Paying for Education 1927
TO MAKE STUDENTS PAY MORE
The Literary Digest for July 2, 1927
TO MAKE IT EASY to pay for a college education has been the ideal of our institutions, but the saturation point of benevolence seems to have been reached. On one side and another we are adjured to make education cost more. In our issue of June 11 it was pointed out that teachers, through being forced to accept small salaries, were the largest contributors to the support of education. The remedy was to increase the student fees. The same recommendation, based on another argument, is advanced by Mr. John D. Rockefeller, Jr. He would ease up the burden of the endowment system by making students pay more for what they get, while limiting gratuities to students intending to enter the ministry, the teaching field and similar ill-paid professions. His remarks at the Brown University Commencement luncheon are reported in part by the New York Sun. “The college education of yesteryear was practically free,” he says, “because of an assumption that students benefiting therefrom would enter a profession in which the returns to them would be small but the gain to the public large.” To-day, so he thinks, students attend college “for a good time, for social considerations or to fit themselves to earn money.”
“The idea of service to the community is no longer the chief consideration. Therefore it seems proper that the student might be expected to pay for the benefits he receives.”
Quoting from figures of the Bureau of Education of the Department of the Interior he estimated the receipts of privately supported colleges and universities in this country at $140,000,000. This sum, based on figures compiled in 1923-24, goes for current expenses. One-half of this amount comes from student fees; the other half from endowments, gifts, and other sources. Continuing:
“Thus it is evident that the student pays only half of the actual cost to the college of his education. The colleges and universities of to-day are confronted with the necessity of securing either scores of additional millions for endowment or increased current income. That these vast sums can be secured from private sources in addition to all that has been given during the last ten years is barely probable.”
Mr. Rockefeller then suggested increased tuition fees with certain modifications. He contends that the great majority of persons sending their sons to college could afford to pay more. For those students who could not afford to pay more he suggests scholarships, student aid, and student loan funds on a large scale.
For most students other than those who enter the ministry or teaching he would have a loan either with or without interest, with the first payment date possibly ten years after graduation. In conclusion:
“If the principle here enunciated were accepted as sound in its application to undergraduate education to which this discussion is limited, its complete realization could wisely be attained only little by little, tuition fees being raised perhaps $50 a year or only so rapidly as was found to be desirable. Already and with-out definitely adopting this principle, various colleges by increasing tuition fees have taken the first step in this program. Thus far no change in the number or character of the student body has been observed, and if adequate funds for scholarships and loans are provided, it would appear that no serious change need be expected. It is true that such a course on the part of privately supported institutions might tend to increase the attendance at State universities, in which event the State universities would undoubtedly find it necessary and advantageous to increase their own fees.”
The New York World comments:
“The problem which Mr. Rockefeller has in mind is a real one; one which people in general have not yet faced; one which must be faced by every institution of the higher learning which aims to keep abreast of educational needs. With applicants for college education increasing four times as fast as endowments, even the unparalleled generosity of college founders and donors can not begin to keep pace with the demand tor those facilities which spell progress for the nation as well as for the individuals affected. Neither by taxation nor by endowments is there any prospect that our colleges generally will be able to raise professors’ salaries to a living level; and this must be done if the quality of teaching is not to deteriorate.”
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