College pricing pressure

[cathmom]

Money is just being spent on totally stupid stuff!

 

https://ure.uncg.edu/prod/cweekly/2010/09/28/upgradefordininghall/

 

Read to the bottom. This totally unnecessary "upgrade" cost $31.5 million!! I have been there. The ADA claim is just that. There was an elevator the handicapped could use. There was a totally functional staircase up to the food court. Part of this renovation was to relocate that staircase. I watched a UNCG promotional video where they touted that students wouldn't have to walk halfway into the building to get to the food court. I guess it escaped their notice that the students would still have to walk the same distance across the second floor to get to the food! They also built a new gym and new luxury dorms for upperclassmen.

 

At the exact same time, the state cancelled a program that provided a $2000 per semester scholarship to low income students, including my son. The only alternatives? Leave college or take out a loan. That upgrade could have given 7875 students their scholarship for another year. Oh, and guess what? The state cancelled those scholarships mid year, not giving the families or students any chance of saving to replace it.

 

As for teachers doing research, I offer this article:

 

http://dagblog.com/potpourri/why-should-professors-do-research-15996

 

 

I am so worried about this. Based on our oldest's experiences with the system, I have no idea if my other children will even be able to go to college. I am very discouraged.

[regentrude]

As for teachers doing research, I offer this article:

 

http://dagblog.com/p...-research-15996

 

 

Excellent article! Thanks for the link.

[Caroline]

Is the public actually represented at the bargaining table in your state/district? We seem to have the district and the union on both sides, with taxpayers down to one board member who isnt a former employee or married to one.

 

 

 

 

Are your board members appointed? I have never heard of a school board that is not voted in by the public.

[Caroline]

 

 

As for teachers doing research, I offer this article:

 

http://dagblog.com/p...-research-15996

 

 

 

 

Thanks for linking this article. As a high school math teacher who has a PhD in engineering, it really resonated with me.

[Kareni]

When my dd took AP European History, the textbooks were falling apart. I actually purchased a like-new one for $4-5 on Amazon. Two years later, my son is taking the same class. No texts because there are not enough to go around or enough to survive another reading. Fifty students receiving photo copies of chapters each week. There will be no money for books next year or the year after that. The class needs something like ten books to fill the need. On a recent filed trip. the teacher and I were discussing the situation. I had already located another 6 texts that were priced at under $10 for "very good." We could probably fill the gap for a little over $100.

 

The irony, of course, is that the copying fees will probably amount to more than the price of a cheap used copy.

 

 

Janice, I'm so sorry to hear of your friend's brain cancer.

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Tullia]

Add the addition of state lottery funding tuition. That is when we really started seeing a huge jump in costs.

 

 

I wonder if there's a correlation in NM as well? There has been talk of means-testing the NM lottery scholarship during our upcoming legislative session because the Roadrunner fund is overdrawn. I'd prefer raising the GPA requirement first, but in NM a means test would be more popular.

 

I'm not going to try to untangle the educational, political or economic issues raised earlier. I do have enough experience with the politics of the education system to believe that tinkering with fundamental economics is always going to be an irresistible temptation. No matter how good the intentions, though, sooner or later the law of diminishing returns kicks in and adjustments will be made one way or another. [ETA: I would agree with Janice that this is fundamentally an issue of supply and demand.] Janice, I'm sorry to hear about your friend. :grouphug:

[Caroline]

In GA, they have raised the GPA for the lottery funded scholarship. There is talk about means testing, but it hasn't happened. The Hope Scholarship has raised the level of education at our state universities because more people are staying in state. A Georgia Tech education funded by the Hope is one of the absolute best education bargains in the world. With the basic Hope, it costs about $16k per year for fees, books, room and board. UGA's ranking has climbed over the past 20 years since the lottery started. Even the lesser known schools are growing and becoming better. Five years ago, Kennesaw State got a $9.6 million grant to develop an urban education program. That level of grant was unheard of for KSU before that. And that grant has enabled KSU's Ed program to get a lot of exposure, which in turn brings in more money, and the cycle goes on. Southern Poly has been recruiting professors from some of the big engineering and architecture schools and their programs are growing, getting better, and gaining national exposure.

 

 

 

I wonder if there's a correlation in NM as well? There has been talk of means-testing the NM lottery scholarship during our upcoming legislative session because the Roadrunner fund is overdrawn. I'd prefer raising the GPA requirement first, but in NM a means test would be more popular.

 

I'm not going to try to untangle the educational, political or economic issues raised earlier. I have just enough experience with the politics of the education system to believe that tinkering with fundamental economics is an irresistible temptation. No matter how good the intentions, though, sooner or later the law of diminishing returns kicks in and adjustments will be made one way or another. Janice, I'm sorry to hear about your friend. :grouphug:

[creekland]

As for teachers doing research, I offer this article: http://dagblog.com/potpourri/why-should-professors-do-research-15996

 

That is an excellent article! Personally, I'd like for all secondary teachers to have had to come from actually using their specialty on a job or in research or something. I find far too many who know what they teach (exactly what they teach) but little, if anything, else beyond it. It's horrible for kids who have questions. I blame the "education" degree. I'd like to see everyone need a "real" degree in what they plan to teach and the education degree in addition as a double degree or masters or something (at least for secondary school teaching). Instead, you can have a VERY knowledgeable person in their subject, but if they don't have that education degree itself, they can't teach in high school (ok to teach in cc or higher!).

 

Is the public actually represented at the bargaining table in your state/district?

 

Yes, we're small town enough that a good number of people know each other, etc. Many school board members have had kids in the district. Some still do. Many don't like the cuts that need to be made, but what else can they do? They can't raise taxes a ton and don't really care to raise them at all as they are also taxpayers and related to other taxpayers. Some of the letters to the editor in the paper are anti giving anything to the school, but generally, it's pretty easy to see they are misinformed with what is really going on. I feel for those in added fluff districts (oodles on sports or building paint or whatever), but it's not happening here (lately).

 

I personally think honors programs are a need. If a child is compelled to attend, he should be getting instruction at his level. That can be called honors, reg ed, spec, remedial, ap, ib, dual enrollment or whatever...but the idea of excluding the top 1-25% from learning new material is warped. Excluded students don't grow up to feel a part of the community at all. Music, drama, debate, math club and science club are the traditional places in the school where the top students can find growth opportunities in the absence of honors classes.. Cut those clubs and their classes, and what do these kids have left?

 

I agree. Unfortunately, I'm in the minority here as again, we're rural, and most do not value super high education both in the staff and in the public. They're already peeved enough that NCLB and state standards want to improve our scores, so... all extra is going to try to raise the bottom half (sometimes more). More than once I've heard, "the good kids will do fine - let them sit and read or something." It's the sole reason I even considered homeschooling when my oldest hit high school age. In reality, I should have started when each hit middle school.

[regentrude]

That is an excellent article! Personally, I'd like for all secondary teachers to have had to come from actually using their specialty on a job or in research or something. I find far too many who know what they teach (exactly what they teach) but little, if anything, else beyond it. It's horrible for kids who have questions. I blame the "education" degree. I'd like to see everyone need a "real" degree in what they plan to teach and the education degree in addition as a double degree or masters or something (at least for secondary school teaching). Instead, you can have a VERY knowledgeable person in their subject, but if they don't have that education degree itself, they can't teach in high school (ok to teach in cc or higher!).

 

 

I completely agree. Teaching first and foremost requires content expertise (I have gotten in trouble on this forum for this point of view before). The horror stories I hear from my students such as the one of the biology teacher trying to teach physics and omitting chapters she did not understand, or of foreign language teachers who are not fluent in the language they teach, make me shudder.

 

.. all extra is going to try to raise the bottom half (sometimes more). More than once I've heard, "the good kids will do fine - let them sit and read or something." It's the sole reason I even considered homeschooling when my oldest hit high school age. In reality, I should have started when each hit middle school.

 

 

This is precisely the reason we homeschool. My DD spent five years reading in school, with teacher's permission. Elementary was sort of OK, but come middle school, she received almost no instruction. There was no reason to send her there.

[Tullia]

In GA, they have raised the GPA for the lottery funded scholarship. There is talk about means testing, but it hasn't happened. The Hope Scholarship has raised the level of education at our state universities because more people are staying in state. A Georgia Tech education funded by the Hope is one of the absolute best education bargains in the world. With the basic Hope, it costs about $16k per year for fees, books, room and board. UGA's ranking has climbed over the past 20 years since the lottery started. Even the lesser known schools are growing and becoming better. Five years ago, Kennesaw State got a $9.6 million grant to develop an urban education program. That level of grant was unheard of for KSU before that. And that grant has enabled KSU's Ed program to get a lot of exposure, which in turn brings in more money, and the cycle goes on. Southern Poly has been recruiting professors from some of the big engineering and architecture schools and their programs are growing, getting better, and gaining national exposure.

 

 

This was one of NM's goals, and the lottery scholarship has been helpful for ds. Our state has a history of importing people with advanced degrees who send their children out of state for college. We were originally prepared to do the same, but the lottery scholarship plus having a school in-state that is a good fit made our decision fairly easy both academically and financially. I cringed at the thread comparing costs for room and board that was started awhile back--and realized how very fortunate we are.

[Dana]

That is an excellent article! Personally, I'd like for all secondary teachers to have had to come from actually using their specialty on a job or in research or something. I find far too many who know what they teach (exactly what they teach) but little, if anything, else beyond it. It's horrible for kids who have questions. I blame the "education" degree. I'd like to see everyone need a "real" degree in what they plan to teach and the education degree in addition as a double degree or masters or something (at least for secondary school teaching).

I completely agree. Teaching first and foremost requires content expertise (I have gotten in trouble on this forum for this point of view before). The horror stories I hear from my students such as the one of the biology teacher trying to teach physics and omitting chapters she did not understand, or of foreign language teachers who are not fluent in the language they teach, make me shudder.

 

I have a MAT (Masters in Arts and Teaching), so I have graduate hours in my subject (math) and in education (useless). I have heard of people who have had a good experience with education courses, but I believe my 10yo could get credit for some of the graduate education courses I took. So when I slam education courses, that's because of my experience with them & I'm speaking of half my degree.

 

As for teachers who don't know their subject, I heard from a curriculum specialist who said she was observing some teachers and had one tell her students they didn't need to know the distributive property; they could just use order of operations. She said she asked the teacher what she'd do with a problem like 5(x+2) and the teacher said, "Oh! I hadn't thought of that!" Hopefully she began teaching the distributive property.

 

There is absolutely a need for understanding in a content area to do a good job teaching the subject. I think education schools should be tossed and the degree should be tossed (again, this is from my experience. There may be good education programs out there; mine wasn't).

 

At the individual level, I'm still not in favor of a degree to homeschool. I think many parents (and certainly most we see on these boards) can do a good job in facilitating their child's learning. I think there's a need to outsource some topics too though. I know there are some experiences I won't be able to give my son that an excellent teacher could. Unfortunately, I also think even with as many gaps as I have in some areas, I'd be doing a better job than some of the local schools. I just heard that one district now doesn't give a grade below 60...sigh... I'm going to start my cc class on Monday by showing them how a zero will affect their grade (watch it plummet!). It's an uphill battle.

[swimmermom3]

I completely agree. Teaching first and foremost requires content expertise (I have gotten in trouble on this forum for this point of view before). The horror stories I hear from my students such as the one of the biology teacher trying to teach physics and omitting chapters she did not understand, or of foreign language teachers who are not fluent in the language they teach, make me shudder.

 

 

 

This year our district cut four days from the academic calendar and 204 licensed staff members for nearly 40,000 students.

 

The way the staff cuts work is that the teachers with the least experience are let go. Let's say that leaves a position for a middle school math teacher open. If it is a position the district can't do without, they will look through the credentials of the remaining staff and see who is licensed to teach middle school math. Ah, the outstanding AP U.S. History teacher at high school X is the only person with the credentials; we'll move him even though he hasn't taught middle school math in ten years and the high school students are threatening a revolt. Because of our union contracts, we have all kinds of teachers teaching subjects and ages they frankly should not be teaching. One teacher actually took herself down to the state capitol and had a credential removed. This made the only candidate for a move to a middle school position, the high school swim coach and PE teacher who had won the state championships for four years in a row. She had been at the school for 17 years and was off to teach a subject she had not taught for that same period of time.

 

I also live in a state with a legendary PERS contract. It is best I don't discuss that.

[creekland]

 

At the individual level, I'm still not in favor of a degree to homeschool. I think many parents (and certainly most we see on these boards) can do a good job in facilitating their child's learning. I think there's a need to outsource some topics too though. I know there are some experiences I won't be able to give my son that an excellent teacher could. Unfortunately, I also think even with as many gaps as I have in some areas, I'd be doing a better job than some of the local schools.

 

Same here. I see a complete difference in a family with very low teacher/student ratios and public schools with higher teacher/student ratios. My boys both did classes I wouldn't teach to others (Marine Bio, Anatomy, etc), but in a smaller setting, I knew we could do ok. We had texts. We had the internet. I also have access to teachers at school (although that wouldn't help with Marine Bio). I will never say we did as well as someone gifted in the field could have, but it sure beats our local school alternative. I outsourced senior year English as that just isn't my specialty.

 

This year our district cut four days from the academic calendar and 204 licensed staff members for nearly 40,000 students.

 

The way the staff cuts work is that the teachers with the least experience are let go. Let's say that leaves a position for a middle school math teacher open. If it is a position the district can't do without, they will look through the credentials of the remaining staff and see who is licensed to teach middle school math. Ah, the outstanding AP U.S. History teacher at high school X is the only person with the credentials; we'll move him even though he hasn't taught middle school math in ten years and the high school students are threatening a revolt. Because of our union contracts, we have all kinds of teachers teaching subjects and ages they frankly should not be teaching. One teacher actually took herself down to the state capitol and had a credential removed. This made the only candidate for a move to a middle school position, the high school swim coach and PE teacher who had won the state championships for four years in a row. She had been at the school for 17 years and was off to teach a subject she had not taught for that same period of time.

 

I also live in a state with a legendary PERS contract. It is best I don't discuss that.

 

Ok, there's nothing like reading on the Hive Board to let me know that my district isn't so bad after all... I'm not sure whether to be glad or terrified.

[swimmermom3]

 

Ok, there's nothing like reading on the Hive Board to let me know that my district isn't so bad after all... I'm not sure whether to be glad or terrified.

 

 

Yes, that is the bad part of being in our district. On the other hand, our high school made two major changes that impressed the heck out of me and I know they are doing it on way less than normal. They just changed the science sequence from the traditional one to: Physics (conceptual), Chemistry, Biology, and whatever advanced topic the student is interested in. Students can choose a STEM option for the Physics and Chemistry classes.

 

For English classes, the sequence was Global Lit and Comp, American Lit and Comp. and then for junior and senior year, the students either chose AP Lang or Lit or they were stuck in some very lame courses that usually required no more than two books a year. I was really dreading the class my senior had chosen, but got to do the happy dance when I saw English 12 on his schedule. The work load is much more intense than what my dd's class was required to do.There are more classic works and far fewer "car novels." I think the school is heading in the right direction. Now if the students would just give a darn.

[Kareni]

 

...I was really dreading the class my senior had chosen, but got to do the happy dance when I saw English 12 on his schedule. The work load is much more intense than what my dd's class was required to do.There are more classic works and far fewer "car novels."

 

 

Glad to hear of positive news on the school front. I'm unfamiliar though with the term "car novels." Can you explain?

 

Regards,

Kareni

[shawthorne44]

When I went back to the same state college to finish my Masters, the tuition costs were 3x what they had been in real dollars. The only difference that I could see was the landscaping was really really pretty,.

[creekland]

When I went back to the same state college to finish my Masters, the tuition costs were 3x what they had been in real dollars. The only difference that I could see was the landscaping was really really pretty,.

 

How much did the state funding decrease in that amount of time? For our state schools, tuition has gone up almost entirely due to the decrease in state funding (saw a story on this on the news when they were talking about college funding this past fall). This is only for PA's 14 true state schools. Our state related schools (Penn St, Pitt, Temple) are far more private than public and cost more. They also saw a decrease in funding, but it didn't affect them as much as most of their funding is from private sources anyway.

[shawthorne44]

 

How much did the state funding decrease in that amount of time? For our state schools, tuition has gone up almost entirely due to the decrease in state funding (saw a story on this on the news when they were talking about college funding this past fall). This is only for PA's 14 true state schools. Our state related schools (Penn St, Pitt, Temple) are far more private than public and cost more. They also saw a decrease in funding, but it didn't affect them as much as most of their funding is from private sources anyway.

 

 

By percentage of the schools budget, state funding is a lot lower. The percentage is what is usually reported. By real dollars, it is about the same.

 

There is a lot of what I consider fluff in the budget. Amount meant on Admin salaries skyrocketed. I don't know the landscaping budget since I haven't seen that broken out, but it is posh. The school was and still is a very non-athletic university. It didn't even have a football team and students were glad. But, after I got my Masters they built a sports stadium for a gazillion dollars. OK, maybe not a gazillion. But, more appropriate for a major league professional team in a small city than a non-athletic University.

 

When they call wanting money I laugh.