I think Bernie is correct: College should be free. If Harvard gets the ball rolling, great! Start a trend!

Most colleges can't afford it, but if Harvard and a handful of other schools can, they ought to do it.

It need not be "free" for everyone. The top 1% can pay, but for everyone else it can be free.

Anonymous wrote:Guys, are you impervious to facts? Harvard already offers the most generous financial aid packages out there. That hasn't put pressure on other schools to keep the list price of tuition down. Why would free tuition at Harvard do so?

No I am not, but most people only see the sticker price and don't dive down into average cost of attendance / average aid award and other data. If Harvard brought the sticker price down, as the market leader it would cause a signalling effect to other schools, because Harvard tuition will always be a point of reference. So the obvious response would be, "why does this school think they can get away with charging more than Harvard?"

The only people I think this would probably benefit the most is the east coast, dual-income families in that $200K-$300K income range who can't afford full pay, but make too much to get any sort of aid and thus their kids are priced out of Harvard. And these people, as a whole, are already upwardly mobile and their kids generally turn out just fine even if they have to "settle" for state flagship or a lower ranked private school with merit aid.

For families making under $150K, Harvard is already very very cheap, even free for a good chunk of the student body (20%).

Not quite the same thing, but my home state of Georgia created the HOPE scholarship to make college more accesssible to lower income kids...need to get a certain GPA in HS and you get to go to state schools for a very reduced fee. Well, turns out this ended up benefiting the kids who would've gone to college anyway (i.e. middle to upper-middle class kids) because those were the ones who were overwhelmingly meeting those standards in the first place. Which is OK, I guess, because it's good when you can convince high achieving kids to stay in state, but that's not what the program really aimed to do.

Anonymous wrote:Mark Zuckerberg was the son of wealthy parents.
Bill Gates was the son of wealthy parents.
Many of the people who become physicians and lawyers have parents who are wealthy physicians and lawyers.

Upward mobility is more limited in the US today than it ever was. Look at how hard people in this area work to avoid schools with high "FARMS" rates so that their children don't have to ever mix with "the poors." This harms poor people more than anyone. Studies have shown that poor children perform best in schools that are socioeconomically diverse. We are becoming a more stratified society than ever.

Harvard making itself cheaper isn't going to fix things.

Exactly. Harvard is already free for low-income (>60K/year) families...

Does the fact that Harvard, Yale, Stanford, etc. spend 70% more on management fees for their endowments than on total financial aid factor into this debate at all?

http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2015/08/universities-pay-investment-managers-scholarships-yale-harvard

Here is a quote from the article:

A New York Times op-ed published Wednesday by Victor Fleischer, a law professor at the University of San Diego, lays out this disparity. Fleischer cited Yale University, which paid its fund managers nearly $743 million in 2014 but gave out just $170 million in scholarships. He also noted that many universities, large and small, public and private, show the same imbalance in spending. "We've lost sight of the idea that students, not fund managers, should be the primary beneficiaries of a university's endowment," he writes. "The private-equity folks get cash; students take out loans."

Fleischer provided Mother Jones with more of his data, which is gleaned from tax forms, financial statements, and annual reports. Here's how the numbers shake out at Harvard, Yale, Stanford, and Princeton. On average, these four wealthy, elite universities spend 70 percent more on managing their investment portfolios than they do on tuition assistance. (Complete scholarship data for 2014 was not available, and some investment management fees are estimated

If Harvard made tuition free, Stanford would have to follow suit. And then Yale. And then Princeton. I think that would put pressure all down the line to increase financial assistance.

Anonymous wrote:Mark Zuckerberg was the son of wealthy parents.
Bill Gates was the son of wealthy parents.
Many of the people who become physicians and lawyers have parents who are wealthy physicians and lawyers.

Upward mobility is more limited in the US today than it ever was. Look at how hard people in this area work to avoid schools with high "FARMS" rates so that their children don't have to ever mix with "the poors." This harms poor people more than anyone. Studies have shown that poor children perform best in schools that are socioeconomically diverse. We are becoming a more stratified society than ever.

Harvard making itself cheaper isn't going to fix things.

This. As I said above, this is a distraction.

Mark Zuckerberg was the son of wealthy parents.
Bill Gates was the son of wealthy parents.
Many of the people who become physicians and lawyers have parents who are wealthy physicians and lawyers.

Upward mobility is more limited in the US today than it ever was. Look at how hard people in this area work to avoid schools with high "FARMS" rates so that their children don't have to ever mix with "the poors." This harms poor people more than anyone. Studies have shown that poor children perform best in schools that are socioeconomically diverse. We are becoming a more stratified society than ever.

Harvard making itself cheaper isn't going to fix things.

@16:55 Please send your kids to Caltech. It seems like it would be a much better fit! I hope they invent great things. Definitely do not spend the money since you found it boring. Find a place that inspires your kid to do great things. If that happens at a place that selects its students based on a numerical formula go for it.

Yes many legacies are poets, authors and other things that are culturally significant. They also disproportionately populate liberal arts concentrations. Many of those who go to wall street (not all) need the money.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No one stays on top without giving thought to how they can best change for the better. They do a good job on the financial end. It is on points 2 and 3 that they can lead the way to a merit based system that still takes into account ECs in addition to academic record yet eliminate the buckets of legacy, URM, sports and connections. Under the current structure of admissions, the institution who is supposedly the best in the world is sending a message to kids that their academic efforts don't really matter. It's more important that you are born to the right family, who you know or that you're a fast runner. We have work places and pro sport teams for that. Alumni kids should not be afraid of the competition they are well equipped for through nature and nurture. People talk about having access to the 1%. Why...are kids only capable of succeeding through other people whose parents did the heavy lifting? I know too idealistic here but I think college should be idealistic because they are dealing with formative years and leave the professional aspects to graduate schools.

Again, you seem to think that it's a problem that Harvard takes into account legacy, URM, sports, and connections. But Harvard doesn't see that as a problem. In fact, no college or university does. Colleges and universities want competitive athletic teams. (Speaking of which, why are you okay with other ECs being taken into account, but not athletics?) Harvard also doesn't see it as a problem that they give preferential treatment to URMs. In fact, few colleges or universities see that as a problem; many see it as an absolute mission. And many Americans agree that they should.

I don't know anyone, anywhere who thinks that Harvard is sending a message to kids that their academic efforts don't really matter. What rock are you living under?

Harvard has managed to stay on top for almost 400 years. I think they may know better than you do how to position themselves to stay there.

Or at least no. 3.

Anonymous wrote:Good for GDS since it is a Harvard feeder!

No, it is the Harvard feeder.

Anonymous wrote:
There is an effort afoot to elect to Harvard's Board of Overseers a slate that believes in (1) free tuition for all Harvard undergrads (because the endowment is large enough to afford it); (2) greater transparency in admissions (so that special perks don't go to alumni kids); and (3) strict enforcement of the principle of nondiscrimination so that there is not necessarily a cap for diversity reasons on Asian applicants.

If Harvard does it, others will follow. The same could apply to private high schools.

The obvious downside is that some who can easily afford to pay are given a free ride. That upside is that it creates competition to compete for the best.

Thoughts? Could this be the beginning of the end for high tuition costs at the top colleges and private high schools?

The "effort" is by a few student blockaders. This isn't a serious effort. And Harvard already is very nearly free for those undergrads that exhibit financial need.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No, I don't believe most other schools will follow because they don't have the endowment to afford it so it will only put the other schools in more dire straights as they try to keep up and can't.

Of course not all schools can do this, but one substantial benefit is that it would put pressure on other schools to keep their tuition costs down. That is unquestionably a good thing.

Guys, are you impervious to facts? Harvard already offers the most generous financial aid packages out there. That hasn't put pressure on other schools to keep the list price of tuition down. Why would free tuition at Harvard do so?

What generous financial aid at Harvard and other elite schools DOES do is put pressure on "lesser" colleges to offer merit scholarships to higher-performing students to try to draw them away from the elites. Free tuition at Harvard might increase the scholarship amounts awarded to better applicants at, say, Tulane. But is this what we are worried about when we wring our hands about the cost of college? That students in the top 10% of their DC-area high schools are not getting big enough scholarship offers from Tulane?

It seems to me our concerns should be focused on more average performing, middle/lower income students who don't have any kind of money being thrown at them because (a) they aren't qualified for admittance at the elite schools that meet all financial need and (b) they aren't candidates for merit scholarships at other schools. Compared with higher achieving students, these average Joes often spend more money to attend not-great schools (often because they take longer to graduate), are much more likely to borrow to attend college (because their financial aid packages are more likely to include loans), are much more likely over-borrow for college (because they are lower income), and are much less likely to get a degree at all. Free tuition at Harvard doesn't help these students AT ALL. If the prospect of free tuition at Harvard somehow inspires them to apply, they will be wasting their time and money. They are not candidates for admission to Harvard, at any price. Period.

What a freaking distraction this issue is.

Anonymous wrote:No, I don't believe most other schools will follow because they don't have the endowment to afford it so it will only put the other schools in more dire straights as they try to keep up and can't.

Of course not all schools can do this, but one substantial benefit is that it would put pressure on other schools to keep their tuition costs down. That is unquestionably a good thing.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't think it's a good idea. I went to Yale, not Harvard, but Yale could afford free tuition also. I grew up middle class (both parents teachers) and got generous financial aid from Yale so I graduated with no debt. The amount my parents were expected to pay was reasonable to their circumstances and Yale was much cheaper than the other, less prestigious schools I got into because the financial aid packages weren't as large. If my kids get into Yale, I wouldn't want it to be free. I can easily afford the tuition and don't want Yale to spend its money subsidizing my family.

Also, one of the big advantages of going to a place like Yale is the chance to mix with people who are well-connected. A school where everyone is a smart kid from some random suburban high school (like I was) isn't nearly the same experience of a school with a mix of kids who are rich, poor, international, etc.

I don't get this. Are you saying that you don't want free tuition so Ivy League schools can stay hotbeds of wealth and privilege?

I'm pretty sure that is exactly what the poster is saying.

"You don't get famous poets, authors or inventors based on SATs and high school grades."




I wonder what the percentage is of legacies that have actually done this, done something of significance??? So many of the stories are about kids that came from nowhere and made themselves a big life. Caltech is a very special place with kids that are rockin it. I'm sure that the Harvard roommate tradition is very nice but is that the point of education? Also, I am scratching my head at the comment that free tuition would lead to more endowment contributions. I guess that assumes legacy parents would buy their way in for their kids so their tuition would be free but they have a back door price ? And why would those kids have any incentive to work hard and achieve to get into their colleges? Is the assumption that having it easy is the road to success or are people just leery of competition????

We were very disappointed in two tours of Harvard. Across the board all the tour guides just kept talking about how much money there is to fund any club they want to start or trip they wanted to take. Nothing about their professors other than they like the free lunch with a professor program. So we are not involved in the application process there but I do find this discussion around money and Harvard really interesting.