Are Colleges really to Blame?

[Michael Bush]

somehow their expenses were geometrically lower.

Somehow = not having to deal with, among other things:

-Large annual declines in state allocations for many years (but this is what you want, right? But you also want lower cost?)
-Rapidly rising cost of insurance, especially since 2001
-The insane number of administrators it takes to manage compliance with increasingly burdensome federal and state regulations
-The nearly annual facilities and services upgrades that are necessary to compete for ever more demanding students
-IT costs that grow every year. (Some places this is over 10% of the budget.)
-Rising tuition discount rates (meaning the sticker price has to rise as well in a vicious cycle)

That's just a few pieces of that "somehow" that pop into my mind on the fly.

[AsiagoCheezBagel]

In terms of music, I don't really think colleges are to blame. Anyone can go online and look up recordings of successful players and then stop at nothing to emulate them. Teachers and classes are of course helpful in this process. You just have to be driven and not let the naysayers that will inevitably surround you get the best of you. Also, consider your options in terms of employment (http://tubarachel.blogspot.com/2011/08/ ... tions.html) - there's more out there than you think. Don't limit yourself.

My biggest qualm with many (not all!) colleges is that many of them lack in academic standards because they are pressured to have high graduation rates and keep students in college paying tuition. Everybody can get a degree nowadays in virtually any field, and that's why Bachelor degrees are becoming obsolete. We have this "everybody's a winner" idea when really, people that are lazy and/or cheat their way through college do not deserve any kind of academic recognition - but alas, many of those people walk out with a degree because they footed the bill. I did not realize all of this until I was a TA... oh the stories I could tell! All because we were pressured to retain students and keep graduation rates up.

I'm not saying that every school needs to be Harvard. Of course the name of the school on your degree says a lot... I used to think admission standards was the only reason why.

My best friend is dyslexic and had to work so hard to get through college. She had tutors to read with her for every subject, and she had tutors to proofread her papers. She usually submitted a paper 3 times before proofreading before turning it in. She was also very poor, no help from her parents (monetarily or emotionally), and had to work and go to school full time. But now she has a Masters in Special Education. She chose to be excellent, even with lots of odds against her.

As a music student, you can totally get a job even with rubbish grades. But also consider this - you could still technically win a job without a degree in anything! So what's the reason you're going to school then?

[Biggs]

So what's the reason you're going to school then?

Learning. Fun. Two things to which I assign high value.

[Uncle Buck]

I have resisted the urge to contribute to this thread. But I'm going to go ahead and make a few observations.

- IN MY OPINION: There will always be a debate about whether higher education should "teach you to think" or "prepare you for a job." Different institutions of higher education adhere to various versions of those two concepts.
- IN MY OPINION: I believe institutions of higher education that take money from young students and from taxpayers (and yes, even private schools get plenty of taxpayer money through federally-subsidized student loans) have an obligation (I'd probably call it a moral obligation) to be completely up-front about what kind of education they provide, and what students can and should expect to be able to do with that education. Call it career counseling, or call it non-deceptive advertising, or call it something else. Schools need to be honest.
- IN MY OPINION: Some institutions of higher education do a great job with that honesty, some don't.
- IN MY OPINION: I'm not a big fan of an over-litigious society, but I tend to think institutions who don't have a strong commitment to honesty with perspective and current students could see increased potential liability in the future.

As for my personal experience, I got two music degrees, spent a couple of years teaching public school, hated it, then went back to law school. I've had a great career that I love for the past decade. I'm probably a better lawyer because of my other educational and career experiences, but I don't have a "control me" to compare against to draw any definitive conclusion.
My particular law school experiences taught me what a school COULD do, if they're committed to it, to honestly inform their students about what they could expect to be able to do with their degree. In retrospect, my two music programs didn't do a great job of that beyond a couple of comments from the dean during freshman orientation, and student teaching.