Should Higher Education Be Free/Mandatory?

Would you rather there be a hefty lower class....as long as they have a degree?

I think the more educated society is the better. I am not selfish enough to support an uneducated class just so I can get ahead. I can always find a way to make it in this world, no matter what, as long as I try, and don't blame others or society for any difficulties, which is less empowering.

Keeping a price tag on college makes students (somewhat) more accountable for their actions. It also keeps the burden of taxes off of the rest of us, I don't want to support free school.

State schools should definitely be more affordable, there is no reason for it to cost more than 4,000 a year.

I feel if students want free college, they need a 3.5+ grade point average OR have a diagnosed medical/psychological disorder. They also need to be actively involved in an internship every semester they are in school.

I disagree that college should be harder to get into, but first we need to raise the standards of education in this country at the high school level. Summer vacation needs to go away in favor of trade school or camps, teachers need to be empowered, curriculum needs to be more rigorous, and more specialized "real world" classes need to be offered. I don't know how anyone could expect the US to be an industrious nation with stupid, lazy, and entitled teenagers.

College LEVEL education (Trade school, etc) should be expected of every contributing member of US society, and it should be more affordable to the average person.

However, I don't see how you can make higher education free until you fix what comes before it. Free education burdens society with taxes and most students it *should* help will still slip through the cracks.

College will never be free, like others have said it's big business that is revenue-based. That's like asking a sports team to give away tickets to their games for free... why would the owners do that?

But I will say that higher education in America is high-way robbery and there is something definately wrong with that picture. There definately needs to be a change. The only way I see that change coming is that if new colleges open up with a brand new philosophy where they are not greedy for money, but even then it will be hard to attract students to a college with no history of existing.

I believe secondary education should be completed, yes. It gives us all a proper foundation of knowledge, which we can then expand upon ourselves or through further academic study. Those who drop out of school, at least in towns, have created a great imbalance that threatens to destabalize the region. I will provide an example of where I live.

68% of people do not finish secondary education, leaving a 32% that either goes on to university or not. It is insufficient to promote the right interest in education or provide clarity of purpose. I regret to inform this forum of such a reality, but it is as such.

However the issue does provide fertile ground for conflict.

I agree with the pp who said that money is not what keeps kids from going to college. There is a lot of financial aid available. I was raised dirt poor and lived a dirt poor adult life for quite a while (still kinda do actually, but that's another story), but when I got sick of it and wanted better, I figured out how to go to college. I was scared that I didn't belong there, that there was a certain type of person who goes to college and I wasn't it, that I would have to jump through hoops to get to go, etc, but that wasn't the case. Those were however, many of the things that kept me from going right after highschool. I didn't have parents who knew the ropes enough to show me the ropes.

I don't think it should be free. I think it should be as it is, with financial aid available to those who need assistance. I do think that perhaps whether you get grants (not repaid) or loans (repaid) should depend less on what you make going into college and more on what you can be expected to make and contribute coming out of college. Social and public services are much needed services but with low expected pay. People going into those areas should not necessarily be expected to pay back what a business major who will have the potential to make a great deal of money, but that will only have a secondary affect on society might be expected to pay back. But that is my opinion. I'm sure it has it's flaws.

As for it being mandatory, well first let me address some of the op comments. Mandatory school age varies from state to state. It is compulsory to age 16 in most states I believe, not 18. It is 18 in a few. However, the high school drop out rate is quite high, many people do not have high school diplomas is suggested in the op. And not everyone is a good match for the academic world. I wish more people would give college a try as it is different than high school and those who hate high school might quite like college, but that doesn't mean that everyone will, nor should everyone. We also need people who get other forms of training, and like it or not, we need people who do menial work because they are unqualified to do anything else, otherwise, the menial stuff doesn't get done.

What I really think needs to be refigured is how we pay people. Some of the most valuable citizens get some of the lowest pay (most emt's would be classified as low income!).

No, it has to be funded somehow and I think it's only fair that you pay for the education you receive at a higher level as it's of a much better quality than the education you had previously. It should definitely not be mandatory- I go to university because I want to learn, I would not want to put up being in classes with a bunch of people who don't want to be there. They will waste both my time and the teacher's, as well as their own time when they could be doing something more constructive (for them) with their time.

Education isn't for everyone but that doesn't mean that people should disregard it completely. You can get free educational resources out there now, I took a Stanford university online course last year and really enjoyed it (hard though, Robotics is more tricky than it looks). I think everyone can benefit from education but you have to have the initial interest in order to foster the motivation to actually absorb the information and learn from it. Not everyone can do that straight away and some prefer to do so outside of a university environment, which is fair enough.

So, no I don't think it should be free or mandatory. However, I do take issue with just how much tuition fees have increased over here in the past few years as it does put people off from making such a commitment. However,I do think it's a worthy investment, possibly one of the most worthy endeavours one can do.

My college degree was in high demand when I started college. Than the demand died with the economy so I was unable to find work that specifically fit my degree path. That said I have found higher paying work than folks I know who haven't got any degree because it looks great on my resume. So even though my degree is the only one in the medical field that is worthless lol, it has gotten me excellent office jobs.

I intend to go back to college when my younger kids get a little older though, because though an associates degree was plenty ten years ago it seems that a bachelors is becoming more and more necessary.

As far as free college goes, my kids are in the Kalamazoo Public Schools. A few years ago a very very wealthy person or group of persons left a huge legacy to KPS that pays for four years of college for any child that graduates from KPS after having been in the Kalamazoo Public Schools from I think fourth grade on. The vast majority of children who have graduated since them have made use of the free education, however the data at this point indicates that the students that use the Kalamazoo Promise grant money fail at a higher rate than students that do not qualify for four years of free education. My kids will have free ride scholarships through the Kalamazoo Promise, but I started from elementary pushing them to understand that they will not be allowed to fail, quit, goof off, or otherwise waste that kind anonymous rich persons money. So far my oldest is in advance placement courses and my younger two live on the honor roll. But, then teen years are just round the corner, and keeping them motivated while the hormones set in will be a challenge. I pray they don't waste this education and end up paying off student loans as long as I have been.

Here is more info about the Kalamazoo Promise for anyone who wants to know more about what I was talking about.

https://www.kalamazoopromise.com/index.php

I don't think financial aid is as easy to get or as abundant as some people seem to imply. If it was, most younger people wouldn't have the student loans they do. I know that some financial aid is available to just about every person that doesn't have a trust fund, but that is nowhere near sufficient to pay for a semester at a four-year school, and a lot of financial aid is unavailable if you're a white male with nothing special about you that's not from a dirt poor family. When I hear that financial aid makes it possible for everyone to get a college degree, I feel like I'm seeing one of those commercials with the guy in the money sign suit, telling me that I can get the government to pay my electric bill. Just doesn't seem likely.

As for the worth of a college degree degrading due to everybody getting one, wouldn't one solution then be to stop making high school mandatory? After all, the fewer people that graduate high school, the more value a high school diploma will have, right? Perhaps we should even encourage the students with lower grades to stop after eighth grade and just find work. That'd make everything better, wouldn't it?

This is a dumb idea.

BTW, Fox, student loans are financial aid.

When people kept saying that financial aid could get them through school, I simply assumed people meant that stuff that didn't have to be paid back. After all, one could get a personal loan and use that money to go to school. It'd be an outrageously bad idea, but it would still be a way to go to college.

As for it being a dumb idea, I never said that it was realistic or that I wanted or expected it to happen. It doesn't make that much sense. But it makes for a good way to talk about education and several other topics.

Financial aid is easy to get, you can go to a very expensive school for next to nothing if you do any of the following

1) Join the military OR go to school first with loans and then join the army or navy - they have a loan repayment program for up to 100,000 in student loans.

2) Serve in the peace corps.

3) Go to community college for 2 years and get good grades, then transfer to a 4 year university. Not only will this increase your chances of getting in, it will increase your chances of receiving financial aid.

4) Get married, emancipate yourself, or wait until you're 22. Do something to get your parents off your FAFSA so you will qualify for grants

5) Actually research grants! I got a few random 1,000 dollar grants that I stumbled upon from Save Mart and BooKoo, there are so few people that apply and even fewer that will take the time to write a decent essay. I found you can just go down the list of businesses in the chamber of commerce and you'll find at least 2 businesses in your area that offer grants for college. Many schools have benefactors that provide funding for students with high GPA's, or reduced tuition if you attend the local community college first, etc.

6)Be a resident or assistant director for campus housing, that way you can get free housing and reduced or free meals.

7) Join a sorority/fraternity. Many frats have scholarships just for members, and some are super easy to get.

I'm sure there are more I can't think of right now, but that's a good place to start.

I'm not picking on you, because what you've said is extremely helpful, but I hate when people say that everyone can go to college as long as they're willing to join some part of the military. I think people should only join the military, whatever branch, if they want to defend the country. I'm not willing to fight and die for America, so there's no way I'd join any part of the military, even if it was the only way I'd get to go to school.

I don't know, I just rarely hear about people participating in a branch of the military for two years, having the military pay for their student loans or tuition, and then never having anything to do with the military again. In fact, I don't think I know anybody that has said anything to that extent. But that may be more about my area. And maybe I just have a bias against the military.

I just don't like the idea of potentially having to fight and kill people to get an education. Granted, I don't know much about the subject, but the military paying for college seems like just a trick to get more people to join.

So basically you just want a free ride?