Raising College Tuition

While colleges remained open solely to the most elite and wealthy people of the country throughout American history, today, a college degree is considered by most to be a necessity everyone needs, however few can feasibly afford. With the Civil Rights Act of 1964 giving more opportunity to African Americans, the Women’s Liberation Movement helping women get into colleges, and the GI Bill giving funding to veterans for education, colleges became much less elite throughout the 1960s as more people had access to the opportunity. As these minorities and women were struggling to afford college, the High Education Act of 1965 attempting to lessen the burden of tuition. They created the Basic Educational Opportunity Grant, now called the Pell Grant,

Typically, colleges raise the tuition a few percentages above the inflation rate every year (speaker), resulting in a 439% increase from 1985 to 2007 (Kanter). This huge rise in tuition is not only pushing poor families away from college, but even making it impossible for some middle-class families to afford college. With some colleges’ tuition now reaching seventy thousand dollars a year, students are forced to take out an unmanageable amount of loans to attend college. With a “national crisis of more than $1 trillion in outstanding student‐loan debt” (Baylor 9), America’s student debt problem is reaching an all-time high. The average debt per student averages around $29,400 (Kanter), and it isn’t uncommon for students to drop out of school simply because it was too expensive, in fact, “thousands of students leave those schools due to their high costs, defaulting on their federal and private loans” (Kanter). Student loans extend far into students’ lives as well. Too many people are leaving school and going into the work force with too high of loan payments to feasibly pay for everything, “burdened by mountains of college debt, students and their families may be unable to sustain a house, a car, or even living necessities” (Kanter). The increase in tuition causes colleges to, once again, become a place only for the already wealthy. As colleges become unaffordable for the majority of America, the

As only the very wealthy can comfortably afford college, the rest of the country either attempts to take out a large amount of loans, or doesn’t go to college at all, affecting their job prospects later in life. According to Margaret Kanter in “Keeping College Affordable is Essential”, the gap between the rich and the poor has become increasingly worse in the last century, and more recently, wages have stayed the same as corporate profit rose greatly. This is making it very difficult for people from middle- class families to remain in the middle-class as they struggle with tuition rates. With this increase in tuition, “middle class families are priced out; low-income families believe it is out of reach” (Kanter). Furthermore, colleges degrees have a great deal of influence over what jobs graduates can get, and how much they can make. As a society, America has taken on the belief that a college degree is essential, to the point where “earning a college degree or credential can be life changing and economically sustaining” (Baylor 2), and not having one can severely worsen someone’s financial situation. A college degree truly does “determine access to most economic, social, civic, and advanced educational opportunities in America” (Kanter). With the price of tuition now, only wealthy students can comfortably afford college, so while they