Should colleges/universities provide students with free textbooks? We believe the students should be provided with free textbooks. Students need to have free textbooks for the fact that they are very expensive. Not many students can afford to pay for their textbooks, thus leading to having complications with keeping up with high grades in school. The money that is being wasted on education that is very important can be used for financial reasons such as paying for food, room and boards, classes that they are taking, and etc. Everyone has to work to earn money, but what if they aren’t getting paid enough? That affects their education and themselves financially. Now, textbooks are very expensive, they range as much as two hundred dollars for …show more content…
Students know that it’s not highschool anymore where parents support students with everything. When entering college they are independent to make their own choices, working would have to be one of them. Everything at college is not for free everything comes with a price which may vary between the school and costs of items. It’s understandable if some have a scholarship, but not everyone can get a scholarship. Those who work have to pay off bills from the universities, such as room and board, food, tution, parking fees, fees in general, equipment and room materials, school supplies, and travel expenses. According to VIDETTE EDITORIAL BOARD, “Many schools, however, cannot say they are focusing on this issue. Students are forced to spend an average of $1,000 a year on textbooks — money that could be used to pay tuition, room and board and other bills. If schools want to make their students feel like they are important and appreciated, they need to take a hard stance on making affordable textbooks a reality.” This is a lot to pay for an individual who is working a minimum wage job. Everyone has to start at something, so working and getting paid minimum wage will not work significantly as they thought. It’s a lot harder to save money than to spend it on bills. The money that is being used for textbooks, should be used for something that is needed to get paid off. Students struggle in college because they avoid buying books that is necessary to use in order to pass the class, thus “leads them to do poorly in their classes, especially if those classes are dependent on those books.” There are thousands of students who have little experience with the job they are working for and get paid minimum wage, but can't afford to pay for books, for this reason that is way textbooks should be provided for free, because they wouldn’t have to pay an extra one thousand bill on books for every semester. Now, those
I plan to work while I attend college. I believe this is so important because I can help with my living expenses and contribute toward my education. For years, I have been under my parents’ wings, and I would love to help them by financially giving back to them. Working in college will improve my education as well as my family’s finances, and I think that it is crucial. Working will make me want to study more and make better grades and it will prepare me for my
Should community college tuition be free? Walter G. Bumphus, the President/CEO, American Association of Community Colleges, believes so. According to him, “The Obama administration's proposed America's College Promise plan stands to increase access to these educational opportunities and is a crucial investment not only in the future of these students, but in the country's future… America's College Promise proposal for “free” community college is not a handout. Rather, it is an investment in education and would have substantial economic and social benefits.” Bumphus states the cost for investing in this proposal would be less than 10 percent of the Department of Education annual budget, and “less than 3 percent of all annual federal expenditures”.
The cost for education is a lot more than it used to be. Everyone would think getting an education is easy so you wouldn’t need a minimum wage job, but it isn’t College tuition has gone up and so have private schools and catholic schools. Some private schools are at
Ask any college student to state one of their largest expenses and it would be safe to bet the response would be “Textbook prices!” The cost of purchasing required materials for courses has reached numbers high enough to cause many students to take out second loans. Information released this year by the American Enterprise Institute shows that “College textbook prices have increased faster than tuition, health care costs and housing prices, all of which have risen faster than inflation” (Kingkade, 2013). This information equates to an 812% increase in the cost of college textbooks over what they were just over thirty years ago (Kingkade, 2013). The figure here shows an unusually large increase that has far outpaced that of average inflation.
Over the past years of getting a college degree was the pathway to get a settle career. College has been a reason for people to carry on after high school. Now that tuition has been raised, getting a degree seems to drain students with more loans and could be in debt. College has been raised to the point where people rather start working at a minimum wage than continuing with school. Working on a part time job would be an easier choice rather than pursuing towards their degree. As people attend college, fees build up and students loaning money and possibly be in debt. Not only that, some may say college isn’t worth it, but it is. Getting a degree pays off at the end going towards your career path, making twice as much as you would work at a regular job. Students who have received a degree are slowly declining. To make adjustment, College should be free for
But many low-income students not only have a full-time course schedule, they also have jobs where they work more than 30 hours per week. Approximately one-quarter of college students’ work while attending school and have both a full course-load and a full-time job (Carnevale, Smith, & Melton, 2015). Working helps students with the living costs as well as tuition and can help students learn skill sets that many employers prefer. However, there are problems with having full-time work while going to college.
No students should be in debt for their education. If students can’t go to school for free, they should make it affordable. Without financial aid families would not be able to pay for the students’ tuition. The country should make it easier for those who have kids that are juggling work and school. Having an education gives everyone a better opportunity for their future.
Those who think a college education is not worth it believe that college can become a setback in life due to the thousands of dollars that college students are spending on tuition and books. Students who attend college will not have the money to purchase a home, spend money on family, vacations, or any other costly items and bills. On the other hand, most college students end up paying for their college loans all of their life or go into debt. They will never have money to rely on since their credit cards will be racking up interest for college loans that need to be paid off. As stated by Paul Taylor in Michelle Adam’s report, the cost of a college education has been at a record level and the cost of tuition and fees has more than tripled which is causing a rise in student debt (58). With rising prices, the economy is making it more difficult for people to afford a college education.
In conclusion, America provides many ways to help reduce the cost of college textbooks but society is still not satisfied with the outcome. The Open Textbook, Affordable Textbook Act, and book store rentals are wonderful programs, but has its disadvantages that hopefully would be resolved in the 2016 presidential elections. The statistics show that many students across the nation benefit from learning with quality of teaching, the amount of accessibility it provides without having to worry about paying off student loans. School administrations should consider about transferring to an act that would benefit both the school and the students, but also provide more equality to the publishers and students.
College education should be free “Education should be a right not a privilege” (Senator Bernie Sanders). A lot of students don't continue their education after high school, because of this thousands of students end up with student loans that take nearly the rest of their life to pay off. College education should be free in my opinion, because it gives students who can’t afford it the opportunity to better their lives, lower income students will go to college. Lower income students might reach graduation, however; so some students drop out because they can’t pay for tuition the first for years.
Income inequality has become a central issue in the United States, and it is sad to think that textbook prices are adding to this gap. The financial aid that is supposed to help poorer families is being used to buy textbooks, which are priced unfairly. There is no way the amount of financial aid given out has kept up with the surge in textbook prices, which means that year after year, students have to use more financial aid to buy books. Essentially, this means that people have less financial aid to use for other expenses of college, such as tuition. I would also theorize that a good portion of the 70% of students who choose to forgo a textbook are also from poor families.
What is the point in earning money, only to not have time to spend it? Working and academics is a lot of stress on a student. High school is a time for students to focus academics. While some people argue that working in high school helps students learn life lessons, students should not work throughout high school because it increases stress, cuts childhood short, and is a distraction from high school academics.
Should textbook be free in college education? According to College Board students spend an average of $1200 on textbooks per year (College Board). It is concerning that learning higher education is being undermined by rising costs of textbook. As more and more working adults want to go back to college to develop skills or specialize in the area of their interest in order to improve the quality of life, while there are others like high school students who are planning to start college right after their high school.
Individuals in my generation that decide to go away for college may graduate with a degree but they also graduate with debt and have a hard time finding work in their area of study. College graduates are young and many may not have much experience in their field. It is a bittersweet option to go to college and further your education, I am all for it, but I am not for getting yourself in tons of debt, that will cause you to live your whole life paying off student loans and such. Which is one of the reasons why I chose to stay at home and go to community college, I’m saving money while still getting a great education. In earlier generations, people may not have felt that college was important because they needed a job to support themselves and their families. That is understandable because in the early years becoming an adult meant turning of age, 18, getting a job, moving out and starting your own family, but now turning 18 doesn’t mean you automatically are an adult and can move out and start your own life, I have friends that went to college, have a job but still are not able to move out on their own even in their
Yes, I strongly believe that college education should be free for everyone because Education is a basic necessity of our society these days. Free education wouldn’t just benefit one generation or one society but it can benefit the whole nation. If a nation is educated, then it can benefit the whole country and it can get better job opportunities for its citizens because in today’s world we can see highly paid jobs are knowledge based or require advanced technical skills. So in my opinion more educated nation would help remove all those flaws which are keeping country’s economy from growing rapidly. If the education is free in college then it can help a lot of those students who got good grades in their high schools but could not get into the college because of their financial situation. This way these kind of needy students who deserves to get a good degree and basically these students are future of America but they could not get it through