Daniel Schwartz could have attended an Ivy League school if he wanted to. He just doesn't see the value.More on that at Washington Post, "Two-year colleges draw more affluent students."
Mr. Schwartz, 18 years old, was accepted at Cornell University but enrolled instead at City University of New York's Macaulay Honors College, which is free.
Mr. Schwartz says his family could have afforded Cornell's tuition, with help from scholarships and loans. But he wants to be a doctor and thinks medical school, which could easily cost upward of $45,000 a year for a private institution, is a more important investment. It wasn't "worth it to spend $50,000-plus a year for a bachelor's degree," he says.
As student-loan default rates climb and college graduates fail to land jobs, an increasing number of students are betting they can get just as far with a degree from a less-expensive school as they can with a diploma from an elite school—without having to take on debt.
More students are choosing lower-cost public colleges or commuting to schools from home to save on housing expenses. Twenty-two percent of students from families with annual household incomes above $100,000 attended public, two-year schools in the 2010-2011 academic year, up from 12% the previous year, according to a report from student-loan company Sallie Mae.
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Is an Ivy League Diploma Worth It?
At Wall Street Journal, "Fearing Massive Debt, More Students Are Choosing to Enroll at Public Colleges Over Elite Universities":
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2 comments:
for years i have said, out loud, not everyone needs to attend college to succeed. Of course if someone else is made to pay for it, why not spend sometime on the protest line?
Any Lexus Nexus search, when I was doing this sort of thing, demonstrated that the courses of study were very close together in requirements. The difference would be the people teaching the courses at "ivy league" schools. Given that TA's were actually doing a lot of the teaching one might be forgiven for some doubt that a diploma from Harvard, et al, is worth it.
As the "good old boy" network continues to break down and public higher educational institutions demonstrates their credibility through their graduates, already noticeable, it will further erode. Far too many "Ivies" have been living on their laurels.
If one looks at the prime movers behind most of the problems we face as a nation one finds "Ivy League" graduates causing or making it worse. They are all singing from the same hymnal.
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