Saturday, November 14, 2009
The "Standard" Lecture: Are the Current Forms of Lectures Really the Most Effective?
Friday, November 13, 2009
Is College Right for Everyone?
Thursday, November 12, 2009
Competitiveness and Collegiate Athletics
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Merit vs. Need-Based Financial Aid
Brenden Duncombe-Smith
There have always been need-based financial aid awards at most major colleges, but in the recent years this has started to become the majority of the aid awarded. In the past a large portion of the aid awarded to students was merit based. Institutions of Higher Education used these merit based scholarships to attract top students. Admitting a large number of top students increases a schools competitiveness and prestige among other schools. Some college presidents dislike the idea of merit based scholar ships but feel that they are necessary for their schools to remain competitive. Robert Massa, vice president for enrollment management at Dickinson College feels that the term "merit based" is really just a euphemism for bribery. He mainly feels this way because the whole point of merit based aid is to attract students who will most likely attend more prestigious schools by offering them a very inexpensive education. Schools that offer this merit based aid often run out money for need based aid and end up having to accept a percentage of their class need aware, meaning they cannot accept any students who cannot afford the tuition. However, institutions like Hamilton college have shifted this trend to completely eliminate any form of need based aid. Largely because thinking among higher education has changed and it is now more valuable for institutions to be able to accept anyone regardless of need. While this is still impossible for some smaller schools it seems to be a turn in the right direction, away from "bribery". In addition most schools have found that the merit based scholarships go largely unaccepted by the top students.
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
A little Incentive could go a long way.
Monday, November 9, 2009
Textbook Costs Just Keeps Rising
Vinh Nguyen
Since I made a post pertaining to textbook costs last week, I decided to make another post relating to the price inflation of textbooks. On my last post, I mentioned that the expenditures most students spend on textbooks is the largest after tuition, room and board. According to this article, some colleges believe that the publishing industry is making the costs even higher by releasing new editions and packaging books with expensive study aids such as study guides, test questions, disks, etc. What is the publishing industry's response? The $3.4-billion-a-year higher education publishing industry reasons that textbooks must be continually modernized in order to grasp the students' attentions. However, the reissuing of editions forces professors into using new books, resulting in students buying new books. A recent study that was done by California's Public Interest Research Group reveals that the average time between editions is 3.8 years even when the information has not changed since the last edition. Moreover, new edition of the textbooks that were surveyed cost 58% more than the previous edition. Believe it or not, professors sometimes play a role in increasing textbook prices without knowing. Because most professors like to order textbooks that have appealing graphs and charts to keep the students' interests, these pictures can be expensive to design. Furthermore, professors are looking for more contents for teaching, leading to the addition of learning tools such as Web site access, study guides, etc. Since these additions are sometimes mandatory, students have no other options but to spend more money on them. So next time one goes to the bookstore to buy a book, think about whether he or she should get the older version or get the new version from overseas.