Tuition Costs
Ken
I don't know how many people replying to this thread are out working and
trying to raise a family with a student loan over their head. Does anyone
really believe the people in Ireland and Switzerland are idiots or layabouts
for having free university? Instead of looking at our own little world here
or touting cliches about working for your education you should speak from
experience and years of paying on a debt to feed greedy and weak willed
politicians and bankers. I don't think much of the interest made off these
loans goes into the 'job- - making fund but shared out among shareholders.
When Roger Grimes and Tobin (who didn't finish his education) went
through the system there were grants, free tuition and some were even payed
to go to university. Yet they say we must pay our way through!
Moores, Peckford, how much tax money went into friends and Sprung green
houses which could have offset education costs? Wells left the Government
with $30 million plus in Litigation against the province which must now come
from your tax dollars. I would rather see it pay for education, health or
what have you.
How much does our economy suffer because the first ten to fifteen years
out of school is spent paying on a loan and living in your parents basement
instead of new-home construction and new car purchases?
No, I have seen too much of our money gone for fat-indexed pensions and
patronage positions dishing out millions of dollars like it was pig fodder.
I pay tax dollars to educate and keep my kids healthy. I once held the idea
that the only real education was the one with the biggest debt you had to
pay off when you were finnished. I now see this the same way I view beer
commercials. If you really look at where the idea comes from and the people
behind it then you will see it for what it is. After all we al know what a
real degree costs to get and how much work it takes to get one worth
keeping.
--
Ken&Cat
kcmu...@nf.sympatico.ca
Mark Norman
Ken <kcmu...@nf.sympatico.ca> wrote in message
news:38f5a...@209.128.1.3...
Claude Daley
parents) with high student debts are feeling the burden. Obviously something
is wrong.
I'm not sure that free tuition is the answer. It may help, but I see many
other problems in our PSE system, and free tuition may make some of those
other problems worse.
This discussion could be very lengthy, so I'll stick to one issue.
1) The European model with free tuition. - I was in that system (3 years in
Helsinki where all PSE has no tuition - they also have free dental and
daycare! - another story). But there are several substantial differences.
The university I was in in Helsinki had fewer students than MUN. Her are
some figures for 98. (see http://www.hut.fi/General/financing.html and
http://www.mun.ca/ciap/factbook.html for source data)
Helsinki MUN
Grads per year 1100 2500
Professors 181 909
Staff ? (a lot) 729
Budget (gov) $ 120 M $110 M
Tuition $ 0 $47 M
External $115 M $36 M
TOTAL Funding $230 M $193
The University in Helsinki (HUT) more than makes up for 0 tuition by
attracting sizable external funding (research grants and contracts -
including about $40M from the private sector vs ~ $6M private funding at
MUN).
But HUT does many things differently than we do. Their professors have
tenure, but there are very few of them, and they manage a team of staff,
most of whom work on 3-5 year contracts. They are well paid, but are
expected to bring in funding and acticvity. We expect our faculty to do
whatever pleases them, and we hope we won't be embarrased! We promote an the
basis of papers published, (or time spent - which ever is greater). They
think that ore way is foolish!
Students at HUT pay no tuition, BUT they tend to run up large student loans,
because living is expensive. 10 years ago, many of them had $20,000 loans
when they graduated. The current web page suggests students budget $1200/mo
just for food/rent/transport !
To get into HUT, students have to write very competitive entrance exams, and
only a relatively small % get in [ E.G. Entrance can be gained by taking the
GRE (an international standard like SAT, GRE is normally for grad studies).
For the student to qualify: verbal ability 70%, quantitative ability 90% and
analytical ability 90%.] So the FREE degree is only available for 'A'
students. Others are expected to go to a 'trades college', an apprenticeship
or get a job. Lots of Finns move straight from HS to the workforce.
Summary : the European model with free tution is very different from here,
and the free tution is only a small part of the difference. All European
countries are different, but NONE of them are like MUN, or like MUN with
free tuition.
I'm not saying that we should adopt any other system. What we should do is
run our own better!
C Daley
(a tenured prof., who would leave MUN in a heartbeat if it weren't for the
students - the students at MUN are great!)
Mark Joyal
On Fri, 14 Apr 2000, Claude Daley wrote:
> So the FREE degree is only available for 'A'
> students. Others are expected to go to a 'trades college', an apprenticeship
> or get a job. Lots of Finns move straight from HS to the workforce.
>
It's precisely this point which people in this country who advocate free
university tuition either ignore or are unaware of. All too often the
example of Ireland, Norway or some other (usually northern) European
country is cited as one which Newfoundland, or Canada in general, should
copy. I think that if closer attention were paid to details instead of
anecdotes, the enthusiasm for these "models" would evaporate. It's simply
a fact that the participation rate of a population in post-secondary
education, especially in universities, is higher in countries where
tuition is *not* paid for by the state. It turns out that, the highest
rate of participation is in the United States, the long-time bogey-man of
the Canadian left, where tuition is far from free.. Canada for its part is
near the top. A good test case for the effect of state-funding of
university tuition as opposed to personal-payment is the UK. From the mid
1940s until the late 1980s the majority of students at universities were
heavily funded by the British government (free tuition etc.). The
participation rate at British universities during this time was very low
in comparison with that in Canada or the United States. When a fee-paying
system was introduced in the late 1980s, the participation rate in the UK
jumped massively.
The fact is that a university education in Ireland, Norway, the UK,
Germany and so on is viewed differently in those countries than it is
here. Admission to MUN is seen as a right for anyone who achieves a
certain minimum performance in high school. In European countries it's not
intended to be an education for the masses, and relatively few are able to
be accepted. I suspect that many people who are calling for free tuition
in Newfoundland would not qualify for admission to university under many
or most European systems (and I'm not implying that these are not good
students or the parents of good students), and that if free tuition were
introduced here, MUN would have a much smaller student population.
Mark Joyal
Department of Classics
Ray Gosine
On Mon, 17 Apr 2000, Mark Joyal wrote:
>
> It's precisely this point which people in this country who advocate free
> university tuition either ignore or are unaware of. All too often the
> example of Ireland, Norway or some other (usually northern) European
> country is cited as one which Newfoundland, or Canada in general, should
> copy. I think that if closer attention were paid to details instead of
> anecdotes, the enthusiasm for these "models" would evaporate. It's simply
> a fact that the participation rate of a population in post-secondary
> education, especially in universities, is higher in countries where
> tuition is *not* paid for by the state. It turns out that, the highest
> rate of participation is in the United States, the long-time bogey-man of
> the Canadian left, where tuition is far from free.. Canada for its part is
> near the top. A good test case for the effect of state-funding of
> university tuition as opposed to personal-payment is the UK. From the mid
> 1940s until the late 1980s the majority of students at universities were
> heavily funded by the British government (free tuition etc.). The
> participation rate at British universities during this time was very low
> in comparison with that in Canada or the United States. When a fee-paying
> system was introduced in the late 1980s, the participation rate in the UK
> jumped massively.
>
I thought that the introduction of tutition fees at UK universities was
done within the last couple of years - perhaps 1997. Before that, however,
there was an upgrading of the status of many of the colleges, and I
believe that many colleges that previously offered diplomas now offer
degrees. That may be the change which resulted in the massive jump in the
participation rate at UK universities.
A recent study of this upgrading from colleges to universities suggested
that generally colleges that had very strong reputations for the
quality of their diploma programmes became second-rate universities with
the stroke of a pen. In terms of the regular UK research assessment
exercise which determines where much of the research funding flows in the
UK, I understand that only a few of the colleges have been able to compete
with the established universities.
Finally, I think that the tuition fees in the UK are still pretty cheap at
about 1,000 pounds per year for domestic students.
Ray Gosine
Thomas Clancy
"Mark Joyal" <mjo...@morgan.ucs.mun.ca> wrote in message
news:Pine.OSF.3.95.100041...@plato.ucs.mun.ca...
> On Fri, 14 Apr 2000, Claude Daley wrote:
> > So the FREE degree is only available for 'A'
I doubt it's strictly "A". Higher standards might motivate more to haul up
their socks, no? Do you feel awarding those that work hard a bad thing?
If based on marks (an indicator of mastering the information taught) it
doesn't discriminate against the poor; high tuition do. You are arguing for
a system that is accessed by cash, not merit. Somehow that's supposed to
help those in need? I'd argue almost all of us can stick our head in a book
and learn if given the chance with the right motivation (study hard = good
chance of tuition paid). Conversly, not all of us can afford the financial
cost of a degree (work hard = still can't afford tuition and living).
> a fact that the participation rate of a population in post-secondary
> education, especially in universities, is higher in countries where
> tuition is *not* paid for by the state. It turns out that, the highest
What's the completion/drop out rate/failure rate of these 'higher
participation' locations? Allowing more people to toss money away isn't
exactly doing anyone a favour.
James MacLean
On Mon, 17 Apr 2000, Mark Joyal wrote:
> ... In European countries it's not
> intended to be an education for the masses, and relatively few are able to
> be accepted.
I have some experience with post-secondary education in France. There
tuition is very low, about 5% of what it is here, and includes subsidized
cafeteria meals (about $2.50 for a full meal, with real bread) and medical
insurance. A large number of students also receive a non-reimbursable
grant ("bourse") to cover their living expenses. Course books cost much
less than here, as there are very few of the expensive undergraduate
"textbooks" that are required for many courses here. Any student with a
high school completion certificate ("baccalauréat") can register at any
university in the country. The pass rate for this certificate is around
75%, and many who do not pass on the first attempt do so the next year or
later. I do not have comparative statistics at my fingertips, but from my
personal experience of studying for five years in a French university, and
at present having friends teaching or studying in one, my impression is
that the proportion of young people attending university, or other
institutions with programmes that in Canada are studied at university
(schools of engineering, nursing, social work and business, for example),
is at least as high as in Canada and maybe higher. Anecdotally, when I
was at the University of British Columbia most people I met came from
business and professional families; at the University of Strasbourg most
came from families of small farmers, industrial workers, civil servants
and teachers.
Jim MacLean.
Claude Daley
Thomas Clancy <psx...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:8dfr74$q1j$1...@nova.thezone.net...
|
| "Mark Joyal" <mjo...@morgan.ucs.mun.ca> wrote in message
| news:Pine.OSF.3.95.100041...@plato.ucs.mun.ca...
|
| > On Fri, 14 Apr 2000, Claude Daley wrote:
|
up
| their socks, no? Do you feel awarding those that work hard a bad thing?
| If based on marks (an indicator of mastering the information taught) it
| doesn't discriminate against the poor; high tuition do.
Thomas, I'll back in here. The students I was referring to (ie any student
in HUT) would all be "A" students by our standards. I do agree that higher
standards do motivate people. And I agree that rewarding hard work and
success is a good thing. I wa sjust trying to point out (as Mark said) that
the system of free tuition in Europe is not free for all, but free for top
students. In fact, come to think of it, our straight A students would would
get into HUT, get in here 'free' too, by entrance scholarships. 90+ in high
school will get you a quite nice scholarship.
The 'discrimination' issue is a bit more complex than just the cost of
tuition. Generally those who are financially disadvantaged are facing other
issues as well.
|You are arguing for
| a system that is accessed by cash, not merit. Somehow that's supposed to
| help those in need?
Wait now! What do you mean about my arguments? Where did I say anything
about cash vs need. I thing you misinterpreted my remarks. I'm just pointing
out that free tuition and wide open enrolement is not available in Europe.
Personally I like the idea of free tuition, and somewhat tightened
standards. But I don't advocate an elite university system.
I'd argue almost all of us can stick our head in a book
| and learn if given the chance with the right motivation (study hard =
good
| chance of tuition paid).
The right motivation has little to do with tuition cost! You don't believe
that inate ability varies substantially?
Conversly, not all of us can afford the financial
| cost of a degree (work hard = still can't afford tuition and living).
Same holds true for almost everything - sports, music, ... life.
The question is - is University something that, like HS, should be for all
regardless of ability? Or, should the achievement of a university degree be
considered a 'special' challenge, not to be attained by all? Everyone can
play a sport, but the provincial championships are not for everyone.
No Spam
their tuition/books/etc. taken care of and are given a living allowance,
etc. (for the minimum period of time needed to get a degree), but
anybody else who meets a lower minimum standard can go, but they have to
pay?
We would need a set of standardized exams to place these students
(preferably administered by something other than the NF Department of
Education... perhaps MUN, post-secondary school umbrella group, etc.).
Personally, I'd hate to see one set of exams be worth so much, but
there's too much inconsistency in grading between schools to let
individual schools handle it.
That would add a new incentive. I'm not happy admitting this, but I
would have studied a *lot* harder in high school if I knew being in the
top 3% (for example) of the province would mean saving all that money,
as opposed to just meeting some perfunctory 60% or 70% average. You can
be sure many students would be under a lot more pressure from parents,
even the ones who don't realize how bad our secondary school curriculum
is.
We may even see an evolution take place, as schools try to give their
students an advantage by setting a higher standard or bringing in more
advanced courses, thus forcing other schools to play catch up, at least,
or try to do better. Right now, sometimes when a school tries to push
their students, parents complain because their child went from an A to a
B or worse; if it meant the difference of several thousand dollars per
year, they wouldn't complain so much. Well, maybe I deserve to be shot
for that bit of optimism... it wouldn't surprise me if the government
just stepped in and told MUN to select a certain percentage of people
from different regions/towns/schools/etc., killing much of the incentive
for schools to better their students beyond a point.
And of course, there's the question of where the money for all of this
will come from. My point is just that we could try to have a compromise
between what many European countries have and what North America has.
Mark Joyal wrote:
> It's precisely this point which people in this country who advocate free
> university tuition either ignore or are unaware of. All too often the
> example of Ireland, Norway or some other (usually northern) European
> country is cited as one which Newfoundland, or Canada in general, should
> copy. I think that if closer attention were paid to details instead of
> anecdotes, the enthusiasm for these "models" would evaporate. It's simply
> a fact that the participation rate of a population in post-secondary
> education, especially in universities, is higher in countries where
> tuition is *not* paid for by the state. It turns out that, the highest
> rate of participation is in the United States, the long-time bogey-man of
> the Canadian left, where tuition is far from free.. Canada for its part is
> near the top. A good test case for the effect of state-funding of
> university tuition as opposed to personal-payment is the UK. From the mid
> 1940s until the late 1980s the majority of students at universities were
> heavily funded by the British government (free tuition etc.). The
> participation rate at British universities during this time was very low
> in comparison with that in Canada or the United States. When a fee-paying
> system was introduced in the late 1980s, the participation rate in the UK
> jumped massively.
>
> The fact is that a university education in Ireland, Norway, the UK,
> Germany and so on is viewed differently in those countries than it is
> here. Admission to MUN is seen as a right for anyone who achieves a
> certain minimum performance in high school. In European countries it's not
> intended to be an education for the masses, and relatively few are able to
Thomas Clancy
"Claude Daley" <cda...@engr.mun.ca> wrote in message
news:8dfth3$u65$1...@coranto.ucs.mun.ca...
> Thomas, I'll back in here. The students I was referring to (ie any
student
> in HUT) would all be "A" students by our standards. I do agree that
higher
> standards do motivate people. And I agree that rewarding hard work and
Ok.
> The 'discrimination' issue is a bit more complex than just the cost of
> tuition. Generally those who are financially disadvantaged are facing
other
> issues as well.
To be sure.
> |You are arguing for
> | a system that is accessed by cash, not merit. Somehow that's supposed
to
> | help those in need?
>
> Wait now! What do you mean about my arguments? Where did I say anything
I apologize. I took your posting to be pro-cash =')
> out that free tuition and wide open enrolement is not available in Europe.
> Personally I like the idea of free tuition, and somewhat tightened
> standards. But I don't advocate an elite university system.
Sounds perfectly acceptable.
> The right motivation has little to do with tuition cost!
Poor choice of words, I'll clarify. Not tuition cost, but the cost of an
education in dollars. If it's normally high cost, and one knows that their
cost will be covered if they perform, avoiding the bill is motivation in and
of itself.. Also, I'd bet a person in a low-income situation, facing the
choice of working for $5, or obtaining a 'free' degree to enhance their
income, would choose the degree. Unfortunately, that person doesn't have
that choice right now. So we run the risk of graduating more poor or
marginal students - compared to good/great students - (in a cash system) as
opposed to those better suited (poor financially, but great performers) in a
merit system. I think a combination of the 2 is required. You show us
you're working hard, and we help... the less you work, the more of a load
you carry.
>You don't believe that inate ability varies substantially?
Yes, and of course No, I do not. At least when it comes to "thought" and the
"mind". Physical, yes. Most of us can sharpen our minds; very few of us
can grow the extra foot or two for the NBA.
> Conversly, not all of us can afford the financial
> | cost of a degree (work hard = still can't afford tuition and living).
>
> Same holds true for almost everything - sports, music, ... life.
> The question is - is University something that, like HS, should be for
all
> regardless of ability?
> Or, should the achievement of a university degree be
> considered a 'special' challenge, not to be attained by all? Everyone can
> play a sport, but the provincial championships are not for everyone.
And the provincial championships oft' do not lead to gainfully employed,
better educated, self-supporting individuals. I see your analogy, but one
is sport, the other is debateably. If you're good, and can show it, you
play on the team. If you're good academically, you get the postion you
worked towards. Neither should be based on economics; both should be on
merit.
Mark Joyal
On Mon, 17 Apr 2000, James MacLean wrote:
>
> Anecdotally, when I
> was at the University of British Columbia most people I met came from
> business and professional families; at the University of Strasbourg most
> came from families of small farmers, industrial workers, civil servants
> and teachers.
>
> Jim MacLean.
>
I think we could swap anecdotes ad infinitum: my friends at the University
of Manitoba when I was an undergraduate in the latter half of the '70s
were all from middle-class and lower middle-class families, like me; none
of us had professional parents, or anything remotely close (I don't
think any had a university education). And I don't believe there is a bias
towards wealth among Canada's university student population.
Mark Joyal
James MacLean
The point of my anecdote was to illustrate my claim that in France,
contrary to Mark Joyal's generalization about "European countries,"
university education is indeed intended to be for the masses -- the
intellectual's role, Voltaire wrote two hundred and fifty years ago, is
"to enlighten the prince *and the cobbler*."
The majority of Canadian students probably are from middle-class families.
The difference between them and French students is that if they don't come
from wealthy families they are graduating with gargantuan debts of thirty
to forty thousand dollars. They are also required to work many more hours
than French students in paid employment while attempting to keep up with
their studies, in many case simply to live at subsistence level. --J.M.
David M. Bourgeois
basically pay back your costs through the taxation system. The great thing
about this is it is geared to your income. I don't know if you can pay it off
in lump sums if you want, but that would be nice to be able to do when you
can afford it, and can speed up the process a bit.
In article <Pine.OSF.3.95.100041...@plato.ucs.mun.ca>,
Mark Joyal wrote:
>
>
>On Fri, 14 Apr 2000, Claude Daley wrote:
>
>> So the FREE degree is only available for 'A'
>> students. Others are expected to go to a 'trades college', an apprenticeship
>> or get a job. Lots of Finns move straight from HS to the workforce.
>>
>
--
David Bourgeois
dbourgeo@NO_SPAM_THANKS_thezone.net
Remove _NO_SPAM_THANKS_ from the Reply-to header should you wish to reply
directly.
Lenora Davis
Probably worth a try. Though maybe, it should be the choice of the individual.
either pay monthly sums or through your taxes every year.
"David M. Bourgeois" wrote:
> What do people think about the Australian system? As I understand it, you
> basically pay back your costs through the taxation system. The great thing
> about this is it is geared to your income. I don't know if you can pay it off
> in lump sums if you want, but that would be nice to be able to do when you
> can afford it, and can speed up the process a bit.
>
> In article <Pine.OSF.3.95.100041...@plato.ucs.mun.ca>,
> Mark Joyal wrote:
>
> >
> >
> >On Fri, 14 Apr 2000, Claude Daley wrote:
> >
> >> So the FREE degree is only available for 'A'
> >> students. Others are expected to go to a 'trades college', an apprenticeship
> >> or get a job. Lots of Finns move straight from HS to the workforce.
> >>
> >
Ian Manning
: What about a hybrid system, where the top N% or N # of students have
: their tuition/books/etc. taken care of and are given a living allowance,
: etc. (for the minimum period of time needed to get a degree), but
: anybody else who meets a lower minimum standard can go, but they have to
: pay?
They call this a "scholarship".
Ian
David Graham
<Pine.OSF.3.95.100041...@plato.ucs.mun.ca>, James
MacLean <jmac...@morgan.ucs.mun.ca> wrote:
> at present having friends teaching or studying in one, my impression is
> that the proportion of young people attending university, or other
> institutions with programmes that in Canada are studied at university
> (schools of engineering, nursing, social work and business, for example),
> is at least as high as in Canada and maybe higher. Anecdotally, when I
Comparative data on this question (dating, alas, from 1991) are
available at http://nces.ed.gov/pubs/esn/n13ba.html. In 1991, the
participation rate for France was very slightly below that of Canada
and the US. No doubt more recent data are available somewhere. Cheers,
DG
--
David Graham || Professeur titulaire, langue & littérature françaises
Memorial University of Newfoundland || St John's, NF CANADA A1B 3X9
-> http://www.ucs.mun.ca/~dgraham || dgr...@morgan.ucs.mun.ca <-
"I'm not a believer in luck, but I do believe you need it."-Alan Ball
Mark Joyal
On Mon, 17 Apr 2000, James MacLean wrote:
>
> The point of my anecdote was to illustrate my claim that in France,
> contrary to Mark Joyal's generalization about "European countries,"
> university education is indeed intended to be for the masses -- the
> intellectual's role, Voltaire wrote two hundred and fifty years ago, is
> "to enlighten the prince *and the cobbler*."
My source, which I no longer have ready to hand, was much more recent
than http://nces.ed.gov/pubs/esn/n13ba.html, to which David Graham
referred us in his posting. However, the data at that site certainly
don't suggest that European countries (or, for that matter, the U.S. and
Canada) view university education or treat it as mass education. Whatever
Voltaire may have had in mind, I'd be surprised if it was 100%
state-funded university education. Was his the commonly accepted view in
the eighteenth century?
Incidentally, the data show that in the age-group 18-21 the participation
rates in Canada and the U.S. were (in 1991) substantially ahead of all
other countries, Spain possibly excepted. I would suggest that the only
reason why the gap narrows in the age-group 22-29 is simply that many
European undergraduate degrees take longer to complete.
> The majority of Canadian students probably are from middle-class families.
> The difference between them and French students is that if they don't come
> from wealthy families they are graduating with gargantuan debts of thirty
> to forty thousand dollars.
I'm sure the first sentence is true, but I simply can't accept the
generalization contained in the second. The vast majority of our
students do not come from wealthy families (I hear the term "wealthy" used
so often nowadays to mean "people in the top Canadian tax bracket" -- this
would include the average associate and full professor at MUN -- that I
wonder if the term means anything any longer in this country). So the
suggestion which is being made is that most students at MUN incur debts of
30-40K. That just isn't true. What's more, those who do have debts owe
less on average than 30-40K, though of course some do have debts of
30-40K.
Mark Joyal
David M. Bourgeois
>I like this idea. It helps relieve some of the stress from burdening student loans.
>Probably worth a try. Though maybe, it should be the choice of the individual.
>either pay monthly sums or through your taxes every year.
>
I suspect it is taken out of your paycheque quarterly, monthly, or even
weekly, not once a year. I know myself I would never save up for it at the
end of the year ;)
>"David M. Bourgeois" wrote:
>
>> What do people think about the Australian system? As I understand it, you
>> basically pay back your costs through the taxation system. The great thing
>> about this is it is geared to your income. I don't know if you can pay it off
>> in lump sums if you want, but that would be nice to be able to do when you
>> can afford it, and can speed up the process a bit.
>>
>> In article <Pine.OSF.3.95.100041...@plato.ucs.mun.ca>,
>> Mark Joyal wrote:
>>
>> >
>> >
>> >On Fri, 14 Apr 2000, Claude Daley wrote:
>> >
>> >> So the FREE degree is only available for 'A'
>> >> students. Others are expected to go to a 'trades college', an apprenticeship
>> >> or get a job. Lots of Finns move straight from HS to the workforce.
>> >>
>> >
Mark Joyal
On Mon, 17 Apr 2000, Ray Gosine wrote:
> I thought that the introduction of tutition fees at UK universities was
> done within the last couple of years - perhaps 1997. Before that, however,
> there was an upgrading of the status of many of the colleges, and I
> believe that many colleges that previously offered diplomas now offer
> degrees. That may be the change which resulted in the massive jump in the
> participation rate at UK universities.
>
My understanding is that it took place around 1989; I could be wrong (it
wouldn't be the first time). You're right that many colleges and
polytechnics gained status as universities. But even at that, the
enrolment at the established universities increased significantly, and it
was this circumstance that I was thinking about.
> A recent study of this upgrading from colleges to universities suggested
> that generally colleges that had very strong reputations for the
> quality of their diploma programmes became second-rate universities with
> the stroke of a pen. In terms of the regular UK research assessment
> exercise which determines where much of the research funding flows in the
> UK, I understand that only a few of the colleges have been able to compete
> with the established universities.
>
I would suggest that although these new second-rate universities are
second-rate in comparison with the established UK universities, they
compare favourably with some Canadian universities, and that in some
cases the best Canadian analogue to these new universities may be Ryerson,
a comparison which would not reflect too badly on them. I also think that
some of these new universities were not intended to be research-oriented
institutions. And I suppose a lot depends on what is considered to be
"second-rate." After all, the Macleans survey could be interpreted to show
that in a number of important respects MUN is second-rate, and is viewed
that way.
> Finally, I think that the tuition fees in the UK are still pretty cheap at
> about 1,000 pounds per year for domestic students.
>
>
Ray Gosine
I think that's just about right. It would be interesting to know what the
difference in real terms is between ca. 1,000 pounds and $3,300.
Mark Joyal
Michael Wallack
site:
Tuition Waiver for Unemployed.
Any individual who submits evidence of currently receiving unemployment
benefits from the State of Rhode Island, of having a household income of
less than three times the federal poverty level, and of not being
claimed as a dependent by a parent (or someone else) will be allowed to
pursue course work at any public institution of higher education in
Rhode Island with the tuition and registration fee waived. To be
eligible for the waiver, the student must have been collecting benefits
within 60 days before the first day of classes. However, students who
qualify for waivers must apply for financial aid. Any aid received must
be applied toward the amount waived.
To see how much tuition would be covered by federal grants in the US, go
here:
Patrick Martin
: wonder if the term means anything any longer in this country). So the
: suggestion which is being made is that most students at MUN incur debts of
: 30-40K. That just isn't true. What's more, those who do have debts owe
: less on average than 30-40K, though of course some do have debts of
: 30-40K.
I agree with you that the average is less than 30-40K. The reason for this
is quite simple. If you are from St. John's, and nearby surrounding areas,
then you do not have as much debt as someone from outside. A person in the
St. John's area does not have to pay the extra food, rent, transportation,
etc. that a person from outside has to pay.
I would guess that people in St. John's pay approximately 15-20K less than
someone outside of town. Since people from St. John's would have much lower
student loans on completion, the average debt would also be lower.
patrick
Thomas Clancy
"Patrick Martin" <pat...@morgan.ucs.mun.ca> wrote in message
news:8dicl5$bsq$1...@coranto.ucs.mun.ca...
> The reason for this is quite simple. If you are from St. John's, and
nearby
> surrounding areas, then you do not have as much debt as someone from
outside.
That's not true at all. Not all of us are living at home with Mommy and
Daddy. Check the stats on the average age of a MUN student, I think you'll
be suprised - the vast majority of us are independant. While it is true
that _some_ students from town have support from their parents, it's equaly
true that _some_ students from outside the city do also. Being born in
St.John's doesn't mean we have a silver spoon up our collective ass. Hell,
I can name quite a few from outside the city that have an apartment, car and
money handed to them hand over fist. Doesn't mean you all are, or that even
most of you are,
> St. John's area does not have to pay the extra food, rent, transportation,
> etc. that a person from outside has to pay.
Ah, but we do. I don't recall getting any food stamps, or free rent cards
in the mail.
No Spam
Yes, essentially it is. But I'm looking at it from a slightly different
viewpoint. Whereas you're equating them with scholarships, I'm looking
at it as taking the stereotypical European system and applying it to our
best students, but still leaving the monetary option available for
others.
The criteria should be 100% scholastic ability. I know things have
changed recently with the new scholarships, but when I attended MUN,
most of the scholarships were not entirely based on previous scholastic
achievement, they included physical disability, gender, race, ethnic
group, financial need. While many of these were offered by NGOs or
private corporations who have every right to decide who they want to
give their money to, even some government scholarships had gender
requirements and grants were based partly on "financial need".
Right now, as others have suggested, the determining criteria for
attending MUN is financial ability more than previous academic
achievement. If you have the money, you go; if you don't, you either
take on a sizeable debt and go or you don't.
Some might pick on my "financial need" reference above, but most
middle-class families in the 90s can relate to having too much money to
be considered in "financial need", but not enough to pay. With my
suggestion, people are judged directly on their grades on the exams,
whatever their financial status.
Even the best scholarships available to students when I started MUN only
covered a fraction of the costs. What I'm suggesting is that the top N%
or N # of students be given a living allowance, tuition, and the cost of
required textbooks. I know things have improved and at this point I
should ask: What kind of (major) scholarships are available to new
undergrads? I certainly don't get the impression that the top 3% or 5%
of MUN's undergraduate population have all their tuition, books and
living expenses paid for (unless it's by Mom and Dad).
If every student who applies to MUN is writes these exams and the top N
% are given these broad scholarships, it would become very clear to
everybody that if you did well on this set of standardized exams, you
get a *major* scholarship. This would be a substantial scholarship,
meaning the difference for some to be between no debt and $35K debt, and
not $500 that will cover your books for one semester or $1000 to cover a
piece of your tuition in the first semester (not that anybody would turn
these down, just that $1000 doesn't make much of a dent in a $35K loan),
but everything taken care of for the duration of your degree. Of course,
limits would have to be imposed on how long it should take for certain
degrees, etc.
There's still nothing stopping other organizations from offering their
own scholarships as they're doing now.
My original suggestion was in response to Mark Joyal's post, informing
those who didn't know that the many European systems were very selective
and if applied here, only "relatively few" of those attending MUN today
would be able to attend. My suggestion was to mix the two, putting the
emphasis on the previous academic merit, but still leaving the option
open for others who are willing to pay. I like the fact that people who
aren't the best and the brightest have the opportunity to better
themselves here, but many people don't like the fact that the best and
the brightest have half or a third of a mortgage by the time they
graduate MUN.
One of the reasons I avoided the use of the word "scholarship" was so
that the rest of my suggestion wouldn't be dismissed with the statement,
"We already have scholarships."
There's scholarships and there's scholarships. What we have today helps,
but is not the same as what I'm suggesting, unless it's changed a lot
more than I thought! I could say, "[European country with no tuition
here] has scholarships for their students and everybody who is accepted
to university will get one!".
What's the difference between (a) being charged no tuition and (b) being
charged tuition and having a scholarship equal to tuition fees?
The rest of my post also mentioned possible side-effects of the
mechanism I suggested for determing who gets scholarships, but that's a
different topic.
Ray Gosine
On Tue, 18 Apr 2000, Mark Joyal wrote:
>
> I would suggest that although these new second-rate universities are
> second-rate in comparison with the established UK universities, they
> compare favourably with some Canadian universities, and that in some
> cases the best Canadian analogue to these new universities may be Ryerson,
> a comparison which would not reflect too badly on them. I also think that
> some of these new universities were not intended to be research-oriented
> institutions. And I suppose a lot depends on what is considered to be
> "second-rate." After all, the Macleans survey could be interpreted to show
> that in a number of important respects MUN is second-rate, and is viewed
> that way.
>
That was the point of the article. It went on to say that the downside of
the change in status was the subjecting of all institutions to
research-oriented evaluation criteria which was not appropriate given the
established practical strengths of some of the colleges.
>
> I think that's just about right. It would be interesting to know what the
> difference in real terms is between ca. 1,000 pounds and $3,300.
>
I thought that our tuition fees were on the order of $3,300 per semester
(or $6,600 per year) compared with the 1000 pound tuition which covers a
full year. Many of the UK degree programs are 3 years and, unless things
have changed significantly over the last few years, there is little room
for failing courses, repeating terms, etc.
R. Gosine
Ray Gosine
On Tue, 18 Apr 2000, Ray Gosine wrote:
>
> I thought that our tuition fees were on the order of $3,300 per semester
> (or $6,600 per year) compared with the 1000 pound tuition which covers a
> full year. Many of the UK degree programs are 3 years and, unless things
> have changed significantly over the last few years, there is little room
> for failing courses, repeating terms, etc.
>
>
My error on tuition fees .... I was looking at the fees per semester for
foreign students.
R.G.
Patrick Martin
: "Patrick Martin" <pat...@morgan.ucs.mun.ca> wrote in message
: news:8dicl5$bsq$1...@coranto.ucs.mun.ca...
: > The reason for this is quite simple. If you are from St. John's, and
: nearby
: > surrounding areas, then you do not have as much debt as someone from
: outside.
: That's not true at all. Not all of us are living at home with Mommy and
: Daddy. Check the stats on the average age of a MUN student, I think you'll
: be suprised - the vast majority of us are independant. While it is true
: that _some_ students from town have support from their parents, it's equaly
: true that _some_ students from outside the city do also. Being born in
: St.John's doesn't mean we have a silver spoon up our collective ass. Hell,
: I can name quite a few from outside the city that have an apartment, car and
: money handed to them hand over fist. Doesn't mean you all are, or that even
: most of you are,
If you can show me the stats, or tell me where you got them...great,
otherwise I stand by what I said. Many of my friends who are from St. John's
are living with their parents. They have much lower debt than someone from
outside of St. John's. As for some students in St. John's have support from
parents versus some students outside St. John's...It would take much wealthier
parents from outside of St. John's to provide assistance to their children
than parents in St. John's. Not only that but people who have assistance from
their family outside St. John's have to provide assistance since the Student
"Aid" will not consider them an independent student since their parents make
too much money. Thus, they have little choice but to accept money from their
parents since they have few other options.
: > St. John's area does not have to pay the extra food, rent, transportation,
: > etc. that a person from outside has to pay.
: Ah, but we do. I don't recall getting any food stamps, or free rent cards
: in the mail.
This is if you are living at Home with your parents. You have access to the
car, you do not pay rent or food (usually), and your parents give you money.
If you want to make your own money then McDonalds will help out and the little
money that you make is all yours.
patrick
Mark Joyal
On 18 Apr 2000, Patrick Martin wrote:
> Mark Joyal (mjo...@morgan.ucs.mun.ca) wrote:
>
> : wonder if the term means anything any longer in this country). So the
> : suggestion which is being made is that most students at MUN incur debts of
> : 30-40K. That just isn't true. What's more, those who do have debts owe
> : less on average than 30-40K, though of course some do have debts of
> : 30-40K.
>
> I agree with you that the average is less than 30-40K. The reason for this
> is quite simple. If you are from St. John's, and nearby surrounding areas,
> then you do not have as much debt as someone from outside. A person in the
> St. John's area does not have to pay the extra food, rent, transportation,
> etc. that a person from outside has to pay.
>
> I would guess that people in St. John's pay approximately 15-20K less than
> someone outside of town. Since people from St. John's would have much lower
> student loans on completion, the average debt would also be lower.
>
> patrick
This is all no doubt true, but it still seems to assume that all students
(apart from children of "the wealthy," perhaps) incur debts, only that
some incur greater ones than others do. In my message I referred to "those
who do have debts" because I think that there is a substantial number of
students (a majority?) who are neither children of "the wealthy" nor
indebted. It seems that in this discussion sight has been lost of those
who pay for their own education through summer employment and part-time
jobs during the regular semesters and thereby avoid debt, as far as
possible. I wouldn't have thought that paid employment was an unreasonable
expectation to make of most university students (I know I risk sounding
like a fogey in saying that this is how I stayed out of debt as an
undergraduate). I'd also suggest that paid employment, not geography, is
the main reason why the average debt is much less than 30-40K.
Mark Joyal
Lynette Hillier
aid from the government. This may not be the majority you are looking for,
but it is an overwhelming statistic. I agree with Patrick, a break down of
debt level versus parental residency in or out of St. John's would be
interesting.
Mark Joyal <mjo...@morgan.ucs.mun.ca> wrote in message
news:Pine.OSF.3.95.100041...@plato.ucs.mun.ca...
>
>
David Graham
> indebted. It seems that in this discussion sight has been lost of those
> who pay for their own education through summer employment and part-time
> jobs during the regular semesters and thereby avoid debt, as far as
> possible. I wouldn't have thought that paid employment was an unreasonable
> expectation to make of most university students (I know I risk sounding
> like a fogey in saying that this is how I stayed out of debt as an
> undergraduate). I'd also suggest that paid employment, not geography, is
> the main reason why the average debt is much less than 30-40K.
Mark, I think your analysis may overlook a couple of key factors. In
the Jurassic era, when I was an undergraduate, annual tuition at
Saskatchewan was $265 (!). Minimum wage was $1/hr. So 265 hours as a
labourer would pay my fees: that's 9 weeks' worth of full-time
employment, at a time when such jobs were very easy to find. Annual
tuition at Memorial is now $3300; minimum wage is what -- $5.50/hr? So
it takes 600 hours at minimum wage to pay fees, let alone room and
board, books, etc. In other words, it takes 15 weeks of employment at
40 hrs/week just to pay tuition fees. Residence and meal plan comes to
$1950/semester or $3900/yr, and I doubt most students living away from
home can do it for much less than that unless they're staying rent-free
with a relative. That's another 700 hours at minimum wage, which is 27
hrs/week over the 26 nominal weeks of the semester. I'd say that's a
fairly tough row to hoe, myself.
As for what the "average debt" is, it might make more sense to ask what
the median or mode are rather than the mean, since in all likelihood
there's so much variation between extremes that the mean debt may
distort the picture. Presumably the data should be available through
StatsCan. Cheers, DG
Mark Joyal
David: Comparison of my undergraduate tuition with yours suggests that I
was in the neolithic age. Anyhow, at the risk of trying the audience's
patience even further than I've already done, I should say that I've
deliberately been avoiding attempts to quantify my statements in order to
make a few simple observations which I don't think are inaccurate: systems
of state-financed university education do not increase accessibility,
contrary to common conceptions; most students at MUN do not belong to
wealthy families; many (perhaps most) do not graduate with debtloads; the
average debt for those who do have debt is far smaller than 30-40K
(though I take your point about median debts); many students graduate
without debt, or keep their debts to a minimum, through paid employment
(those fortunate enough to have work in the summer and/or during the
semester which pays higher than minimum wage are inevitably more
successful at this); I would add that some are helped (though usually only
in a limited way) by scholarships. My main point is that generalizations
about tuition costs and debt loads don't get us very far at all, for the
obvious reason that every student's circumstances and opportunities are
different and impossible to capture through the kinds of statistics and
assertions that are regularly trotted out. At the same time I also know
from contacts with students that some are under a lot of financial stress.
MJ