- Aug 4, 2009
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Or you can do it the old fashioned way and get a job and work your way thru.
Yes, in old fashioned times it used to be that way. I worked my way through college working Minimum wage summer jobs at $2 an hour. I am not naive enough to expect college kids to do the same at $7.50 an hour and $35,000 a year tuition
But fairly easy to do at say the University of New Mexico where the spring, summer, and fall tuition for a full course load will cost in state students less than $10,000 per year. Subtract maybe a Pell grant, merit a scholarship or two, do some volunteer work in return for some student discounts, take out student loans when you have to, and you can still work your way through college.
I have a family member who didn't have to pay much of anything for a master's and PhD at Stanford? How? A 4.0 GPA and graduation with honors from the nearby relatively inexpensive state university earned her acceptance and attractive financial packages from all seven top graduate schools to which she applied. She choose Stanford. She still had some hefty student loans preferring to go that route during times she needed to work less and focus more on her academic projects. But she also has qualified for jobs that allowed her to pay them off in fairly short order.
It can still be done for those with the gumption and initiative to do it.
Once again the right points to the extremes and assumes that it applies to all. Not all tuition is $10,000 a year, not all students are 4.0 GPA Stanford candidates
We need to develop solutions that fit the needs of all students. Not just those who live in states with low cost tuitions or off the charts GPAs.