- The complexity of the financial-aid process is one, because it scares away many poor students; in the ideal system, up-front tuition costs would remain low, and students would pay back colleges with a percentage of their income.
- The patchy — and often shoddy — quality of education at many high schools and colleges is a major problem.
- It’s also a problem that we don’t know which colleges are doing a good job and which are not.
- Finally, it’s a problem that Washington and the states spend billions of dollars subsidizing higher education but do not demand accountability. See this Daniel de Vise article in The Washington Post for more.
- Washington and the states spend billions of dollars subsidizing higher education but do not demand accountability.
- We don’t know which colleges are doing a good job and which are not.
- The patchy — and often shoddy — quality of education at many high schools and colleges
- The complexity of the financial-aid process is one, because it scares away many poor students
Costs are, to a large extent, the symptoms of the disease, and with our preoccupation with costs we seem to be confusing symptoms and causes. Even there, at the end of everything, do we have any confidence that the costs, which are spiralling out of control, are worth it?
But, if course, most faculty and administrators will come together very quickly on the one issue of accountability--they will fight it because they like the current system where they can keep asking for as much money as possible without being held responsible for constructive outcomes.
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