College Costs

The cover price of going to college these days is, in many cases, impossibly high for any member of society middle class and below without any financial aid. So, it seems to me like the price of college is actually not a very clear cut thing. The price varies incredibly from person to person based on their background economically, academically, athletically, and I’m sure other factors as well. For this reason I think instead of looking at what the average schools price tag is, I think a more useful study would be to look at the average amount of debt that students are graduating with. This way we can ignore how much a school awards in financial aid, and really see how much higher education is impacting students. With further long term studies on the students lives, understanding if the price of college is worth the degree. Furthermore, early in the reading there was a comment about how the cost of higher education has been rising regardless of the economy as a whole. I think this may be in part because college used to be primarily attended by only the wealthy members of society. In such circumstances, it seems as though most students would be able to pay their tuition. Now that college is expanding to include a higher diversity of students economically, more students need financial aid or loans. More students needing such things means that the cover price of a school will likely go up so that students who can pay full ride can help the school make up the difference. Then add a bad economy and less state funding, and the cost will rise. That seems  to me why the cost of education has been rising in good and bad economies.