School offers free tuition
Ron Grossman - Chicago Tribune (MCT)
Issue date: 6/6/08 Section: News
"It is fair to ask whether the tax breaks that lead to big university endowments are serving the public," said Sen. Chuck Grassley, R- Iowa, point man on the issue. "That's especially true when low- and middle-income working families are struggling to pay college tuition."
For more than a century, Berea hasn't billed a single student for tuition. A nondenominational Christian liberal-arts college, it's committed to helping the children of Appalachia escape the region's endemic poverty.
A few other colleges don't charge tuition - among them, College of the Ozarks, Yale School of Music and Cooper-Union, a New York school for arts and engineering. But Berea officials think their college is unique for its combination of a free liberal-arts education, an on-campus work requirement and instilling graduates with a sense of responsibility to the communities from which they come. A large percentage of alums remain in Appalachia, rather than heading off to the bright lights of big cities.
Their Ratliff family income is about $36,000 - about the same as what Harvard and many other private universities charge for tuition and fees. If their daughter went to Eastern Kentucky, Mike and Kenya Ratliff would each have to work a second job; Mikka, who wants to be a nurse, would need student loans.
"We're the ones you hear about - living from paycheck to paycheck," Kenya Ratliff said. "We didn't want Mikka to live like we do."
The U.S. government once underwrote that perennial hope of a better life for the next generation. As a thanks, veterans of World War II were provided federal stipends that enabled 7.8 million ex-GIs to attend college and other educational programs by the time the program ended in 1958.
The GI Bill of Rights, as it was called, put higher education on the intellectual horizon of a broad section of Americans. But by the later 1960s, tuitions began to increase faster than the general inflation rate. Some years witnessed double-digit tuition inflation, making it seem like the window of educational opportunity was closing - especially to children from working-class families, like Bill Fitzsimmons'.
For more than a century, Berea hasn't billed a single student for tuition. A nondenominational Christian liberal-arts college, it's committed to helping the children of Appalachia escape the region's endemic poverty.
A few other colleges don't charge tuition - among them, College of the Ozarks, Yale School of Music and Cooper-Union, a New York school for arts and engineering. But Berea officials think their college is unique for its combination of a free liberal-arts education, an on-campus work requirement and instilling graduates with a sense of responsibility to the communities from which they come. A large percentage of alums remain in Appalachia, rather than heading off to the bright lights of big cities.
Their Ratliff family income is about $36,000 - about the same as what Harvard and many other private universities charge for tuition and fees. If their daughter went to Eastern Kentucky, Mike and Kenya Ratliff would each have to work a second job; Mikka, who wants to be a nurse, would need student loans.
"We're the ones you hear about - living from paycheck to paycheck," Kenya Ratliff said. "We didn't want Mikka to live like we do."
The U.S. government once underwrote that perennial hope of a better life for the next generation. As a thanks, veterans of World War II were provided federal stipends that enabled 7.8 million ex-GIs to attend college and other educational programs by the time the program ended in 1958.
The GI Bill of Rights, as it was called, put higher education on the intellectual horizon of a broad section of Americans. But by the later 1960s, tuitions began to increase faster than the general inflation rate. Some years witnessed double-digit tuition inflation, making it seem like the window of educational opportunity was closing - especially to children from working-class families, like Bill Fitzsimmons'.
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Jim
posted 6/06/08 @ 12:38 PM EST
Stanford sets the bar at $100,000?!
Funny my family is also much below that with three kids and I was offered no scholarship to Drexel. Oh wait, I did get that $700 DU Grant and the rest is in private loans from that private loan company that partnered with Drexel, EFP. (Continued…)
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