Probably because that's more than ten times as much as it took back when they attended college.
When I was a student (80s), tuition rose by more than the cost of inflation every year. And every year, the colleges claimed that "tuition does not cover the whole cost of your education," as though we were being subsidized.
And they make this same claim every year, while still increasing tuition by more than the cost of inflation (this may have slowed slightly in the last couple of years). Yeah, right. It
really costs $60,000 for eight or nine months of classes at Yale or Harvard? I mean, REALLY? Or are we spending our money on buildings we don't necessarily need so that we can hire more faculty members who won't get NIH grants or tenure?
I went to an elite private college. I know how good my education was compared to what my peers at public colleges and universities got. No one cancelled a class because fewer than 20 students had enrolled (some classes were actually capped at 3 or 5 students). The biggest class I ever took had 50 students in it. There was never any stress about overcrowding and the possibility of waiting a year to take a class. I never took a multiple choice test.
Ever. Everything I did was graded by a human, usually the professor who was teaching the class. And the standards were pretty high. Etc.
Yet even knowing what I do, and even though I
happily okay, grouchily, pay for private schools for my kids, I'm beginning to question if elite colleges are actually worth it. At the rate things are going, costs will be over a quarter of a million dollars for four years when my eldest is ready to go to college. Maybe way more. Who knows? And what about when my 8-year-old is ready for college?
So, I've been paying close attention --- and I'm disgusted.
