Abtract and Bibliography

ABSTRACT:

This is a piece working through the numbers and prices in higher education. From an economic frame, this paper explores the opportunity cost of choosing a public school versus a private, the subsidy that schools provide, and the return on investment the exists in any college decision. This paper faces the criticisms of higher tuition prices for private colleges, and explains where the numbers come from, helping to shed light on what is usually overlooked by the public. There is no way to say that private schools are the clear choice for everyone, but looking at all the facts, its seems to be the more beneficial choice economically.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.

Works Cited/Works Consulted

Axtell, James. "What's Wrong--and Right--with American Higher Education?" The Virginia Quarterly Review 79.2 (2003): 189-208. Print.

Berg Dale, Stacey, and Alan B. Krueger. Estimating the Payoff To Attending A More Selective College. NBER Working Paper Series. National Bureau of Economic Research, Aug. 1999. Web. .

Burten, Kathy L., and Victor M. Borden. The Impact of Class Size on Student Performance in Introductory Courses. Rep. Indianapolis: Indiana University, 1999. Print. AIR Forum.

Goethals, George R., and Cynthia McPherson Frantz. Subsidy Shock. Subsidy Shock: Reshaping Judgments of College Sticker Prices. Williams Project on the Economics of Higher Education, Nov. 1996. Web. Nov. 1996. .

Hill, Kent, Dennis Hoffman, and Tom R. Rex. The Value of Higher Education: Individual and Societal Benefits (With Special Conserderation for the State of Arizona)io. Arizona State University, Oct. 2005. Web. .

Ikenberry, Stanley O., and Terry W. Hartle. Too Little Knowledge Is a Dangerous Thing: What the Public Thinks and Knows about Paying for College. Washington, D.C.: American Council on Education, 1998. 3-64. Print.

Kokkelenberg, E. C., Michael Dillon, and Sean M. Christy. The Effects of Class Size on Student Grades at a Public University. Rep. Ithaca: Cornell Higher Education Research Institute, 2006. Print.

"Official College Planning Tools | Research Colleges and Universities Online." College

Admissions Requirements. College Board, 2010. Web. 21 Apr. 2010. .

"Office of Admission." Yale University. President and Fellows of

Yale University, Web. 19 Feb 2010.

<http://www.yale.edu/admit/visit/facts.html>

Parmar, Neil. "Why the Ivies Aren't Worth It?."SmartMoney.com Jan 2009: n. pag. Web. 19 Feb

2010. .

West Virginia University - Tuition." West Virginia University - Undergraduate Admissions. 2005. Web. 21 Apr. 2010. .

Winston, Gordon C. "Grow" the College?: Why Bigger May Be Far From Better. Williams Projects on the Economics of Higher Education. Williams College, Oct. 2001. Web. .

Winston, Gordon C. Economic Stratification and Hierarchy Among U.S. Colleges and Universities. Williams Projects on the Economics of Higher Education. Williams College, Nov. 2000. Web. .

my story

Looking back, I started out thinking I would have a non-bias standpoint through the majority of my research and then discover an answer. I believe for the majority of my research I did a good job sticking with this, however I did a full 180 between my two rough drafts of this paper. I went from backing public school education as the best means for education because students will pay less overall. However, when looking into it more, the private education showed more and more benefits as research and writing went on. Considering smaller classes versus lectures. From personal experience I have noticed in my first year at college, the large lecture classes are the classes I struggle in and the small classes I do my best in. In the large lectures I feel like I fall under the radar and fall behind, I feel helpless when I get behind and if I were to fail, no one would notice. However, in the smaller classes there is someone making sure you're tracking and willing to help. This topic was chosen by me because I chose Rutgers over a private university and I wanted to know if I made the right decision, while I still think Rutgers was the right choice for me, I just have a small price to pay and I have to work harder to make sure these large lectures don't effect me.

painting a picture.

In my project, I feel like not many images will be able to help me prove an economic argument, so I will use my personal standpoint in my images, here are two images. One from a small class and one of a large lecture hall. Which one do you think would be the best learning environment?

how i will go about my project

since my first rough draft, i have made some fairly big changes to my debate. I have changed my position and re-edited my paper completely and started from scratch. The sources that I found began to make me change my mind. I started out trying to prove my case that public schools were overall the better choice for a student, but as my project began to unfold I began to look at the bigger picture and changed my position all together. My outline now is as follows:

I divided my argument into three parts the personal, social, and economic standpoints on the differences between public and private universities.

Personal: Student teacher ratios, learning environment, counseling systems.

Social: "party schools", reputation, entitlement

Economic: tuition, tuition payback, salaries after graduation, job opportunities.

With everything I organized my paper into those three sections then at the end I wrap them all up together.

the point I am trying to make

At this point in my research, I have finally come to where I can start to formulate my case and the point I am trying to make. My question is, Is the giant Ivy League price tag truly worth it and what do students get from a private education? In my case I am starting to believe that it depends on the student and in most cases, a student can get a great education anywhere they go. My research shows that students in public universities can earn just as much (even more) than students in private universities. other aspects included in my research are employment rates for students coming out of both types of universities and enrollment levels in private universities. I am looking at evidence showing, graduation rates, class sizes, tuition, graduate schools acceptances, etc. to help stake my claim.

The Debate

The debate i have identified. Is a tough one to distinguish, and it will be even tougher to establish a winner. Both sides provide enough evidence to sway me in either direction. My question has shifted to whether or not the experience of an ivy league is worth it over another institution. And what is it that gives the schools such a sense of entitlement for their graduates success? While one side says, the Ivy League "grooms" its students for success, nurturing them and making certain that they do succeed. Is the university doing so to keep its highly accredited numbers high? And on the other hand, students at large public schools aren't granted the personal touch like the students at ivy league schools. They tend to be "mass educated" and students can drop out and fail a class without notice. However, students who do excel in this situation, do so on their own, showing that they can achieve success independently. So, the debate is difficult and I have much more research to do to venture both sides of this topic.

What I Need Help On.

So far, my research has been going quite smoothly. However, there are a few things in my research that I feel as if I definitely need help on. First off, I need help finding more scholarly sources, for some reason I have had no issue finding primary sources (i.e. U.S. News articles and University admissions websites), however when it came to me finding secondary sources I was coming up against great difficulty. I am not sure if I am going about my research the wrong way or I am just typing in the wrongs things into my search because I am having a hard time finding what I am looking for. I have found a few good ones, but I am fully aware that I need much more. Also, we already spoke of this in our conference, but I am still thinking of what directions I am going to go in my topic. I have been jumping around the topic and I need to finally choose a direction. Besides those things I think I am off to a pretty confident start. If I think of anything else, I will be sure to ask!

Is It All Worth It?

I have gotten to the stage of my research to where I can begin to piece things together and I can begin to see the picture of where I am going with this project. So far I have had no difficulty finding primary sources I can use in my research. Primarily I used the admissions website at Harvard University to show examples of the attitude the Ivy League has towards the education they have to offer. On their website I noticed---which was different from other university websites--- they brag about the statistics of where their graduate end up after graduation much more than the rest. In Deresiewicz's "The Disadvantages of An Elite Education", Deresiewicz (an Ivy League graduate himself) speaks of the issues with Ivy League entitlement, he describes how Ivies "encourage their students to flatter themselves for being there". He also discussed how the entitlement that the ivies impose causes it's alumni to be "incapable of talking to people who aren't like you [Ivy Grad]). This could be a lead on the Ivy League "entitlement" argument. While I still haven't decided a specific question the resources have helped me come closer to what my question might be. What do students get from an Ivy League education? Where does this source of entitlement that the Ivy Leagues impose on their students? and is it all worth the overall high cost? In "What's Wrong--And Right-- With American Higher Education" by James Axtell, Axtell explores all aspects of American higher education including the difference between public institutions and the ivies. Axtell explains the downsides of both which makes my non-bias approach towards this project much more simple.

Annotated Bibliography

"Office of Admission." Harvard University. President and Fellows of

Harvard University, Web. 19 Feb 2010.

It is know just by looking at the Harvard website that there truly is a sense of entitlement embedded into their students before they even arrive at the school. The students are told the graduates who they are to follow in the footsteps of and how they are the future leaders of America. Their statistics and what they choose to advertise on their website is that coming out of their school they will go wherever they want.

O’Shaughnessy, Lynn. "5 Reasons to Attend a Liberal Arts College."

CBS Money Watch (2010): n. pag. Web. 15 Feb 2010. .

O’Shaughnessy discusses in this article her feelings on why private (not necessarily just Ivy League) education is the better way to go. She talks about how the small and more personal class sizes aid in student development for their futures in the workplace. O’Shaughnessy highly discourages the impersonal qualities of the large scale university. With this it is safe to assume that she believes the high price of private education is worth it.

Research Questions

At first, I thought I wanted to write about who should pay for college and how. However, as I went further and further into my thinking process, I came up with a whole new topic. Something I would like to address would be the difference between public and private institutions. Is a $300,000 private institution investment truly worth it in comparison to an in-state school that is a fraction of the cost. Are the educations the same? What makes the private school so much more expensive. I would also like to explore why society has an obsession with the ivy league education and why often times public universities are over-looked.

MLA Resource assingment

I did a search on resources that would be helpful in my topic area, and while using the Rutgers RIOT advice, I found the following to be possible aids:

Arnett, Trevor, and General Education Board. Trends in Tuition Fees in State and Endowed Colleges and Universities in the United States from 1928-29 through 1936-37. New York: General Education Board, 1939. Print.

Carnegie Commission on Higher Education, Carnegie Commission on Higher Education. Higher, and Education. Tuition; a Supplemental Statement to the Report of the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education on "Who Pays? Who Benefits? Who should Pay?". Berkeley: Calif, 1974. Print.

Council for Financial Aid to Education. What Price Tuition? A Staff Study Prepared by the Division of Research., 1957. Print.

Ehrenberg, Ronald G. Tuition Rising : Why College Costs so Much. Cambridge, Mass; London: Harvard University Press, 2000. Print.

Hoxby, Caroline Minter, and National Bureau of Economic Research. College Choices : The Economics of Where to Go, when to Go, and how to Pay for it. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004. Print.

United States. Congress. House. Committee on Education and Labor. College Opportunity and Affordability Act of 2007 : Report of the Committee on Education and Labor Together with Additional Views to Accompany H.R. 4137. Washington, D.C: U.S. G.P.OPrint.

Rutgers RIOT

Before I went through the Rutgers RIOT program, I thought I knew quite a bit about researching for essays. My junior year of high school we spent a whole semester researching and writing a ten page research paper. With this, a lot of the lessons I already knew, I just needed my memory to be refreshed. The main thing I learned from this was the "evaluating" section. I have known how to find sources but some of the criteria I am supposed to be looking for, I did not know about. This was a good refresher exercise before I start working on my paper.

Three Questions for the Librarian.

Today,
the three questions I have for the librarian are as follows:


1.) Is there anyway I can find records of college tuition prices and how they have increased in the past few years?
2.) Is there any way I could find out how much college cost way back in the beginning of higher education?
3.) Is there a statistic that could show the average G.P.A's of college students on scholarship and who are not on scholarship?

Continuing with the topic idea

Since the first time I wrote in this my topic ideas have changed a little. The analytical essay made me think of more and more ideas for what I would like to write about. The idea of who should pay for college and privatization. To go in more depth to see who deserves scholarships and who should pay for college out of topic would be very interesting to me. When searching through the internet, I came to notice how scholarships are so difficult to acquire these days and those who receive them should take full advantage of the privilege they are granted. Also, I check out the prices for college tuition, which are on the rise. College just keeps getting more and more expensive, meaning scholarships will be in higher demand. The other side of the debate could be how everyone deserves the right to an education, which I agree with but when people don't work up to their full potential they should have to pay for their education them self. In my research I found some of the most expensive colleges from 2008-2009. Including Sarah Lawrence which is $ 53,000 a year, according to http://www.campusgrotto.com/most-expensive-colleges-for-2008-2009.html. I will still venture other topics but this could be an interesting topic to choose.

1

I honestly don't know what I want to write about in my final project for this class. I mean this is such a broad topic that I don't want to pick something and then end up regretting what my decision later on down the road. I like to consider all options before I make my final decision. I know this first assignment was to just discuss what I "might" want to write about, but I am finding it difficult since I have no idea what I would even consider writing about. Maybe something about how schools (like Rutgers) are getting so much bigger and even though it's great that so many people are pursuing higher education, where are all these new people going to go? With the incoming class sizes continuing to increase housing, registering for required courses, and just taking the bus have become more and more difficult with the growth in populations. What could be the solution to this problem without decreasing the number of new students in higher education? Should schools simply increase in size including more housing, more buses, and more classes? Or should more schools be created in order to maintain some sort of "smaller" school environment so students can get individual attention without getting lost in the rush of 60,000 people. This is just an idea. I doubt I will stick with this idea the whole way through. I'll probably change my mine at least six more times, just a heads up.