Calif students try to get fee freeze on ballot

[SoCalGirl]

Originally Posted by KSig RC

I mean . . . this seems like a lot of money, but it's really about a 9% increase per year. Considering inflation and the massive amount of new services provided by colleges in 2008 compared with 1979, I'm not really sure 9% per year is unreasonable - and why did we decide now is the time to freeze?

I think the raw numbers are somewhat misleading here.

"massive amount of new services"? **Rolls with laughter**

Try massive cuts of budgets and services as the fees continue to grow.

I'm so glad to be done with school because the increases would make me really mad.

[KSig RC]

Originally Posted by SoCalGirl

"massive amount of new services"? **Rolls with laughter**

Try massive cuts of budgets and services as the fees continue to grow.

I'm so glad to be done with school because the increases would make me really mad.

You really think a college doesn't have many more "responsibilities" today than it did in 1979?

I mean . . . we forget that a lot of the ineptitude in college administration is due to stretching too thin and becoming involved in too many parts of student life.

Where was the IT department (complete with campus-wide email and LAN services) in 1979, or the rape crisis center(s), or the "blue light phones" or suicide hotline or food service until midnight or subsidizing of a huge portion of the student body via work-study or . . . I don't want to curtail your laughter, but students simply expect more in 2008, don't you think?

This is without even considering that the modern college landscape requires massive departments for marketing the school (including everything from advertising to endowment percentage toward marketable patents, discoveries or research) - a development that the students are asked to fund, but which partially offsets itself in the form of increased perceived value of the diploma/prestige, etc.

It's kind of stark, but that's reality.