I recently read the debate "Should College Be Free?" on the Room For Debate website. This debate caught my attention rather quickly. Over the past few months some Presidential Candidates were promising free college tuition including Senator Bernie Sanders and it got me thinking if college tuition could really be free. Author Andrew P. Kelly says that free college is not really free. I must say that I do not agree with Andrew P. Kelly, I think that college can and should be free. If college was free the graduation rates would rise and lots more people would be able to attend college. Author Deborah Santiago makes a point on the debate on how free college tuition would cause more people in the Latino and Black communities to attend college and have a chance at a better future for themselves and their families. Free college tuition would help many families and reduce debt in families.
I agree that free college is a great idea that would solve a lot of problems;but, there are other problems that have to be adressed. Nothing is free. If college becomes free, citizens will be taxed more and we will all eventually pay off the equivalence of student debt plus more.
ReplyDeleteHonestly, I don't think college should be free. While it would be great if it was free, it would not turn out very well. Sorry to put it this way, but not everyone should go to college. If everyone went to college, the standards would drop. Having a bachelor's degree doesn't seem very impressive anymore. It would make the degrees of people who worked harder be worth less, and it would make finding a job harder. Also, just because more people are attending college doesn't mean graduation rates will rise. We also need people to remain in trade jobs, jobs that don't necessarily require a college education. We need people to collect the garbage, fix plumbing, and keep the powerlines in check. Also, alongside all of that, who would pay for free college?
ReplyDeleteAs of 2014, college in Germany became free (For an Undergraduate Degree). However, this can't be the case for America. A large amount of America's money comes from College Tuition. The reason Germany can sustain free education is because their economy was not as heavily dependent on college tuition as America's. As Seth stated, if we were to stop charging for college tuition, taxes would increase significantly. This would not at all help fix the economy; it would only damage it.
ReplyDeleteIf possible, I'm all for free college. As we all know, a college education can get very expensive. I believe city colleges can become free in the future. The city colleges could form districts and function like public high schools but with college classes. As far as Cal State's and UC's, I also believe they can be free. However, these universities shall be exclusive and very competitive to be accepted into, kind of like the Cal State's and UC's of the present but free!
ReplyDeleteTo counter Ken's point about people that should not be in college, I believe everyone deserves an opportunity and that they should be able to have free college education. If they decide they can't handle the rigors of college, then their decision to dropout would be logical and the right decision. Then, these college dropouts will still be able to have minimum wage jobs. And who would pay to maintain free college education? The government! It is how the Bellflower Unified School District is able to continue to offer free public education.
On the other hand, I doubt private universities will ever become free. They are similar to private high schools in that they are exclusive to those with the money to pay for a private education.
To anyone free college sounds appealing since tuition could be so expensive plus paying for dorm and textbooks adds to it. However, as already mentioned nothing is really free. Also, everyone does deserve a chance to go to college whether or not they finish is up to them but they deserve a chance to try as Javen pointed out. I feel like whether or not college was free there will still be people who will decide not to go. The ones who will still decide not to go will be the ones who already have a job that pays them well enough. There are people who truly don't want to go to college and would rather start working right away.
ReplyDeleteThis is actually a much more complex issue than it seems. All sides make strong, valid points: "College isn't for everyone," "College is prohibitively expensive for many students who want to attend college and are even qualified," "FAFSA, Pell Grants, and other financial aid are already helping people get to college," "Even middle and upper-middle class students find student loans to be insurmountable," and so on. The first step is for everyone to at least recognize that the cost of higher education is an issue that is hurting students who can't go to college and should, students who go to college and can't pay their student loans even though they have decent jobs and may even have worked through college, and even the general population of Americans who aren't receiving the potential benefits of potentially brilliant students who cannot afford the education they need. My stance is that college doesn't necessarily have to be free. It just needs to be affordable. A degree should be a significant investment, but shouldn't leave students in obscene amounts of debt. And those who really need the extra help should be able to get it. But it would definitely take some major rearranging of budgets on the national level, more efficient spending by the schools themselves, and probably an increase in taxes or something to that sort.
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ReplyDeleteI agree with Jenica that college should affordable, but not free. Making a higher education feasible to economically disadvantaged students would be a great idea; however, I feel like universities would become more selective due to competition for aid. In the long term, the middle class, or the majority of the population may suffer as they try to make ends meet in the real world with tremendous amounts of debt.
ReplyDeleteKen did make a great point about how a bachelor's degree may be come ordinary to the general population if we do allow free education; however, I see this phenomena occurring in the present. Our generation is currently sending more scholars to college than ever before. Wouldn't that degrade the value of someone's college education? For example, if employers have a plethora of undergraduates to choose from, would the job market become more competitive than it is now?
I agree with both Jenica and Matthew that college should not be free but affordable to those who want to attend. A lot of people are talented but live with families that may not be able to financially support them even if they were to get a scholarship because of how much colleges charge to provide their education. At the same time, even if colleges were more affordable, I think high-ranked universities such as Harvard or Yale would continue to charge higher or ,as Matthew said, more selective because they want to see the potential of each person who applies. In the end, making colleges more affordable could give a lot of people who can't afford them huge opportunities, but it would not change the fact that higher ranking colleges or universities would require large debt to be in and would still cause financial issues with those who really want to attend or have earned their way there.
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