You’ve worked hard. You’ve taken AP classes, gotten great SAT scores, done volunteer work. You’ve sent your college applications, gotten accepta

Colleges Don’t Care About Your Professional Success

submited by

Style Pass

2021-07-05 22:00:03

You’ve worked hard. You’ve taken AP classes, gotten great SAT scores, done volunteer work. You’ve sent your college applications, gotten acceptance letters, and chosen the right academic program.

83 percent of college revenue is based on tuition. In the US, the amount of college tuition is divided into credits. To take a course, you have to buy a certain number of credits. Based on the courses you take, you can then get a degree.

The problem with the pay-per-credit system is that it’s based on the resources invested by colleges and not on student outcomes. A graduate that obtained a degree with an expected salary of $40,000 paid the same tuition amount as a graduate earning twice as much. At the University of Pennsylvania, learning Akkadian costs the same as learning Operating Systems. While a recent Ancient History graduate earns $43,900, a Computer Science graduate earns $70,700, according to Payscale.

There are two ways to fix this: Income-Based Tuition and Income-Share Agreements. With Income-Based Tuition, colleges adjust their tuition prices to the expected graduates’ salary. This data could be obtained using audited historical records or an independent third-party census. This mechanism is easier to implement since it only adjusts the price while maintaining everything else the same.