| 来源类型 | Article |
| 规范类型 | 评论 |
| Hillary Clinton’s free college isn’t better with student work requirements | |
| Jason D. Delisle; Rooney Columbus | |
| 发表日期 | 2016-09-13 |
| 出版年 | 2016 |
| 语种 | 英语 |
| 摘要 | Since arriving on the scene during the 2016 campaign trail, “free college” has come under fire from all sides. Critics – ourselves included – charge that it’s not actually free and would disproportionately benefit well-off students and families. Hillary Clinton might even concede that “free” is too generous. After all, she’s eager to point out that tuition will only be free under her plan for those willing to work for it. As Clinton explained to the Des Moines Register last year, “I am not going to give free college to wealthy kids. I’m not going to give free college to kids who don’t work some hours to try to put their own effort into their education.” The media has barely covered the work requirement in Clinton’s “New College Compact.” It specifies that students must work 10 hours a week in order to receive free public college tuition. The logic: Students who receive the benefit of free tuition should contribute at least some of their own resources while in school. (Ten hours per week is also less than the level of work that researchers and advocates caution interferes too much with school.) Clinton hasn’t provided any additional information, so exactly how a work requirement would operate remains unclear. While we wait for more details, it’s worth examining who would be affected by such a policy. What can we learn about the college students who do not work while enrolled? One source on the topic, the Department of Education’s National Postsecondary Student Aid Survey, includes a wealth of information about the undergraduate student population, including how much students work. In the 2011-12 school year, the most recent year for which data is available, well over half of full-time students already met the 10-hour work requirement. At community colleges, the number reached 60 percent of full-time students. And full-time undergraduates at all public colleges clock in roughly 25 hours a week. It’s clear the majority of students work their fair share, if not more. It’s the 37 percent of full-time undergraduates at public colleges not working who would have to make a change under Clinton’s plan. A knee-jerk assumption might be that these are mostly wealthy students. These students mustn’t need the money if they aren’t working, right? Clinton suggested as much in Des Moines. The data, however, show that there is no “typical” non-working student. Among full-time dependent students at public four-year colleges, the median income of those not working ($72,464) is about the same as that for working students ($76,734). One would expect to see a larger difference if the students who are not working came from upper-income families. But there appear to be about as many low-income students not working as high-income students. In fact, in calculations not shown here, we examined a variety of characteristics – tuition, institutional selectivity, living costs, student loan borrowing, grant eligibility – for working and non-working students; The two groups of students are remarkably similar in many ways. One difference, however, does stand out: Those who don’t work are much more likely to live on campus. That might mean students who are campus-bound have a harder time finding a job because work opportunities on college campuses are more limited. Or perhaps living on campus is a sign that a student is more serious about her studies. She may opt not to work in order to devote more time to schoolwork. Whatever the reason, we know many students do not work. So in the event free college is implemented with a 10-hour work requirement, a large portion of college-going undergraduates will need to look for employment opportunities. Are there enough less-than-part-time jobs available for these students, especially those who live on campus? Likely not. If jobs are scarce, one permutation of free college then might include a softer 10-hour work requirement. In this instance, a student isn’t required to work. But if she doesn’t, then states and colleges could charge her tuition up to the amount she could in theory earn from working 10 hours a week. Some might consider this version of free college an empty promise; tuition is only “free” if a student puts her own earnings toward tuition. On the other hand, if students are having trouble finding work, one can imagine free college advocates calling for an expanded federal Work Study program as part of Clinton’s free college plan. Federal Work Study is a grant program that provides $1 billion a year to colleges to pay the wages of students who work in approved jobs, mostly on campus. Expanding it would make more jobs available on college campuses, but it’s an awkward fit for Clinton’s plan. The point of the work requirement is that students contribute their own earnings to tuition. Paying their wages with federal grant aid defeats the purpose. Regardless of which scenario is borne out, there might be a downside to any policy that induces students to work who wouldn’t have worked otherwise. For instance, one studyfound that holding a work-study job has small negative effects on academic outcomes for students who wouldn’t have worked in the work-study program’s absence. A different study notes that “low-income students, especially low-income African-Americans and Hispanics, tend to experience the more negative effects of working on their educational achievement and educational attainment.” Data and research show that there are likely many reasons why college students don’t work while in school. Solving this “problem” won’t make free college a better idea. |
| 主题 | Education ; Higher Education |
| 标签 | Center on Higher Education Reform ; education ; Higher education ; Hillary Clinton |
| URL | https://www.aei.org/articles/hillary-clintons-free-college-isnt-better-with-student-work-requirements/ |
| 来源智库 | American Enterprise Institute (United States) |
| 资源类型 | 智库出版物 |
| 条目标识符 | http://119.78.100.153/handle/2XGU8XDN/261135 |
| 推荐引用方式 GB/T 7714 | Jason D. Delisle,Rooney Columbus. Hillary Clinton’s free college isn’t better with student work requirements. 2016. |
| 条目包含的文件 | 条目无相关文件。 | |||||
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