Xref: utzoo comp.edu:1092 misc.jobs.misc:1567
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From: animal@im4u.UUCP (Jeremy B. Blatt)
Newsgroups: comp.edu,misc.jobs.misc
Subject: Re: Re: CS and Jobs
Message-ID: <2637@im4u.UUCP>
Date: 7 Apr 88 18:38:27 GMT
References: <1838@ssc-vax.UUCP> <4103@whuts.UUCP>
Reply-To: animal@im4u.UUCP (Jeremy B. Blatt)
Organization: U. Texas CS Dept., Austin, Texas
Lines: 58

In article <4103@whuts.UUCP> spf@whuts.UUCP (Steve Frysinger of Blue Feather Farm) writes:
>> If you really want to change the system, I think that having employers
>> pay the costs of education is more realistic.
>> -Tom
>
>Who do you suppose pays it now?  I worked "blue collar" jobs to get
>myself through college, but sure didn't go to an Ivy League school.
>As far as I can tell, students in "the right" schools have their
>way paid by some combination of 
>	(1) their parents savings;
>	(2) industrial scholarships;
>	(3) government-sponsored loans.
>I speculate (note the lack of data) that mechanism (1) ultimately comes
>from the same (broadly defined) industry that will receive the
>graduate, and (2) clearly does.  (3) will be repayed by the
>student out of their industrial salary.
>So, again, if not industry, who pays for schooling now?
>Steve Frysinger,

having gone to one of `the right' schools, i might point out that
you neglected to mention some significant sources of education financing.
i worked full-time every summer when i was in college, worked
three years in school for food services, and served as a teaching
assistant one semester.  my tuition was reduced in part by intelligent
management of my school's endowment,  and also in part by the
generosity of the alumni.  my school is private, but no doubt the
government helped in many ways to finance my education.  a working
spouse also helps, though i didn't have this luxury.

while industry certainly is important in financing education, but there
are many other sources of funds.

also, your argument that some funds (e.g., parental savings) ultimately
come from industry is vacuous; certainly any dollar bill could be
traced back to industry, but so what?  industry has no say over how
my parents spend their money, so industry is irrelevant in this respect.

the big problem in higher education is additudinal.  almost everyone
from state senators down to students view an education as nothing more
than job training.  yes, job training is important, but education should
have other goals.
	whatever happened to going to school so you could *learn*?
	how about so you could grow as a person?
	how about so you could meet new people from different backrounds?
	how about educating people so they can intelligently participate
		in our democracy?
	how about teaching people so together we can learn more?
	how about teaching people so that they can contribute to society
		something more than just their labor?
	how about education because education is good?

as for industry paying for education, i suspect that they don't
pay much in terms of what they get under the current system.
if they didn't, they'd set up their own schools.  i would certainly
be in favor of an increase in corporate taxes to help finance education,
particularly need-based scholarships, loan guarantees, etc.

					-- jeremy