Student Union
- By Ashlyn Peter
Class of 2020 Faces Vanishing Finish Line
We have separated so we can come together.
Not since the influenza pandemic in 1918 have Americans been asked to self-isolate as a country in order to help each other. And perhaps not since then has a group of university students been forced to disrupt their final months of college because of a pandemic.
Coming together is what will get last-semester seniors through a college experience that has no definitive resolution. We've been asked to move back in with our parents. Classes have been moved online and graduation ceremonies have been canceled.
Our final moments at college are being reshaped by a global event, but so were our first months. We were the class upset over Donald Trump's presidency. We were still freshmen when sexual and racial violence made national headlines. Some of us cried, but we also embraced. Amid the uncertainty, we were there for each other.
Imagine how the graduates of 2008 felt. They walked off the commencement stage and into the Great Recession. They couldn't know what awaited them — they just had to take the leap.
That's what we must do now.
We've spent the past four years hoping that our time in college would give us the knowledge, the work ethic and the determination needed to take on the rest of our lives. That hope got some of us on planes, traveling overseas for the first time, and learning about the world outside of our campuses.
As students at American University in Washington, D.C., it carried us to Capitol Hill, where we became history makers, small or large. It let us take part in public displays of hope, from the Women's March to the March for Our Lives. We've screamed in the center of the quad together at midnight before final exams. We've nodded from across crowded Metro cars while going to our respective internships.
We love to debate our preference for Georgetown Cupcakes or Baked and Wired as much as we like to debate politics.
This is the time in the school year when seniors search for jobs or prepare for graduate school. Many workplaces, however, have enacted a hiring freeze. Health experts say that the virus could return in the fall, like in 1918, potentially halting university operations again.
Everything is up in the air, even our long-awaited commencement ceremony that once seemed so fixed and unmoving. It's hard to watch the finish line disappear just as we approach it.
The one benefit in all of this is that we now have an abundance of time to reflect on the time we did have here. We all accomplished something great for ourselves and for our families. Some of us are first-generation graduates or the first of our community to travel outside the country. Some of us published research papers in renowned journals or had a hand in passing important bills.
In our time of mass isolation, we must remember that we are still united. We still experienced the nightlife together, and drank coffee together at the same places, and found $20 Tuesdays at the local tattoo parlor.
Amid crises, we are the change-makers, the self-starters, the creative geniuses, the leaders, the wonks.
We are not the class of tragedy, but the class of resilience. We are the class that comes together, even when we're forced apart.
Ashlyn Peter is a senior at American University School of Communication in Washington, D.C.
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College tuition has fallen significantly at many US schools, research finds
The cost of college keeps spiraling ever higher, right?
Not necessarily. New research indicates students are paying significantly less to attend public universities than they were a decade ago. And tuition increases at private colleges have finally slowed after years of hefty rises.
Figures compiled by the nonprofit College Board indicate the average student attending an in-state public university this year faces a tuition bill of $11,610, which is down 4% from a decade earlier when taking inflation into account. But the real savings come in what the average student actually pays after getting grants and financial aid. That's down 40% over the decade, from $4,140 to $2,480 annually, according to the data.
That reduced cost means less borrowing. Just under half of students attending in-state public universities are graduating with some debt, down from 59% a decade earlier, according to the College Board figures. And among those who do borrow, the average loan balance has fallen by 17%, to $27,100.
Meanwhile, at private colleges, tuition continues to rise, but at a much slower rate. It has increased 4% over the past decade, when taking inflation into account, to an average $43,350, according to the College Board. That's a big change from the two decades prior, when tuition increased 68%.
Costs are coming down as Americans question whether college is worth the price. Surveys find that Americans are increasingly skeptical about the value of a degree, and the percentage of high school graduates heading to college has fallen to levels not seen in decades, according to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Yet research still finds that, over time, a degree pays off. Americans with a bachelor's degree earn a median of $2.8 million during their careers, 75% more than if they had only a high school diploma, according to research from Georgetown University's Center on Education and the Workforce.
COVID effect
The COVID-19 pandemic has been a big factor in the cost reductions, said Jennifer Ma, an executive research scientist at the College Board and lead author of the study.
"We know that during COVID, a lot of institutions — public and private — froze tuition," Ma said.
As states and the federal government responded to the pandemic, Ma said, they increased higher education funding, allowing colleges to reduce the cost of attendance. Some of that money has since expired, however, including an infusion of federal pandemic aid that was mostly used up by the end of 2022.
Cost was a major consideration in Kai Mattinson's decision to attend Northern Arizona University. It would have cost her about $39,000 annually to attend the public university but discounts and scholarships bring that down to between $15,000 and $20,000 for the 22-year-old senior from Nevada.
"I originally wanted to go to the University of Arizona, but when it came down to tuition and other cost, Northern Arizona University was the best option," said Mattinson, a physical education major who also works as a long-term substitute at a local elementary school.
Many institutions have tried to limit cost increases. Purdue University in Indiana, for example, has frozen its annual in-state tuition at $9,992 for the past 13 years.
Mark Becker, the president of the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities, said he was pleased to see the new data.
"Institutional efforts to control costs, combined with many states' efforts to increase investments in public universities and federal investment in the Pell Grant, have increased college affordability and enabled significant progress on tackling student debt," Becker said in a statement.
Costs for those attending public two-year community colleges have fallen even more, by 9% over the past decade, according to the College Board data, which is broadly in line with federal figures collected by the National Center for Education Statistics.
Still, for parents paying for their children to attend out-of-state public universities or private colleges, the costs remain daunting — as much as $95,000 annually, in some cases. However, many institutions offer significant discounts to the sticker price for middle- and lower-income students.
Some private colleges have been expanding their financial aid, including the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which in November announced undergraduates with a family income below $200,000 would no longer need to pay any tuition at all starting in the fall.
Other private colleges are discounting tuition as a marketing move in an increasingly difficult environment. They face a dwindling pool of young adults, and students who are more wary of signing up for giant loans. Recruiting students is crucial for staying afloat as operational costs rise. After temporary relief thanks to federal money during the pandemic, many colleges have cut programs to try to keep costs under control.
As regional schools struggle to survive, AI could provide hope
Declining enrollments are causing problems for some smaller, regional colleges struggling to survive.
But schools that embrace artificial intelligence and customer experience could be at an advantage, Eric Skipper writes in Times Higher Education. (December 2024)
Universities move away from DEI initiatives
Diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives have fallen out of favor in higher education recruiting and hiring in recent years, but even more colleges and universities are moving away from the programs now, Thea Felicity reports in University Herald.
In addition to political opposition to the programs, there are concerns that DEI initiatives hinder free speech, affect ideological balances and discourage academic freedom. (December 2024)
‘College Deserts’ leave many communities without higher education options
“College Deserts” – areas where high schools are located more than 30 miles away from the nearest community college – leave large groups of people unable to pursue higher education because of transportation problems, Lexi Lonas Cochran writes in The Hill.
Most college deserts are in the Southern U.S., with a recent study in Texas showing that long commuting distances discourage many potential students from attending college. (December 2024)
Analysts say rate of college closures likely to increase
If current trends continue, the rate of college closures is expected to increase, according to a new study reported in Forbes.
Closures are more likely to affect private institutions, and while the number of closures might seem small on a national level, it could cause serious problems for the smaller and mid-sized communities where those colleges are located. (December 2024)
