Tag Archives: education

Education Finance Reform

Posted on by | Leave a reply

I saw a post on Facebook today about how other countries (namely Germany, Finland and Denmark) provide free access to university education to their citizens.  So I did a little research here.

While I agree that the nearly 7% interest rates on student loans is criminal, and I content that the availability of student loans has allowed the tuition of even public universities to grow at nearly 3x the rate of inflation for the last 30 years creating a situation where paying for college is a tremendous burden on the middle class who earn too much to qualify for “real” financial aid.

U-of-I-urbana-champaign

As difficult as it is for us to hear, the reality is that Germany, Finland and Denmark on income and sales or vat tax – are much higher than the US for comparable income. So if you want to pay 25% sales tax instead of 8% we probably could afford free universities.

I really don’t want to pay the kind of higher taxes that other developed countries pay.  However, I think that in the information age, university education is becoming more and more essential for the kind of growth careers that are emerging.

Every politician says they want to fix it, but have you heard a concrete proposal from any of them?

Continue reading →

The Problem With Education Is…

Posted on by | Leave a reply

The problem with education is…

The problem with education is the reason we value education.  There, I said it.  That thought has been bouncing around in my mind for a long time.  The problem with education is that we care about it for many of the wrong reasons.  At all levels, from kindergarten through graduate level, we care about education for the wrong reasons.

My son (a college sophomore) told me recently that he didn’t think he was making enough progress. that he felt that school was slowing him down or something like that.  Of course it is.

One of his friends has been frustrated because he is required to declare a major by some date for some reason.  Another friend is considering changing schools/majors or dropping out altogether.  Given the cost of a baccalaureate degree, it amazes me that we allow 17-18-19 year old students to make decisions that will impact their financial status for 10 years post graduation or more.

So what are the reasons we value education?  Truth be told, ranked in some order we value education for the following reasons:

  • Citizenship
  • Independent Living Skills
  • Better Career Options
  • Social Opportunities

 

Self-Esteem, Competence, or Confidence

Posted on by | Leave a reply

In our US education system, we have become concerned with preserving or promoting the self-esteem of students. The educators who initiated this use the psychological definition of the term to mean a persons sense of self worth or personal value. As opposed to a merriam webster definition of self-esteem which is a confidence and satisfaction in oneself.

I would never say that it is not important for students to believe in themselves, to feel important or valuable. But it is the source and method of developing self-esteem that I have observed that I question. Students who gain competence, and through competence a sense of confidence, and finally a sense of value in their own capacity to accomplish – have a self-sustaining self-esteem. That is, it is natural and does not require outside assistance or bolstering. This is the state that we are striving to acheive in students. Continue reading →

Do Colleges Produce Value?

Posted on by | Leave a reply

Does our educational system, especially the university system, create value? Should it? If it does, what value does it create? If it should, what value should it create? My last two posts were about creating value and our relation to the value chain, and this is a continuation of the same line of thought. This is especially relevant, because my son is about to enter university, in Fall 2012.  While we are agonizing over the decision of where he should go, what he should study, and how we will fund this endeavor, my mind always wanders back to the question of value – “Why is he going in the first place?” Continue reading →