When one thinks of the term “higher education”, many things race through the mind. The student envisions the high of graduating from an esteemed college/university and the parent experiences the pride of watching a child receive a degree that will further their chances of financial success in society. There is the high of receiving that long sought after acceptance letter from your favorite school or for many just being accepted is cause for jubilation. But as realists, we must honestly acknowledge that there are two sides to every story. Everything about higher education can’t be as pleasant as the final outcome portrays. Through critical analysis of higher education and just plain old common sense, we find the low points of 25% of college freshmen will drop out of college at some point during their first year! Frankly, that’s ridiculous, but let’s looks into why they drop out. More research revealed to me a plethora of reasons why people discontinue their college education: emotional issues (3%), distance from home (4%), health problems (5%), family support (9%), poor social fit (13%), academic disqualification (28%), and FINANCIAL PRESSURE (38%). In a country where we claim to be the best and brightest, we still have problems in proper allocation and budgeting of educational funds. There is a triad of issues within that financial pressure that I feel will be best to elaborate on: lack of Pell grants, working students, and investing in the wrong students. Financial pressure has ruined marriages, empires, fortune 500 companies, and higher education is next on the list. Join me as we navigate the labyrinth of why degrees are declining in America.
What are Pell grants? The Pell Grant program is a type of post-secondary, educational federal grant program sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education. As far back as 1965, between the GI Bill for veterans and Pell grants for average families, the government was footing the bill for the higher education for many Americans. Going to college was pretty much a given for many. There was no FINANCIAL PRESSURE (there’s that phrase again). All a student had to do was go to class and learn. Simple right? You would think so but, then in 1980 corporate greed put its idiot poster boy, Ronald Reagan in the oval office. Now history teaches that under most republican regimes, war expenditures increase and social programs such as education suffer. That’s fact. Reagan, a moron in my opinion, drastically cut the funds for federal contributions to Americans’ education. He placed a cap on borrowing as well as attached an income requirement to borrow. This stupid move opened the floodgates for big banking, little government, predatory lending, preying on the poor, widening the gap between the “haves” and “have-nots”, and simply making the pockets of fat cats fatter. He simply cared less for Joe the Plumber and his family. Now Joe may not be able to put his daughter through college, so in turn his daughter becomes Jenny the Plumber because she has no education. That legislation put a huge strain on the American student then and now. 77% of students that attend college borrow a whopping average of $23,600! So, now you’re telling me that before Bobby Booshay, graduate of Pickle Jar State University, will begin his adult life $23,600 in debt and he hasn’t a job yet! This is what the Reagan/Bush administrations did to higher education. Now since students are accumulating massive debt at alarming rates and they come from blue-collar working families, they got out and get part-time or full-time jobs. That’s the logical thing to do right? It may be but it leads us to the next issue in higher education: the working student.
I will be honest with you, I DON’T WANT TO WORK. I work because I have to. In a perfect world, I could just go to school all day and feed my desire for paideia. After to talking many classmates, I find we share those sentiments. 78% of all students enrolled in college have a part or full time job. Working students can be categorized into two groups: those who primarily identify themselves as students but who work in order to pay the bills and those who are first and foremost workers who also take some college classes. Almost two-thirds of undergraduates who work consider themselves "students who work"; the other third consider themselves "workers who study." Part-time student employment may have beneficial effects: for example, an on-campus research position may spark a student's interest in further academic programs or provide important work experience that will improve future labor market prospects. Working part-time as a student generally appears to supplant only non-productive activities, such as watching television. In addition, students who work fewer than 10 hours per week have slightly higher GPAs than other similar students. However, full-time employment may impair student performance. For example, 55 percent of those students working 35 or more hours per week report that work has a negative effect on their studies. Students working full-time also reported the following liabilities: 40 percent report that work limits their class schedule; 36 percent report it reduces their class choices; 30 percent report it limits the number of classes they take; and 26 percent report it limits access to the library. Students who work full-time are also more likely to drop out of school. For example, the available evidence is consistent with a roughly 10 percentage point differential in graduation rates between full-time and part-time workers. In 2008, nearly 830,000 full-time college students worked full-time. Because of the adverse effects of such full-time work, tens of thousands of these college students are likely to drop out of school and fail to receive a college degree. So I hope you can see how forcing a student to work opposed to studying ruins their chances at being productive in class. They will be too fatigued to attend class and eventually drop out. Or if they attend class, they won’t be able to give their best effort. All in all, students need to work less to be successful in college.
The last issue I have with higher education (for the sake of this essay) is rather disgusting and downright selfish, but then again, this is America that we live in and anything goes in the name of Capitalism. Somehow these nitwits in these ivory towers across the country still haven’t figured out where to effectively allocate funds in higher education. Where is it going? Well, I will tell you since you asked. Let’s pick on Auburn University for a while. Auburn is a well respected school in Alabama and aligns itself with the Southeastern Conference (SEC). Auburn boasts one of the elite football programs in the country and participates in the most competitive football conference year after year. They bring in the best student-athletes to their schools and give them the best education money can buy. Yay!!!!! Let’s celebrate!! Okay, let’s cut the crap. First, college is to get an education. Anything else should be secondary to learning. I guess that’s why students are pegged “student-athletes”. The student comes first I would assume. Absorb these numbers. In 2009, Auburn paid its President Jay Gogue a salary of $727, 761! Whoa, he’s really doing well for himself! I mean that’s great seeing that his school graduates 60% of its students. Now, here’s the problem. Auburn football coach, Gene Chizik, made 2 million dollars in 2009. He graduated only 57% percent of his football players. Something is wrong with that picture. No, not really. That is the norm in college athletics today. Coaches make droves more than chancellors. The national average for student athlete graduation is 79% but the bigger schools that pull in the most money have rates around 45%-55%. My dad always told me people show you what’s important to them in how they spend their money. According to this adage, Auburn University doesn’t care about academics. In 2009, they spent 127 million on all academic departments’ combined, opposed to 121 million on sports alone. Sickening huh? I know. Millions of dollars are shelled out in scholarships to students who will not even graduate as they pursue professional athletic endeavors. Colleges are using these kids to line their own pockets. These facts obviously show you where the focus is in higher education and it isn’t education.
Brothers and sisters I know you probably feel as though I'm preaching to the choir, but these are burning issues for me, especially the latter discussed. I hate seeing corporate greed ruin the lives of budding young minds. Coaches’ salary shouldn’t dwarf that of their bosses. Who does that? Congress should step in and set a mandatory graduation rate for athletic programs. Congress must step in and regulate big banking and predatory lending to students. More money needs to be allocated for the Pell grant program. A better life shouldn't cost you $26,000 before you even start this “better life”. If college is affordable, if not free, students can focus their energies in the classroom instead of the break room. According to history, these things may happen because we have a democratic regime now. But wait! Isn't this the same regime that just gave away 700 billion dollars of taxpayers' money to bail out these same banks that have us in this financial mess? Oh hell, why bother? Well at least you know how I feel and that’s all that matters. :-)
