If it was really about getting kids ready for life you would be able to skip it if you can pass a proficiency test.
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