4 ms·

Tuition has skyrocketed, but have universities changed that much? They act like they never have enough money, but yet... they have more than ever. What are the

by tibbon 13y ago

Tuition has skyrocketed, but have universities changed that much? They act like they never have enough money, but yet... they have more than ever. What are the offering now for their 10x increase in tuition in 30 years?

rayiner 13y ago
Have you seen all the shiny new academic buildings?
codva 13y ago
Kids in a lot of colleges today are living a life of luxury compared to what I had in the 80s. Any dorm built or renevated in the last 10-15 or so years will have semi-private bathrooms. The dining options today are way better than what we had. I trudged down to the dorm cafeteria and ate whatever slop they were serving, high school cafeteria style. My son (at a small public university) has what amounts to a mall food court at school, and he can choose from burgers, pizza, wraps, vegetarian, Italian, Mexican, etc. every day. The libraries are more functional, the sports facilities are all updated, etc. All that costs money.
- VLM 13y ago
  I've noticed the luxuriousness of modern higher ed, and I imagine the culture shock after graduation for virtually all grads must be interesting. My favorite waitress used to eat at a facility like that, after graduation now she's stuck working at a similar facility. A bit too personal to ask, but I imagine its kinda a shock to the system for about 99% of the students.
  - danielweber 13y ago
    I imagine the culture shock after graduation for virtually all grads must be interesting. Unless they think that they cannot possibly go through a reduction in their standard of living and borrow to keep up with what is, in their mind, "normal." College used to be rare and ascetic. Now it's required and expensive. I don't think either of those are a good trend.
- fnordfnordfnord 13y ago
  >The dining options today are way better than what we had. The dining options are also much more expensive.
- specialist 13y ago
  Yea. College used to be a rite of passage. Now campus looks like a resort, to better attract tuition, err, I mean students.
- MatthewPhillips 13y ago
  Definitely true about dining but private bathrooms? I only went to college 12 years ago, has it really changed that much since then?
- king_jester 13y ago
  As someone who did college only several years ago, I have to chime in on this. > Any dorm built or renevated in the last 10-15 or so years will have semi-private bathrooms. This is true for new construction, but generally speaking older dorm buildings are kept in use and have the exact same experience as ever. Generally the new construction or alternatively designed dorms are more expensive to rent. > The dining options today are way better than what we had. I trudged down to the dorm cafeteria and ate whatever slop they were serving, high school cafeteria style. My son (at a small public university) has what amounts to a mall food court at school, and he can choose from burgers, pizza, wraps, vegetarian, Italian, Mexican, etc. every day. Food court style offerings are common, but like a food court you have to pay for anything offered. Typically corporate food chains try to get their place in the court and will wine and dine school administration for the chance to have a captive audience. The cafeteria style food options are still available and are cheaper (yes this food is really awful slop). Worse is that some universities require purchasing some amount of food ahead of time, whether it be a prepaid card usable anywhere or some kind of meal plan for the cafeteria style dining, milking money out of folks who prefer to live off campus and/or make their own food (esp. if they have special dietary requirements). > The libraries are more functional, the sports facilities are all updated, etc. This is generally true. Equipment is usually fairly modern and there is staff available most of the time.
- nicholas73 13y ago
  One out of many cafeterias on my college campus was reported to have cleared 100k in profit for the year. Food is definitely not the problem, and I wouldn't be surprised if college dorms were profitable as well (more expensive than living off campus).
  - maxerickson 13y ago
    How many meals do you figure they served each day? $500 a day might not be all that much (or it could be quite a bit).
- bdegman 13y ago
  Dining and living in the dorms is an extra cost on top of tuition. At least at the public universities I'm familiar with.
  - codva 13y ago
    True. However, they are factored in to the "cost" of college. The financial aid calculations include lodging, food, transportation, books, etc. It was surprising to see that the govt. thinks I'm contributing $23K of the $26K my son needs for school this year. He lives at home, so his room and to some extent his board are not variable costs for me so I don't think of them as college expenses.
- tibbon 13y ago
  But that doesn't seem to be tuition stuff. Room & Board is a separate set of fees, and most sports programs more than pay for themselves.
VLM 13y ago
K12 teachers get less pay than garbagemen unless they have enormous experience. True, most English Lit grads work as waitresses/bartenders, but the few who become tenured college profs are the new landed gentry, paid well above what their peers would get in industry. Which flows uphill, such that only in academia could the boss of a liberal arts major be making more than $9/hr. Of course the system of teaching with adjuncts who are paid less than minimum wage and indentured servant TAs is cutting into that. There was a time, when teaching didn't pay as well as private industry, but at least you got good benefits and summers off. Since then we got rid of private industry and boosted the pay and benefits in teaching beyond whatever private industry is left, if any.
- cafard 13y ago
  Wait, what? The wage structure is private industry < k12 teachers < garbagemen?
  - VLM 13y ago
    From the wikipedia article for my home town "Males had a median income of $40,743 versus $29,279 for females." (assuming most people here work in private industry) From the Dept Pub Instruction 2012 report for the salaries for teachers (not admin, not staff) for the school district I live in which is almost perfectly coincident with the boundaries of the city, lowest pay was 24131, highest was 93313, and average was 61223 with an average years of employment in the district of 12.34 years and total years of experience of 13.66 years. I can't get a straight answer on garbage man pay. I can find quotes between $20K and $60K depending on which political axe they're grinding. I believe the low end is part time / noob / disability and there's a cluster around upper 50s for the full timers who have a couple years in (so we can compare apples to apples, like the teachers with 12 years experience above). Some guys get stuck on overtime, especially around the holidays. So if your axe to grind is they're underpaid for a gross heavy labor job, they're only making in the $20s, but if your axe to grind is they're overpaid for gross heavy manual labor then they make about $60K. Its hard to compare medians and means and there's lots of fuzzy math.
dgabriel 13y ago
Administrative and IT costs are much higher.

by tibbon 13y ago

rayiner 13y ago

Have you seen all the shiny new academic buildings?

codva 13y ago

Kids in a lot of colleges today are living a life of luxury compared to what I had in the 80s. Any dorm built or renevated in the last 10-15 or so years will have semi-private bathrooms. The dining options today are way better than what we had. I trudged down to the dorm cafeteria and ate whatever slop they were serving, high school cafeteria style. My son (at a small public university) has what amounts to a mall food court at school, and he can choose from burgers, pizza, wraps, vegetarian, Italian, Mexican, etc. every day. The libraries are more functional, the sports facilities are all updated, etc. All that costs money.

VLM 13y ago
I've noticed the luxuriousness of modern higher ed, and I imagine the culture shock after graduation for virtually all grads must be interesting. My favorite waitress used to eat at a facility like that, after graduation now she's stuck working at a similar facility. A bit too personal to ask, but I imagine its kinda a shock to the system for about 99% of the students.
- danielweber 13y ago
  I imagine the culture shock after graduation for virtually all grads must be interesting. Unless they think that they cannot possibly go through a reduction in their standard of living and borrow to keep up with what is, in their mind, "normal." College used to be rare and ascetic. Now it's required and expensive. I don't think either of those are a good trend.
fnordfnordfnord 13y ago
>The dining options today are way better than what we had. The dining options are also much more expensive.
specialist 13y ago
Yea. College used to be a rite of passage. Now campus looks like a resort, to better attract tuition, err, I mean students.
MatthewPhillips 13y ago
Definitely true about dining but private bathrooms? I only went to college 12 years ago, has it really changed that much since then?
king_jester 13y ago
As someone who did college only several years ago, I have to chime in on this. > Any dorm built or renevated in the last 10-15 or so years will have semi-private bathrooms. This is true for new construction, but generally speaking older dorm buildings are kept in use and have the exact same experience as ever. Generally the new construction or alternatively designed dorms are more expensive to rent. > The dining options today are way better than what we had. I trudged down to the dorm cafeteria and ate whatever slop they were serving, high school cafeteria style. My son (at a small public university) has what amounts to a mall food court at school, and he can choose from burgers, pizza, wraps, vegetarian, Italian, Mexican, etc. every day. Food court style offerings are common, but like a food court you have to pay for anything offered. Typically corporate food chains try to get their place in the court and will wine and dine school administration for the chance to have a captive audience. The cafeteria style food options are still available and are cheaper (yes this food is really awful slop). Worse is that some universities require purchasing some amount of food ahead of time, whether it be a prepaid card usable anywhere or some kind of meal plan for the cafeteria style dining, milking money out of folks who prefer to live off campus and/or make their own food (esp. if they have special dietary requirements). > The libraries are more functional, the sports facilities are all updated, etc. This is generally true. Equipment is usually fairly modern and there is staff available most of the time.
nicholas73 13y ago
One out of many cafeterias on my college campus was reported to have cleared 100k in profit for the year. Food is definitely not the problem, and I wouldn't be surprised if college dorms were profitable as well (more expensive than living off campus).
- maxerickson 13y ago
  How many meals do you figure they served each day? $500 a day might not be all that much (or it could be quite a bit).
bdegman 13y ago
Dining and living in the dorms is an extra cost on top of tuition. At least at the public universities I'm familiar with.
- codva 13y ago
  True. However, they are factored in to the "cost" of college. The financial aid calculations include lodging, food, transportation, books, etc. It was surprising to see that the govt. thinks I'm contributing $23K of the $26K my son needs for school this year. He lives at home, so his room and to some extent his board are not variable costs for me so I don't think of them as college expenses.
tibbon 13y ago
But that doesn't seem to be tuition stuff. Room & Board is a separate set of fees, and most sports programs more than pay for themselves.

VLM 13y ago

K12 teachers get less pay than garbagemen unless they have enormous experience. True, most English Lit grads work as waitresses/bartenders, but the few who become tenured college profs are the new landed gentry, paid well above what their peers would get in industry. Which flows uphill, such that only in academia could the boss of a liberal arts major be making more than $9/hr. Of course the system of teaching with adjuncts who are paid less than minimum wage and indentured servant TAs is cutting into that. There was a time, when teaching didn't pay as well as private industry, but at least you got good benefits and summers off. Since then we got rid of private industry and boosted the pay and benefits in teaching beyond whatever private industry is left, if any.

cafard 13y ago
Wait, what? The wage structure is private industry < k12 teachers < garbagemen?
- VLM 13y ago
  From the wikipedia article for my home town "Males had a median income of $40,743 versus $29,279 for females." (assuming most people here work in private industry) From the Dept Pub Instruction 2012 report for the salaries for teachers (not admin, not staff) for the school district I live in which is almost perfectly coincident with the boundaries of the city, lowest pay was 24131, highest was 93313, and average was 61223 with an average years of employment in the district of 12.34 years and total years of experience of 13.66 years. I can't get a straight answer on garbage man pay. I can find quotes between $20K and $60K depending on which political axe they're grinding. I believe the low end is part time / noob / disability and there's a cluster around upper 50s for the full timers who have a couple years in (so we can compare apples to apples, like the teachers with 12 years experience above). Some guys get stuck on overtime, especially around the holidays. So if your axe to grind is they're underpaid for a gross heavy labor job, they're only making in the $20s, but if your axe to grind is they're overpaid for gross heavy manual labor then they make about $60K. Its hard to compare medians and means and there's lots of fuzzy math.

dgabriel 13y ago

Administrative and IT costs are much higher.