Rising tuition cost has been an issue that Americans have been dealing with for several years. Each year the cost of attending universities increases while the tax payer support decreases (Fethke 2012). The government has attempted to solve the problem by increasing federal spending on Pell grant programs and other educational loans with low interest rates (William 2013). But such programs have instead driven the cost of tuition upward since universities have to spend a great amount of money on student programs, operational expenses, and facilities upgrades to stay competitive with other universities (Clark 2011). There needs to be a solution that will help drive the cost of tuition down, but that solution will have to come from the government and has to include tax payer support. Because providing subsidies for schools that do not control their expenses and keep increasing their tuition cost does not make sense (Fethke 2012).
A possible solution is for the government to pass a new law that would reduce the subsidies for universities that keep increasing the tuition cost for students, such a move would motivate universities to take a hard look at their expenses. As part of the new law the government should award higher subsidies for universities that keep their tuition cost down and affordable for students. The law would help student keep their loans at an acceptable amount, we do not need our children graduating with a huge debt that would cause them to default their loans; our children are the future for tomorrow. The law should also have requirements such as requiring universities to keep a certain graduation rate or their subsidies benefits would be impacted. The law should also include a year-end bonus for universities that kept the tuition cost down and include a penalty for those that increased tuition cost for unnecessary expenses or unacceptable reasons. The unnecessary expenses could include for example upgrades to sports fields, such upgrades should be inspected carefully and should only be done if its absolutely necessary meaning if the sports field is unsafe or in conditions that is not presentable for the students. Unnecessary expenses could include advertising campaigns, basically the law would award benefits for universities that have a good performance while keeping the cost affordable and it would penalize those with poor performance with unreasonable expenses. The law should also include a measure that would also discourage students from attending for profit universities because the cost for such school is much higher than a state university. The government should instead provide less aid for students who attend private universities and provide more for those that attend public universities. It will help to reduce the cost of tuition for public universities since they do not have to make expenses to try to stay competitive. We have more for profit schools than we do public, so public universities have many competitors. It is reasonable solution with consequences such as for profit universities filing law suit for reduced aid for their students, or universities ignoring the law altogether and simply run business as normal while increasing tuition cost mainly because most students view college as an investment instead of a debt.
The other solution for reducing tuition cost would be for states to provide more funding for public universities, one of the reasons state universities have to increase their tuition cost is due to lack of state funding because of poor tax payer support (Fethke 2012). If the tax payer supports education the state can provide more funding for public universities, but the money has to come from somewhere and there needs to be rules in place that will encourage universities to control their expenses. The money can be obtained by increasing taxes in certain areas such as tobacco, alcohol, and property
