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Why is tuition so high?
According to an article by David Hogberg in Investor’s Business Daily, it’s mostly the growth in administrative costs that’s responsible for this. In the last 30 years college tuition has increased at twice the rate of inflation. But according to Hogberg:
Analysis of data from the National Center for Education Statistics shows that from 1989-2009 the number of administrative personnel at four- and two-year institutions grew 84%, from about 543,000 to over 1 million. By contrast, the number of faculty increased 75%, from 824,000 to 1.4 million, while student enrollment grew 51%, from 13.5 million to 20.4 million.
The disparity was worse at public universities and colleges, where personnel in administration rose 71%, faculty 58% and student enrollment 40%. Private schools also saw administration and faculty growing faster than student enrollment, although faculties slightly outpaced administration increases.
College administrators, however, claim their incredible cost is appropriate given “changing needs.” According to the article:
“Students are coming in less prepared, needing more remedial assistance,” [Dan King, executive director at the American Association of University Administrators] said. “If they need help from a writing lab or math lab, that’s usually done by administrators. That’s something that universities didn’t have to provide as much even 10 years ago.”
Well interesting point, but it doesn’t tell the whole picture. Universities still don’t have to provide remedial assistance. Blaming administrative costs on the need for remediation is misleading, suggesting as it does that the growth in such costs is valid. In fact, there’s no reason administrators have to manage such “help,” and there’s no indication they’re doing it well.
And let’s not talk about how remediation wasn’t necessary years ago. If students aren’t prepared for college, just don’t admit them. It’s very troublesome to suggest that somehow because high school students aren’t ready for higher education colleges will just let them in anyway and then bill all students for the costs of remediation. It’s the college’s fault they don’t run remediation programs efficiently; there’s no reason to pass the costs of that wastefulness on to students.
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P. Bremser on August 10, 2011 8:52 PM:
The increase in the number of administrative personnel that you cite is no surprise. This has to be a significant factor in increased costs to students, since administrators (I don't mean people working in a "writing lab or math lab" -- I mean people with "Vice President" or "Associate Provost" or "Special Assistant to the President" in their titles) are paid more than full-time faculty, and their support staff are likely be paid more than their counterparts in academic departments, for example. So of course the increased cost of remedial education "doesn't tell the whole picture."
However, if we're going to see the whole picture, we should be clear on a couple of points you gloss over here. First, the article you cite about failed remediation efforts refers exclusively to community colleges. We should certainly pay close attention to those schools and their challenges, but they aren't all of higher education.
Second, one development I've welcomed in my 25 (okay, more) years in higher education is the explicit effort at four-year colleges and universities to enroll more diverse selections of students, where "diversity" can refer to race but also family income and geography. If we didn't already know that our public school system favors students from wealthy districts, we do now. The student from P.S.## in the Bronx may be ready for college, but not as well-prepared as his classmate from Bronxville (and let's not even include Andover), and the college that admits them both while ignoring that fact is putting the Bronx kid -- or the one from a tiny rural school or the young woman from Afghanistan -- at a disadvantage from day one. I would much prefer that colleges and universities lobby actively for a K-12 school funding system that pays teachers more, not less, to work with kids from lower-income families. In the absence of that, the least colleges can do is offer academic support to the promising student whose only mistake was ending up in the wrong school district.
Dave Mazella on August 10, 2011 9:57 PM:
I think this piece is misleading for a number of reasons.
First of all, I agree with P. Bremser that, for better or worse, today's far more diverse student population demands that universities invest more heavily in student services. Twenty years ago, there was barely any attempt to deal with the emotional or developmental issues faced by traditional 18-22 year old students, let alone the much more complex problems faced by returning students, working students, students with children, and so forth.
I think these are good developments, but the schools that succeed with today's students need to do a good job in such services (as, for example, we can see in Towson State U)
http://imerrill.umd.edu/facultyvoice1/2011/02/28/towson-university-closes-education-gap/
Moreover, a public university whose mission is defined as giving access to a state or region's population cannot unilaterally decide that it will refuse to admit anyone it considers "unqualified." Admissions standards are eminently subject to political and economic pressures, and these affect the quality of incoming students.
So before I dismissed this claim, I would like to see how and where the money at any particular university is spent on these kinds of services, which include advising, tutors, summer courses, etc. And these may very well be used by the entire student body, not just those in remediation.
Snarki, child of Loki on August 11, 2011 7:40 AM:
As is typical of anyone that gives credence to college admin apologists, this article gets "cause" and "effect" reversed.
Administrative bloat is the "effect".
Increased tuition costs is the "cause".
How is that? Because the vast, overwhelming proportion of colleges and universities are "non-profit", they don't give their CEOs stock options or profit sharing. So the profit is absorbed in making little Admin empires. That's why admin bloat is an "effect".
And those faculty numbers are misleading; most of the increase in faculty numbers is in underpaid temporary Adjuncts. Instead ask 'how much did the faculty COST increase' and you'll get a much lower number. Again, typical of admin apologists, they like to trot out deceptive stats to bolster their position.
But as for why tuition goes up: it's supply and demand, only constrained by the inefficiency of the market for higher ed. As long as a college degree is considered essential for a decent job and lifestyle, the demand is very high.
Habernathy on August 11, 2011 9:40 AM:
This article is disingenuous. Comparing percentages from all colleges is a lazy way to gin up controversy. Since I graduated my alma mater has built several new buildings. All of which need staff to just to maintain the buildings. At least one of those buildings is a new dorm, so that includes new staff to just to feed the students. A good question would be "an increase of X number of students requires an increase in Y number of security officers?". . . "an increase of Z number financial aid personnel" Is it more complicated to process financial aid now? If student levels stayed the same would it still require more staff? Does it take more HR staff to manage employee benefits?
The biggest difference between now and then is computers. When I was in school there was a remedial computer network. Now the campus has WIFI everywhere. Computer labs in every dorm. It takes staff and money to support the network. Unlike some industries you can't replace college workers with technology.