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All it takes is a recession?
For years, parents, students, and taxpayers have lamented the spiraling cost of higher education -- with too little effect. Between 1982 and 2007, college tuition and fees increased 439 percent, adjusted for inflation, while the median family income only rose 147 percent. Pleas by ACTA and others to cut costs fell on mostly deaf ears.
The recession is now compelling at least some universities to cut back on all the pricy extras that drive up cost and shift the focus back to the fundamental purpose of their institutions: education. In January, ACTA praised the Pennsylvania State Board of Education for approving a proposal to create a "low cost, no frills" bachelor degree. Now comes news of a similar degree at Southern New Hampshire University -- a "low-cost airline equivalent," according to its president -- and plans to create a new affordable state university in Arizona with no football team or research programs.
The exact action these institutions are taking -- creating new colleges -- may not be the right course for their peers elsewhere. But the larger lesson they have learned is applicable everywhere: Trustees and others must constantly keep in mind the real reason colleges exist -- to prepare students to become informed citizens and effective workers -- and budget accordingly.
Posted by David Azerrad on May 07, 2009 at May 7, 2009 02:20 PM
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