Tuition Skyrockets as Staff Increases [Print]

We've made it, boys and girls. We've made it. We're over the top. We have faced the great challenge and left it bleeding in the sands of the area. We have achieved The Big Six Oh Oh Oh Oh.

Sixty thousand dollars per year in combined tuition plus room and board. To be exact, $60,201. Last year, students had to pay $58,000 for the right to earn credits here, but the past 12 months have shown that amount to be totally insufficient, and so at their last meeting the College's illustrious trustees approved another hike of 3.8%, well above the inflation rate of 2%. The new number almost boggles the mind, exceeding the median American household income by nearly $8,000. A full-priced degree will cost around $250,000, with the price soaring above $300,000 if one has the temerity to be an engineering major. To put that in perspective, that's enough to buy a decent house in a cheap market, a terrible house in an expensive one, or over 400,000 Snack Pack pudding cups if bought in bulk.

This number puts Dartmouth firmly in the top 10 among American colleges (though it cannot top Sarah Lawrence's hilarious $64,000 price point), but Dartmouth stands out from the pack by being one the few rural colleges to rise so high. Nobody is shocked to see an array of New York schools (Sarah Lawrence is in Bronxville) in the top 10 surrounded by other big-city brethren. Dartmouth cannot protect itself with the same excuse. While Hanover itself is a very costly location thanks to the College, costs drop rapidly upon leaving town and Lebanon is below the American average. Whatever the reasons for Dartmouth's high costs, it can't blame it on where the Rev. Eleazar decided to set up shop.

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A President Worthy of a Mansion

The home of a scholar or another bureaucrat?Writing in The Wealth of Nations, economist Adam Smith quietly introduces the world to a novel type of fiscal litmus test. About halfway through his magnum opus, he observes with cheerful pithiness that “the health of any community can be discerned simply and truly by the quality of its homeowners.” Simply put: should society’s most impressive structures rest safely in the hands of the most worthy, then the nation’s integrity remains intact, and its future is secure. Should, however, its mansions and palaces be occupied by the mundane – by the legions of middlemen, bureaucrats, and apparatchiks of a new elite – then its days are numbered and its former greatness is doomed to the ash-heap of history.

While this historic warning may seem a tad heavy-handed, a careful look at the current state of the College’s affairs proves it not only relevant, but downright prophetic. It would appear that in the last few decades, a radical and far-reaching change has swept through the campus, altering the way Parkhurst approaches its goal of educational excellence. Once upon a time, Dartmouth seemed to emphasize the values of efficiency and affordability in contexts other than admission packet platitudes. Administrations used the interest from the school’s endowment and the generosity of its donors to develop a world-class curriculum, keep tuition costs low, and, above all else, fill the homes of Hanover with legions of accomplished professors and a paucity of bureaucrats.

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Times Takes Apart Law School Racket

In a development that should disquiet the swaths of Dartmouth students who look forward to pursuing legal careers, the New York Times has put out yet another devastating piece on the broken nature of modern-day law schools. This article in particular focuses on the broken incentives that lead law schools to constantly raise class sizes and tuition costs despite a massive recession in the legal market.

The usual problems are all out in full force. Although nominally "non-profit," law schools are frequently cash cows for their associated universities, which has helped lead to tuition increasing by over 300% in the past 20 years. Also at fault are the rankings in U.S. News, whose ranking mechanisms encourage schools to raise their tuition as a straightforward means to prop up their rankings. The result is a situation like that at New York Law School, which charges higher tuition than Harvard despite a below-average ranking and sends out over 500 students a year (a 10% increase over 10 years ago) into a dreadful job market with vast piles of debt.

Articles such as this are grim news for the many students (including dozens out of Dartmouth every year) who see law school as the path to a lucrative career without needing a technical degree. With constantly rising tuition to obtain a degree in a market with few openings, one wonders if there will be any backlash against law schools or if tens of thousands of students will continue to enter law school only to discover that it is a losing game.

--Blake S. Neff

Tuition Spikes, College Now Most Expensive in Ivy League

As tuition rockets up another 5.9%, let us give thanks for our unionized friends.The recently announced 5.9% increase in Dartmouth’s tuition, room, board, and fees for the 2011-12 academic year might come as a surprise to Dartmouth students and parents, following several years of much more manageable, albeit still significant, increases.  Following increases of 4.6-4.9%, this year’s 5.9% hike in the cost of a Dartmouth education seems unprecedented, particularly with the inflation rate at 1.5%.  Perhaps more troubling, however, is the fact after this announcement, Dartmouth’s $55,365 tuition and fees are now the highest of the seven Ivy League schools that have released next year’s costs.  While President Kim asserts that the costs are necessary to “provide our students with the highest quality… experience” one would believe that the administrators in Hanover could keep costs closer to the range of peer institutions, with Harvard and Yale both keeping total costs below $53,000, and Princeton only increasing tuition and fees by 1 percent for next year, to stay below $50,000.  Add to that the low costs of living in Hanover compared to other Ivy League towns, and the College’s costs start to indicate serious inefficiency.

The overall increases do not tell the entire story—room, board and fees will increase by an astounding 10.83%.  Included in this is a new $800 general fee for all students to support “growing library needs, information services and recreational activities.”  One might ask, however, what the new fee could possibly cover that is not already part of the $1,377 of yearly fees for class dues (“free” barbeques) and student activities, such as the numerous events that many dismisses as annoying blitzes.  The additional increases—room and board—must be attributable to the “gift” of the renovated Class of 1953 Commons.  As housing at the College certainly hasn’t improved since last year, the higher cost of meal plans, such as the new mandatory freshmen 20-meals-per-week plan that was recently announced at an annual price of $4,884, is a major contributor to Dartmouth’s higher costs for the coming year.  Thus the Class of 1953 Commons, which was touted as an alumni gift that would pay for its own operating and financing costs through various savings, is leading next year’s freshman to pay over 26% more for on-campus dining than this year’s class paid (assuming, in both cases, the minimum allowable dining plans).
 
With fiscal crises across the country and serious questions about the cost structure of higher education, Dartmouth’s latest announcement is surely not a reassuring sign.  Dartmouth tuition stood at approximately $2000 just thirty years ago, and by allowing inefficiency to drive the costs to today’s level, our College is certainly not setting a good precedent for sustained affordability of a Dartmouth degree for future generations.   

--Harry Greenstone