My mom and dad always taught my brother and I about the importance of going to college to complete our education. My parents themselves never went to college, but worked hard to become upper middle class and always wondered “what if” they had received a college degree. When my brother applied to college, it proved much more difficult than he'd imagined to get the money to help him out, and now that I am planning on completing my college education in the near future, I am faced with the same difficulties. In some cases I am finding it even more difficult than my brother did to get the money I need for college. The sad thing is that in a country that preaches the importance of attaining higher education, many students cannot afford it, making a once bright possibility, a fading light at the end of a long tunnel.
Colleges boast that they have the money for kids to attend college, but this money is often only given to those via merit based scholarships, to those from needy families, as well as those who have been donating money to the colleges and are therefore given admittance to the college. Although many colleges say they try to work with students with the above mentioned scholarships, it still leaves many qualified college students unable to attend college.
In Zoe Mendelson's essay “Paying For College,” she describes a friend who is having similar difficulties. Her friends' father describes their family as “in the nether region,” where his household income is “too much to qualify for substantial financial aid but not enough to pay that amount,” (Mendelson, 131). This is often one of the main issues middle class families face. For families like my own, who make a good living on paper- things are not quite what they seem. My...
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...ybe the kid is just good at memorizing. Colleges deserve to have their own admittance requirements as well as their own financial aid requirements, however, if a colleges concern is providing an education to students who want it and are going to make the university proud, then these universities need to come up with a multidimensional way of looking at a student and whether or not they should be admitted to their school and whether or not they need money.
WORKS CITED
Peter Schmidt "At the Elite Colleges-Dim White Kids." Rpt in Practical Argument: A Text and Anthology. Kirszner, Laurie G., and Stephen R. Mandell.Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2011. 128-30. Print.
Zoe Mendelson "Paying for College." Rpt in Practical Argument: A Text and Anthology. Kirszner, Laurie G., and Stephen R. Mandell.Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2011. 131-133. Print.
Everyone knows that person from high school that just wasn’t cut out for college. It’s not a bad thing by any means, but if you’re thinking about heading off to college like many American teenagers often do, think about this: going to college can be a waste of both your time and your money. I’m not the first to say it, and I sure as hell won’t be the last. In Stephanie Owen and Isabel Sawhill’s essay, Should Everyone Go to College?, the two authors take a strong economic approach to justify going to college. Owen, an ex- senior research assistant at Brookings’ Center on Children and Families and current research associate at the Urban Institute, a nonpartisan center for research on the problems of urban communities, and Sawhill, the co-director
Ellison, Keith. “The Argument for Tuition-Free College.” The American Prospect. The American Prospect. 14 April 2016.Web. 20 March 2018.
While it may seem that most students can manage the financial problems on their own, sometimes they cannot depend on themselves all the time. It is not good for students to only depend on themselves, for the students can become overwhelmed and cause them to give up on school because of the amount of debt they could possibly be in. Even if the student does not have enough financial support from their family; nevertheless, there are still people around that can help them with certain problems they may have. In Wes Moore‘s The Other Wes Moore, he introduces his readers on how his mother was able to afford him to be in a military school called Valley Forge. He states that “The price tag for Valley Forge was even steeper than that of Riverdale.
Long ago, receiving education was once something only the rich could afford; it was a luxury. Nowadays it is open to everyone, but many students enter college only to discover that they are underprepared, and in turn they become disenchanted. David Leonhardt’s article, The College Dropout Boom, addresses the issues that are apparent in the education system and how it contributes to the gap between the upper and lower class while Access to Attainment by Abby Miller, Katherine Valle, Jennifer Engle, and Michelle Cooper calls to improve access to college education for today’s students. This is incredibly important because many students either drop out or never attended college and in today’s time, having a Bachelor’s degree has become a requirement
In my community, El Sereno, college is viewed as an option as opposed to it being the next step in life. Most people in my area either begin working or start a family after they graduate from high school. Not always by choice, but in some cases by circumstance. Students in my neighborhood either lack the knowledge, financial support, guidance or even legal status that would otherwise drive them to apply or even go to college. About eighty-percent of students graduated from my high school, but only about twenty-percent ended up attending a four-year university (NINCHE). One of the biggest reasons for student’s low college entrance rate has to deal with their family's socioeconomic
Many are expecting college to be expensive. They worry about how much they can afford and having to make payment arrangements. Some go as far as to think only rich people can afford to go to college. There is a thought that you have to have good credit to get a loan that takes forever to pay back. Many are not aware of the programs that are o...
Having the college experience is everyone’s dream, especially High School students who are ready to get out into the world and explore. College is very important for furthering someone’s career, but no one thinks about all the costs and the stress that comes along with college. Tuition fees and costs are increasing more and more each year. Now days it feels like you have to be a millionaire just to attend a good college and get a good degree in what you were attending for. There are some students that do not have a lot of money and live on very little things with their parents, but indeed are very smart and have a 4.0 GPA. Those students are the ones that are unable to attend college if they cannot afford it. College tuition is too expensive,
But what’s more important? Saving money orapplying to college? So here we ask ourselves on more time, is college worth it? Of course, it is.The more colleges you apply for, the better. Expanding your college options are better thanlimiting yourself with a budget.The cost of tests and applications may be high, but that is nothing compared to how muchcollege really costs. In college, you’re not just paying for the opportunity to learn. You arepaying for books, to rooming, to the grass you step on, and to the air you breathe. A student withno subsidizing means to pay for college can find themselves amidst a nightmare when findingout how much college costs. The cost is so high that an “average of $29,400” (Webber 2) isexpected for a single student’s loans. College tuition, is not lenient, and you know it’s bad whenalmost former president Barack Obama mentioned and “criticized the rising rate of collegetuition” (Gutmann 136). The average cost of college can “range from $3,000 to more than$32,000” (How Much Will College Cost Me? 1). And for low-income students? The statisticssay that “only 52 percent of low-income students enrolled in a…college immediately upongraduating” (Elliot 26). The game is not in the favor of low-income students. In fact, collegecosts plus lack of monetary. See, they need jobs to pay for college, but without college, thechances at a good paying job are slim. And so, some never see the end of
As students near the end of the academic year, they are constantly faced with some of the same choices the generations before them have been presented with too. The biggest question a lot of seniors in high school have to answer is if they are going to be attending college or not. There are a lot of legitimate reasons as to why a person might not attend a college, but I personally feel like everybody should have a higher education if they have the opportunity to do so. One of the biggest reasons that people do not have the opportunity to pursue higher levels of school is the fact that they do not have enough money to pay for it. With the staggering amount of debt, the majority of students incur in college, it is becoming a
Steve Cohen shows the disparity between the rising cost of college and a family’s capability to afford it. Cohen explains “Tuition has risen almost 1,200 percent in the last 35 years, and the sticker price for many four-year private colleges and out-of-state public universities exceeds $250,000.” Moreover, he goes on to say that even at public universities, it is about $80,000 for four years for tuition and other college related expenses. Later in his article, Cohen explains how this leaves middle-class families in a very uncomfortable situation. The parents or other money-making entities in the household want their student to go to college and earn a degree, but now there can be an element of stress in figuring out how the fees will be paid for. Furth...
Pharinet. “Is College for Everyone?” Practical Argument. Ed. Lauren G. Kirszner and Stephen R. Mandell. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2011. 635-636. Print.
There are many families were not able for the chance of college because they could not afford it. An example of this, happened to the Morais family. Richard Morais’s daughter got accepted into John Hopkins University. The whole family was happy, but with the acceptance letter was the cost for all of the expenses. All of the expenses came out to be a total of $54,470 dollars. Financial aid only paid for $6000 which left the family to pay $48,470. This caused the family to take out student loans to allow the daughter to go to college. With her taking out the loans she will graduate being $200,000 in
There are so many students who would extremely grateful to attend any four year institution but can’t because of the lack of funds. College life can be very stressful, and the process can is very frustrating to most students the first two years. When the cost of college tuition is compared to the 21 century financial economy the cost does not make sense, because for a middle-class family it is impossible to afford sending their child to any four-year institution. It hard for students to graduate with the stress to pay-off hundreds and thousands of dollars in loans. Going to college is stressful enough without the need to worry about how we’re going to pay for it and what other costs will continue to rise with getting a degree afterwards. With the current increase of unemployment rate and the thought of going to college seems like a farfetched goal. Many people choice not to attend a four year institution, because they did receive a scholarship or enough government funding. Having a college background is very important for professional growth, it will eventually limit career opportunities. My stand point is, you may not leave college doing the same thing you began with but the life experience is endless. College experience not only gives knowledge that builds you into a better person by giving a broader erosion. With the cost of tuition increasing will hurt our generation, by causing physical and mental stress but in the end it will all pay off. Not all colleges are for the blame; some of the blame is our economy and other factors play a big roll. As students we need to be aware of all our resources offered, such as Pell Grants, and government scholarships. For example, the some states will pay for a student’s college if they graduate high school with a GPA of 3.5 or higher. There are many states that are willing to pay for all or some of college tuition only if students are willing to use
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In the currently bleak economy that students face after attending college has called for an open discussion to the policy of higher education. One of the many medians where this discussion is happening is in the wall street journal called “Do Too Many Young People Go to College?” written by Lauren Webber. The article takes form in a forum of higher educational policy experts and professors, addressing two major questions posed by the public (Webber). The first of which is whether the investment in attending college is worth its value financially (Webber). Not only is the argument of why college is worth it’s value is explored so is why the value of ...