I graduated from a state university in 2003, and my parents wrote a CHECK for my tuition every semester. I paid for my books and living expenses. I graduated with no debt.

Since then, my understandng is that tuition at my school has more than doubled... but on the grand scale of things, it's still less than I pay for my kid's daycare.

I know grad students who live in high-rise condos downtown and pay their rent with student loans. I wouldn't do that, and I wouldn't co-sign for my kid to do that.

It would be easy to show the uselessness of most public education and college courses. Wait two months after the courses have ended. Give an exam each month for the next four months on one of the taught subjects, chosen in random order.

The very high failure rate would prove the point. Why pay money, spend time, and study particulars if there is no significant retention of the taught "knowledge" a few months after the instruction.

Success in school shows only that a person has learned something at some time, although it is mostly forgotten later. Mostly, courses do not impart knowledge, but they test for the ability to learn something temporarily under pressure, and possibly later when entering a profession. That could be accomplished at much less expense than 4 years of residence and $80,000.

What supports my proposition? First, personal experience. Second, Google "retention". In education, it refers to the ongoing discussion of whether to socially promote students or "retain" them for another year in a lower grade. There is no mention of retaining knowledge.

Online Education and the Null Hypothesis by economist Arnold Kling

Bradford S. Bell and Jessica E. Federman write [translated to common speech] :
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We reviewed past studies. E-learning and classroom instruction generally produce the same educational outcomes if the course materials are the same.
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Arnold Kling: [edited]
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The null hypothesis is that there is no difference in outcomes, and apparently the “meta analysis” by Bell and Federman does not reject it.

Taylor sees evidence that the quality of online learning has “caught up” to classroom learning. My more cynical interpretation is that there was never any catching up required. What students learn does not appear to depend in any way on how they are taught.

I am sure that there is a limit to this. Presumably, if some students get $50,000 worth of instruction and others get zero, you will see some difference in outcomes. However, relative to what we do today, the way to improve cost-effectiveness in education is to slash costs. My view of the null hypothesis is that most of what we spend on education has no marginal impact. [AMG: The last half of expense buys no additional education.]
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but on the grand scale of things, it's still less than I pay for my kid's daycare. -- ahw at June 3, 2013 11:12 AM

Well that is another issue. Why should you have to be paying for daycare. Until recent decades a single income family could be in the middle class. Maybe at the lower end, but still middle. So if mom wanted to take a few years off to get the kids to kindergarten, then go back to work it could happen.

Now a mother is expected to take 6-12 weeks off, half unpaid and then go back to work. And that is to get to a low median family income for the area.

The problem is also that anyone can go to college.

If you are teaching your students things they should have learned in high school why are they there?

I want to disagree with each and every one of you.

Sadly I can't disagree with any of you.

My first kid goes off to college in 2 years. I hope this problem is fixed by then.

http://deadspin.com/infographic-is-your-states-highest-paid-employee-a-co-489635228

What supports my proposition? First, personal experience. Second, Google "retention". In education, it refers to the ongoing discussion of whether to socially promote students or "retain" them for another year in a lower grade. There is no mention of retaining knowledge.
Posted by: Andrew_M_Garland at June 3, 2013 12:03 PM

Obviously people do learn some things through repetition and practice or else we all would leave high school not knowing how to read, write, or for the talented and dedicated few, play a musical instrument.

You are absolutely correct that students exposed to a set of facts or a concept "one " time retain very little of it.

However that does not make true education a waste. What it means is that people who can not teach, and students who cannot learn basic skills through the endless repetition and practice needed to become truly proficient, will also not be able to go on to learn "any" advanced concepts that require a sound understanding of the fundamentals which they will never acquire.

When public schools stopped teaching these fundamentals because the students had no attention span, and the teachers themselves had not mastered what they were supposed to teach, public schooling became nothing more than a taxpayer funded babysitting service.

When the budget was front page news I saw an interview with a large state college president (sorry, don't remember which one). He noted that awhile back (early 80s I think) the state government was paying 70% of the cost - the student & finicial aid paid the last 30%. Now it was reversed. And that was were a significant amount increase has come from.

So if cost was $10k in 83 (say) then the state paid 7k and the student paid 3k. Now assuming there was no inflation or extra costs (so still 10k) the state paid 3k and the student paid 7k....the students cost went up 4k w/o figuring any inflation or a new additional costs.

Let's face. A pittance of $2.9 million a year isn't going to get a university the best president, is it?

That's where Penn State went wrong. Keep raising their salaries until the solutions trickle down to the students.