Harvard University shook the academic world a few weeks ago when it announced an expansion in its student aid program. (Refer to NY Times article here.) The expansion was an effort to further diversify its student base by reaching out to middle-class and upper-middle-class American families, specifically those with household incomes in the $120,000 to $180,000 range. The Harvard plan calls for charging these families an annual tuition equal to about 10% of their household income.
Annual tuition at Harvard runs at about $45,000, an amount affordable only to the wealthiest of Americans. With the above program, middle-class families in the income bracket mentioned would only have to pay from $12,000 to $18,000 a year, amounts that are quite competitive with a significant number of state/public universities.
For academically gifted students from middle-class families, Harvard's announcement should come as a very pleasant and welcome surprise. Long convinced by financial advisers and news reports that college tuition costs are rising at a rate higher than overall inflation, many of these students have totally avoided the Ivy League schools, deeming the latter quite unaffordable. This expanded student aid program would force these students to at least give Harvard and an Ivy League education a second look.
Though it's still quite early to tell, the effects of Harvard's move could be profound. Less than three weeks after Harvard's announcement, a number of prestigious private universities such as the University of Pennsylvania, Pomona, and Swathmore, to name a few, have followed Harvard's lead. In the marketplace of education, Harvard could take the lead in reining in the spiralling costs of a college education in the US.
Philippine universities, especially the exclusive ones, could take a page from Harvard's playbook. In the Philippine setting, it's the middle middle-class and lower middle-class that are struggling to gain access to quality college education. Exclusive schools currently offer and focus their scholarship programs to poor but deserving students. I have no problem and no argument against such programs. However, reviewing such programs with the aim of extending aid to deserving students from middle class Filipino families may be worth a try.
Tuesday, January 1, 2008
A Harvard Experiment
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Even in obtaining a place in the top universities in Manila is sometimes politicised. The quota system is the same.
That is one serious misgiving I have about the quota system. It is quite politicised. Some people (or a lot) may disagree with me on this but I've always felt that the quota system should be strictly merit-driven. And if in the course of evaluating applicants, there is a tie between a poor kid and a rich one, priority should be given to the poor but deserving student. Kids from wealthy families could still avail themselves of education from the university but they should be made to pay the full tuition. I think that's just fair because in the end, "For those to whom much is given, much is required." (Luke 12:48)
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