8 ms·

A lot of the cost of American college doesn't go towards education but things like sports stadiums and teams, various non-academic events, administrators, vario

A lot of the cost of American college doesn't go towards education but things like sports stadiums and teams, various non-academic events, administrators, various other non-academic staff, uniquely-expensive American legal costs and insurance, on-campus police (a big wtf for Europeans), and then there are also those people who decide which Halloween costumes are appropriate for students, investigate various misconduct on campus etc. Americans expect college campuses to be like resorts, parents expect a lot of pampering and personalized whatever for their kid etc. In Europe, university students are independent adults who take a bunch of courses, take exams etc, but have lives on their own, outside uni. They may rent a room in housing with connections to the university, but the university doesn't babysit them. They don't expect anyone else to keep tabs on what they need to do, no pampering. There is no customer mentality. You spare a lot of money this way. So it's at least in part cultural and also reflects in different attitudes regarding healthcare, restaurants, retail, and general business conduct.

jessaustin 6y ago
The schools don't have shareholders to whom dividends might be paid. The extra programs and the employees to support them will expand to use up all extra income.
jldugger 6y ago
> Americans expect college campuses to be like resorts You say that but the typical dorm room offers no privacy or air conditioning, and the showers and bathrooms are shared. They're similar in nature to SROs which the US pretty much abolished anywhere else, but way more expensive. And then universities have the audacity to demand that students live in them freshman year, even though living off campus would be cheaper.
- bananamerica 6y ago
  While I understand that many students in the US are away from home, this degree of coupling between education and housing seems odd to me, an outsider. It adds a lot of requirements that certainly make the operation significantly more expensive. Even in the less luxurious ones.
- JCharante 6y ago
  Yeah the dorm situation is a bit unfair. My freshmen year I paid $8,400 to have access to a bed, desk, 4 drawers, and a third of a closet (two other roommates) for a total of 8 months (no access during winter). Living off campus costs just about $450/mo for a private room with utilities and AC. If you could find a landlord that lets you cram 3 people in 1 room I can't imagine how cheap the rent would be (except you won't find it because city regulations forbid more than 4 persons per lease, and you can only have 1 lease per obvious division of a house/building. To go above the limit you need a boarding house license, which is how the school gets away with charging $67k/yr for 8 people to share a 3 bedroom apartment).
- lotsofpulp 6y ago
  And they force the students living in them to purchase meal plans which cost 3x what a restaurant meal would cost for defrosted food from Aramark/Sodexo. Obviously someone is getting paid.
  - hansvm 6y ago
    Last time I ran the numbers at my alma mater, the mandatory meal plans were (in most circumstances) more expensive than paying cash for the same meals at the same dining halls. There were a few low-end restaurants on campus too (sandwiches, wraps, pizza, burgers, etc) that were both better and far cheaper than the dining halls. Their defining characteristic was that you couldn't spend your dining dollars there.
    - tdeck 6y ago
      Same at my alma mater. One point is worth $1 at the dining hall. You can top up points for $1/1, but you're required to buy a plan of at least 1,200 points that costs $1,800. https://diningservices.wustl.edu/meal-plans/undergraduate/ https://diningservices.wustl.edu/meal-plans/undergraduate/ I always tried to explain to people that they should get the smallest plan but some didn't get it.
      - esyir 6y ago
        That's not exactly a good sign for the numerical literacy of your undergrads.
- Digory 6y ago
  Many colleges have old buildings on campus that are cash cows. There's little incentive to cut margins by building new. But recent buildings look better, and the off-campus "communities" in Texas look better than ... most apartments in New York. [0] [0] https://www.theblockwestcampus.com/features.aspx https://www.theblockwestcampus.com/features.aspx
  - jldugger 6y ago
    >But recent buildings look better, and the off-campus "communities" in Texas look better than ... most apartments in New York. [0] How bad are the apartments in New York? The one you cite has great marketing literature but abysmal reviews: https://www.yelp.com/biz/the-block-austin-3?osq=the+block https://www.yelp.com/biz/the-block-austin-3?osq=the+block
    - sgerenser 6y ago
      To be fair, the last time I was apartment shopping (8 or so years ago) I quickly realized that basically every apartment complex gets terrible reviews.
    - Digory 6y ago
      I guess this is the equivalent in NYC.[0] Which, admittedly, looks nicer than my dorm in college, even accounting for the normal difference between advertising and reality. But most of my Manhattan-based friends started off with summer jobs and living in spaces smaller than closets out in suburbia. But that came with a certain vie boheme that you probably don't get at "The Block" in Texas. [0]https://www.63wallstreet.com/63-wall-street-new-york-ny/interiors?gclid=Cj0KCQjwhb36BRCfARIsAKcXh6GEEWyiU86N5q0qY7H2T2YDAfebbnNevEnJxq0Ge70he68J5EYv87saAmfoEALw_wcB https://www.63wallstreet.com/63-wall-street-new-york-ny/inte...
- dougmwne 6y ago
  I had heard that there was a huge trend among colleges to build new single occupancy dorms that have the ammnities of a nice bed and breakfast. Partly due to increasing expectations and partly due to decreasing social skills around sharing living space (more only children or grew up in large house with no shared rooms among siblings). My alma mater built one of these dorms 15 years ago and it was incredibly popular. From some quick googling: https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/02/the-end-of-the-college-roommate/283621/ https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/02/the-en...
- narag 6y ago
  ...demand that students live in them freshman year What? I've been watching movies and series made in USA for decades and didn't know that. I assumed that students living there was a way to save money or the parents wanted it. I had no idea it was required. If it's in the same city, can students just keep living with their parents?
  - Gibbon1 6y ago
    Depends on the University. One I went to probably 90% of students lived off campus. See: commuter school
  - jldugger 6y ago
    > If it's in the same city, can students just keep living with their parents? The uni I worked for eventually rolled out that policy after the initial "all freshmen live in dorms now" backlash, but it's a tiny fraction of the student population whose parents live in town. State unis are deliberately located away from the population centers, for obscure reasons involving a mistrust of European politics.
    - ampdepolymerase 6y ago
      Can you elaborate on the last point?
      - jldugger 6y ago
        US states generally have not placed their capitals in their population centers. I'm told some of it is a fear of big city corruption might have on democracy (not without reason, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_machine#In_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_machine#In_the_Unite...). The logic seemed to play out in land grant unis as well, but looking at some history articles about my alma mater, it seems more complicated than "big city bad" -- the big city was on the opposite side of the state boundary river, and on the opposite side of the Slavery issue. Instead as best I can tell, the decision was driven by local legislature party politics of the time, with accusations of voter fraud, vote buying, and bad faith negotiations. Perhaps the reason most of the state unis I can think of are in small towns is simply that without a crossroads or river confluence driving trade, landowners in those areas were most eager to get a state institution to prop up property values?
- WalterBright 6y ago
  True, but I enjoyed living in the dorms very much. I was never bored :-) I moved off campus into an apartment my senior year, thinking it would be cool, but regretted it.
3131s 6y ago
I attended a small but well-known liberal arts school that increased tuition about 20k in well under a decade. In a single year the tuition increased 5k, and yet the department of my major was downsized and classes that I needed to complete my degree were full. At the same time though they built a new $42 million "cultural exchange" building and began adding an enormous sports facility. It turned out that actually there was no intended purpose for the new building either, and it was mostly sat empty as far as I know.
- galaxyLogic 6y ago
  It seems to me the appeal of the expensive colleges is at least partly that you get to hang out with other rich kids, making connections that can benefit you later financially. It's like Donald Trump's golf-club you pay lot mostly for the chance of being part of the club
dehrmann 6y ago
> things like sports stadiums and teams I went to a large school in one of the big NCAA athletic conferences. Their stadium cost around $100M in 2020 dollars, and they bring in roughly $100M in revenue from all sports annually. They call football and basketball "revenue sports" because they fund all the others. I'm not sure how much tuition goes to sports, but the big ones are very self-sufficient. That, and they serve as marketing for the school, and that can add value to the degree.
- kristopolous 6y ago
  Sure but that's just an adjacent business model with very little relationship to the core mission. Universities could also say, run gambling halls, nightclubs, or any other business you can think of. The criticism is they are distracted from their core purpose and mission in society, which certainly isn't to run large entertainment venues.
  - bonoboTP 6y ago
    Sport, at least in principle, if you squint, has more to do with education. After all, grade schools have a physical education subject but no gambling subject. (Elite, pro, spectator sport is different though, that's why the squinting is required). Generally, Americans have an obsession with what they call "well-roundedness" and a "holistic" approach which I don't see elsewhere that much. For example in European university admissions nobody cares about subjective stuff like volunteering experience, musical talent etc, when doing university admissions. It's all focused on the narrow academic subject. You also don't take generic subjects unrelated to your study program as in American undergrad. The whole culture and concept of what a university is supposed to be, is pretty different in the US overall
hintymad 6y ago
I thought college sports helped university get huge amount of money. But yeah, American's obsession of sports is bewildering. Caltech was mocked in national media for their poor performance in NCCA. I mean, really? Why would I give rat's ass about NCCA or Caltech in NCCA? For all I care about, I just wanna see Caltech produce top-notch education, research, and students.

jessaustin 6y ago

The schools don't have shareholders to whom dividends might be paid. The extra programs and the employees to support them will expand to use up all extra income.

jldugger 6y ago

> Americans expect college campuses to be like resorts You say that but the typical dorm room offers no privacy or air conditioning, and the showers and bathrooms are shared. They're similar in nature to SROs which the US pretty much abolished anywhere else, but way more expensive. And then universities have the audacity to demand that students live in them freshman year, even though living off campus would be cheaper.

bananamerica 6y ago
While I understand that many students in the US are away from home, this degree of coupling between education and housing seems odd to me, an outsider. It adds a lot of requirements that certainly make the operation significantly more expensive. Even in the less luxurious ones.
JCharante 6y ago
Yeah the dorm situation is a bit unfair. My freshmen year I paid $8,400 to have access to a bed, desk, 4 drawers, and a third of a closet (two other roommates) for a total of 8 months (no access during winter). Living off campus costs just about $450/mo for a private room with utilities and AC. If you could find a landlord that lets you cram 3 people in 1 room I can't imagine how cheap the rent would be (except you won't find it because city regulations forbid more than 4 persons per lease, and you can only have 1 lease per obvious division of a house/building. To go above the limit you need a boarding house license, which is how the school gets away with charging $67k/yr for 8 people to share a 3 bedroom apartment).
lotsofpulp 6y ago
And they force the students living in them to purchase meal plans which cost 3x what a restaurant meal would cost for defrosted food from Aramark/Sodexo. Obviously someone is getting paid.
- hansvm 6y ago
  Last time I ran the numbers at my alma mater, the mandatory meal plans were (in most circumstances) more expensive than paying cash for the same meals at the same dining halls. There were a few low-end restaurants on campus too (sandwiches, wraps, pizza, burgers, etc) that were both better and far cheaper than the dining halls. Their defining characteristic was that you couldn't spend your dining dollars there.
  - tdeck 6y ago
    Same at my alma mater. One point is worth $1 at the dining hall. You can top up points for $1/1, but you're required to buy a plan of at least 1,200 points that costs $1,800. https://diningservices.wustl.edu/meal-plans/undergraduate/ https://diningservices.wustl.edu/meal-plans/undergraduate/ I always tried to explain to people that they should get the smallest plan but some didn't get it.
    - esyir 6y ago
      That's not exactly a good sign for the numerical literacy of your undergrads.
Digory 6y ago
Many colleges have old buildings on campus that are cash cows. There's little incentive to cut margins by building new. But recent buildings look better, and the off-campus "communities" in Texas look better than ... most apartments in New York. [0] [0] https://www.theblockwestcampus.com/features.aspx https://www.theblockwestcampus.com/features.aspx
- jldugger 6y ago
  >But recent buildings look better, and the off-campus "communities" in Texas look better than ... most apartments in New York. [0] How bad are the apartments in New York? The one you cite has great marketing literature but abysmal reviews: https://www.yelp.com/biz/the-block-austin-3?osq=the+block https://www.yelp.com/biz/the-block-austin-3?osq=the+block
  - sgerenser 6y ago
    To be fair, the last time I was apartment shopping (8 or so years ago) I quickly realized that basically every apartment complex gets terrible reviews.
  - Digory 6y ago
    I guess this is the equivalent in NYC.[0] Which, admittedly, looks nicer than my dorm in college, even accounting for the normal difference between advertising and reality. But most of my Manhattan-based friends started off with summer jobs and living in spaces smaller than closets out in suburbia. But that came with a certain vie boheme that you probably don't get at "The Block" in Texas. [0]https://www.63wallstreet.com/63-wall-street-new-york-ny/interiors?gclid=Cj0KCQjwhb36BRCfARIsAKcXh6GEEWyiU86N5q0qY7H2T2YDAfebbnNevEnJxq0Ge70he68J5EYv87saAmfoEALw_wcB https://www.63wallstreet.com/63-wall-street-new-york-ny/inte...
dougmwne 6y ago
I had heard that there was a huge trend among colleges to build new single occupancy dorms that have the ammnities of a nice bed and breakfast. Partly due to increasing expectations and partly due to decreasing social skills around sharing living space (more only children or grew up in large house with no shared rooms among siblings). My alma mater built one of these dorms 15 years ago and it was incredibly popular. From some quick googling: https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/02/the-end-of-the-college-roommate/283621/ https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/02/the-en...
narag 6y ago
...demand that students live in them freshman year What? I've been watching movies and series made in USA for decades and didn't know that. I assumed that students living there was a way to save money or the parents wanted it. I had no idea it was required. If it's in the same city, can students just keep living with their parents?
- Gibbon1 6y ago
  Depends on the University. One I went to probably 90% of students lived off campus. See: commuter school
- jldugger 6y ago
  > If it's in the same city, can students just keep living with their parents? The uni I worked for eventually rolled out that policy after the initial "all freshmen live in dorms now" backlash, but it's a tiny fraction of the student population whose parents live in town. State unis are deliberately located away from the population centers, for obscure reasons involving a mistrust of European politics.
  - ampdepolymerase 6y ago
    Can you elaborate on the last point?
    - jldugger 6y ago
      US states generally have not placed their capitals in their population centers. I'm told some of it is a fear of big city corruption might have on democracy (not without reason, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_machine#In_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_machine#In_the_Unite...). The logic seemed to play out in land grant unis as well, but looking at some history articles about my alma mater, it seems more complicated than "big city bad" -- the big city was on the opposite side of the state boundary river, and on the opposite side of the Slavery issue. Instead as best I can tell, the decision was driven by local legislature party politics of the time, with accusations of voter fraud, vote buying, and bad faith negotiations. Perhaps the reason most of the state unis I can think of are in small towns is simply that without a crossroads or river confluence driving trade, landowners in those areas were most eager to get a state institution to prop up property values?
WalterBright 6y ago
True, but I enjoyed living in the dorms very much. I was never bored :-) I moved off campus into an apartment my senior year, thinking it would be cool, but regretted it.

3131s 6y ago

I attended a small but well-known liberal arts school that increased tuition about 20k in well under a decade. In a single year the tuition increased 5k, and yet the department of my major was downsized and classes that I needed to complete my degree were full. At the same time though they built a new $42 million "cultural exchange" building and began adding an enormous sports facility. It turned out that actually there was no intended purpose for the new building either, and it was mostly sat empty as far as I know.

galaxyLogic 6y ago
It seems to me the appeal of the expensive colleges is at least partly that you get to hang out with other rich kids, making connections that can benefit you later financially. It's like Donald Trump's golf-club you pay lot mostly for the chance of being part of the club

dehrmann 6y ago

> things like sports stadiums and teams I went to a large school in one of the big NCAA athletic conferences. Their stadium cost around $100M in 2020 dollars, and they bring in roughly $100M in revenue from all sports annually. They call football and basketball "revenue sports" because they fund all the others. I'm not sure how much tuition goes to sports, but the big ones are very self-sufficient. That, and they serve as marketing for the school, and that can add value to the degree.

kristopolous 6y ago
Sure but that's just an adjacent business model with very little relationship to the core mission. Universities could also say, run gambling halls, nightclubs, or any other business you can think of. The criticism is they are distracted from their core purpose and mission in society, which certainly isn't to run large entertainment venues.
- bonoboTP 6y ago
  Sport, at least in principle, if you squint, has more to do with education. After all, grade schools have a physical education subject but no gambling subject. (Elite, pro, spectator sport is different though, that's why the squinting is required). Generally, Americans have an obsession with what they call "well-roundedness" and a "holistic" approach which I don't see elsewhere that much. For example in European university admissions nobody cares about subjective stuff like volunteering experience, musical talent etc, when doing university admissions. It's all focused on the narrow academic subject. You also don't take generic subjects unrelated to your study program as in American undergrad. The whole culture and concept of what a university is supposed to be, is pretty different in the US overall

hintymad 6y ago

I thought college sports helped university get huge amount of money. But yeah, American's obsession of sports is bewildering. Caltech was mocked in national media for their poor performance in NCCA. I mean, really? Why would I give rat's ass about NCCA or Caltech in NCCA? For all I care about, I just wanna see Caltech produce top-notch education, research, and students.