Could You Afford to be Poor?

[Darth Wong]

I don't see why scholarships should be relevant in a discussion like this. Not everyone gets a scholarship, so you can't discuss university costs for the population at large on that basis.

Schooling is actually a particular financial burden which weighs most heavily upon the middle class. The wealthy class and its paid politicians have systematically gutted education systems while liberal educators have adopted all manner of foolish policies designed to handcuff teachers and let students run wild, thus creating a perfect storm of underfunded public schools and unruly students who cannot be disciplined. The result is that parents flee the public school system and go to private schools if they want to get a good education and/or avoid violent or disruptive students. But private schooling (and subsequent university) is a heavy financial burden for the middle class, who are neither poor enough to get financial aid or rich enough to shrug it off.

[Winston Blake]

Since when is HECS/CSA/Whatever they're calling it this year means tested? You just pay less if you pay it up front.

Huh. I don't know what I was thinking. Somehow I had in my head 'don't use it -> can't use it'.

[ArmorPierce]

I don't see why scholarships should be relevant in a discussion like this. Not everyone gets a scholarship, so you can't discuss university costs for the population at large on that basis.

I was talking about financial aid. I don't think anyone was talking about scholarships.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Miscellaneous and transportation expenses can be cut out by someone willing to buy absolutely nothing, living on cafeteria food, and never leave campus, and that stretches out the grant money pretty nicely to cover room and board and tuition/books, since they're awarded based on the assumption such money will be spent.

hell books and supplies can be cut down by buying your books used online getting older editions (not always recommended, but a lot edition changes has almost no changes at all) or borrowing book from someone you know that took the class before and selling back books. Two semesters ago I spend about $600 on books at which point I got fed up and now buy online whatever book I can. Also I think my school's book store will buy back books even if you didn't buy it from them so that comes to me spending almost nothing on certain books.

Dont get me started on textbook prices. My Senior year I spent somewhere in the neighborhood of 1400 USD on books.

[CaptainZoidberg]

I don't see why scholarships should be relevant in a discussion like this. Not everyone gets a scholarship, so you can't discuss university costs for the population at large on that basis.

Yes but at a private school that costs 50k a year, virtually no one who cannot pay that money out of pocket ends up paying the entire 50k.

In fact some schools like Cooper Union and Franklin Olin are entirely free to go to, but for some odd reason describe themselves as costing 50k a year and offering a 50k/year scholarship to all students.

Schooling is actually a particular financial burden which weighs most heavily upon the middle class.

True, and most of the schools that would offer significant need-based aid to these students (Princeton, Harvard, MIT) don't accept many of these students to begin with.

The wealthy class and its paid politicians have systematically gutted education systems while liberal educators have adopted all manner of foolish policies designed to handcuff teachers and let students run wild, thus creating a perfect storm of underfunded public schools and unruly students who cannot be disciplined.

I definitely encountered this in High School.

The result is that parents flee the public school system and go to private schools if they want to get a good education and/or avoid violent or disruptive students. But private schooling (and subsequent university) is a heavy financial burden for the middle class, who are neither poor enough to get financial aid or rich enough to shrug it off.

Actually the public schooling does a pretty good job of removing more academically inclined kids from the general student population already.

The bigger problem I see with public schooling is that there is a major culture of underachievement. Students are encouraged to take the easiest classes and not challenge themselves.

The other problem is that literature is emphasized over math/science.

[Junghalli]

Dont get me started on textbook prices. My Senior year I spent somewhere in the neighborhood of 1400 USD on books.

Oh God yes, university book stores are a textbook example of why monopolies (or at any rate near monopolies) are very, very, very bad.

My favorite part is when it comes time to sell back the books at the end of the year and they buy back a three hundred dollar book for $20, then sell it used for two or three times that much.

[ArmorPierce]

Dont get me started on textbook prices. My Senior year I spent somewhere in the neighborhood of 1400 USD on books.

Oh God yes, university book stores are a textbook example of why monopolies (or at any rate near monopolies) are very, very, very bad.

My favorite part is when it comes time to sell back the books at the end of the year and they buy back a three hundred dollar book for $20, then sell it used for two or three times that much.

You're blaming the wrong people. The university isn't guilty of the high textbook prices. As far as I recall, they don't make that much money on the sale of new books (maybe different with used books but that is only achievable due to the prices of new books). The companies publishing the textbooks are guilty of rising textbook prices incredibly faster than inflation with little added value.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Dont get me started on textbook prices. My Senior year I spent somewhere in the neighborhood of 1400 USD on books.

Oh God yes, university book stores are a textbook example of why monopolies (or at any rate near monopolies) are very, very, very bad.

My favorite part is when it comes time to sell back the books at the end of the year and they buy back a three hundred dollar book for $20, then sell it used for two or three times that much.

You're blaming the wrong people. The university isn't guilty of the high textbook prices. As far as I recall, they don't make that much money on the sale of new books (maybe different with used books but that is only achievable due to the prices of new books). The companies publishing the textbooks are guilty of rising textbook prices incredibly faster than inflation with little added value.

Oh god yes. New editions come out faster than the material in the textbook changes. Chapter order might change, or the type and number of work problems (if applicable) might change. But the actual content changes slower than the change in consensus, and that is something that your professor will just tell you. They could easily get away with updating general chemistry books once a decade instead of every other, but they just have to milk us for every cent

[ArmorPierce]

Get this I bought the wrong edition of a book for financial accounting (professor listed the wrong one on the syllabus and then said oops and changed it when someone asked). There was no discernible difference in the material as far as I could tell. Even the problems were the same kind of problems except with different numbers. I was able to get through the class on this old edition but I had to buy a pass in order to use the website for the book publisher so that I can get the questions.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Get this I bought the wrong edition of a book for financial accounting (professor listed the wrong one on the syllabus and then said oops and changed it when someone asked). There was no discernible difference in the material as far as I could tell. Even the problems were the same kind of problems except with different numbers. I was able to get through the class on this old edition but I had to buy a pass in order to use the website for the book publisher so that I can get the questions.

If that had happened I would have photocopied relevant pages (the ones with answers) from the copy on reserve in the library...

[Invictus ChiKen]

Get this I bought the wrong edition of a book for financial accounting (professor listed the wrong one on the syllabus and then said oops and changed it when someone asked). There was no discernible difference in the material as far as I could tell. Even the problems were the same kind of problems except with different numbers. I was able to get through the class on this old edition but I had to buy a pass in order to use the website for the book publisher so that I can get the questions.

If that had happened I would have photocopied relevant pages (the ones with answers) from the copy on reserve in the library...

In some colleges you have to show you have the right book or you get a test grade F every time your told to present it.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Get this I bought the wrong edition of a book for financial accounting (professor listed the wrong one on the syllabus and then said oops and changed it when someone asked). There was no discernible difference in the material as far as I could tell. Even the problems were the same kind of problems except with different numbers. I was able to get through the class on this old edition but I had to buy a pass in order to use the website for the book publisher so that I can get the questions.

If that had happened I would have photocopied relevant pages (the ones with answers) from the copy on reserve in the library...

In some colleges you have to show you have the right book or you get a test grade F every time your told to present it.

The hell? That seems... somewhat draconian to me. What does a professor care if you actually own the book, but get the work done regardless?

[Master of Ossus]

In some colleges you have to show you have the right book or you get a test grade F every time your told to present it.

The hell? That seems... somewhat draconian to me. What does a professor care if you actually own the book, but get the work done regardless?

Seriously. I've never heard of that, although I have heard that professors frequently get free textbooks for the classes they teach (to encourage them to use THAT book for their classes, thus forcing students to get them).

[Gil Hamilton]

Oh god yes. New editions come out faster than the material in the textbook changes. Chapter order might change, or the type and number of work problems (if applicable) might change. But the actual content changes slower than the change in consensus, and that is something that your professor will just tell you. They could easily get away with updating general chemistry books once a decade instead of every other, but they just have to milk us for every cent

I've seen new editions of text books that have literally been minor graphical changes without any change at all to the content of the book. However, it's worse because textbook makers also do things like "bundle package" textbooks with worthless CDs or study aids that most people don't ever bother using... and then raise the price of the book by 60 dollars.

My third calculus course was interesting that the teacher actually used an older edition than the current one, because he had already filled the edition he had with notes to himself and didn't see any reason why he should keep on using it, since the math hadn't changed any. However, the bookstore only had a handle of copies of the older edition because the textbook got a new edition the previous semester and they simply didn't buy them back.

[nickolay1]

What does a professor care if you actually own the book, but get the work done regardless?

I imagine it only occurs with professors of bullshit classes and/or at bullshit "liberal arts" colleges.

[CaptainZoidberg]

In some colleges you have to show you have the right book or you get a test grade F every time your told to present it.

In what college does that happen?

[Terralthra]

In some colleges you have to show you have the right book or you get a test grade F every time your told to present it.

The hell? That seems... somewhat draconian to me. What does a professor care if you actually own the book, but get the work done regardless?

Seriously. I've never heard of that, although I have heard that professors frequently get free textbooks for the classes they teach (to encourage them to use THAT book for their classes, thus forcing students to get them).

This happens very frequently. Most publishing houses give away free copies of their anthologies and textbooks like fruitcake at christmas. How else are they going to get professors' attentions?

[Junghalli]

The whole college textbook industry is as good ammunition against lolbertarians as my middle school cafeteria was against communists.

[Ar-Adunakhor]

One of my professors told us a little story about textbooks once. He is fairly well regarded in his field and often sends off letters to various publishing companies for "sample" books, books that the campus bookstore also happens to stock and rebuy at the end of semesters. When they arrive he gives them a look through and if they don't introduce any important materiel (almost all of them) then he sells them to the bookstore for $50-$80 a pop.

Genius.

[Broomstick]

If that had happened I would have photocopied relevant pages (the ones with answers) from the copy on reserve in the library...

In some colleges you have to show you have the right book or you get a test grade F every time your told to present it.

The hell? That seems... somewhat draconian to me. What does a professor care if you actually own the book, but get the work done regardless?

Well, if he wrote the book in question there might be some profit in it for him....

[Jaevric]

Not a textbook, exactly, but I had an Economics professor who had written a packet of "class notes" and required us to buy the packet from the school when taking his class. At a hundred bucks for the packet, with no resell value.

He told us that nobody would be able to pass the class without these notes, so like 98% of the class bought them. I didn't, showed up at class every day, took notes in class, and got an A. He didn't find out I didn't buy the packet until the last day of the semester and was *not* happy, in retrospect I'm damned lucky he didn't flunk me out of sheer spite. I think those "notes" were a nice extra bit of cash for him.

[[R_H]]

Not a textbook, exactly, but I had an Economics professor who had written a packet of "class notes" and required us to buy the packet from the school when taking his class. At a hundred bucks for the packet, with no resell value.

He told us that nobody would be able to pass the class without these notes, so like 98% of the class bought them. I didn't, showed up at class every day, took notes in class, and got an A. He didn't find out I didn't buy the packet until the last day of the semester and was *not* happy, in retrospect I'm damned lucky he didn't flunk me out of sheer spite. I think those "notes" were a nice extra bit of cash for him.

He was allowed to do that? I know professors do the same thing here, but you can download the notes for free (don't even have to be a student) from the webpages of the classes.

[Jaevric]

He was allowed to do that? I know professors do the same thing here, but you can download the notes for free (don't even have to be a student) from the webpages of the classes.

I don't know if he was allowed to or not, but he did it and nobody raised hell about it with anyone higher up the food chain. Personally I thought it was crooked, especially since the notes were basically the same information we were getting in class. I suppose some people felt paying a hundred bucks was a fair trade for not having to come to a morning class all semester long and still have all the notes.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Not a textbook, exactly, but I had an Economics professor who had written a packet of "class notes" and required us to buy the packet from the school when taking his class. At a hundred bucks for the packet, with no resell value.

He told us that nobody would be able to pass the class without these notes, so like 98% of the class bought them. I didn't, showed up at class every day, took notes in class, and got an A. He didn't find out I didn't buy the packet until the last day of the semester and was *not* happy, in retrospect I'm damned lucky he didn't flunk me out of sheer spite. I think those "notes" were a nice extra bit of cash for him.

Had he flunked you, provided you kept copies of all your tests and assignments, even tenure wouldnt have protected him.

[ArmorPierce]

Over here, professors aren't allowed to profit for books that they use in their own class. He was complaining about it in class and I said that is a good thing but him and everyone in the class seemed to think that that idea was crazy.