I have a crazy idea - one that I think is just crazy enough to work. I propose a model for providing education, for a profit, without requiring students to pay tuition. The model also provides strong incentives for the institution to give career-relevant lessons and to ensure that each student achieves financial success after graduation. I'm sure I'm not the first person to suggest this, though I have done zero research on the subject.
The model is simple. Students are enrolled in the institution based on whatever criteria the school finds appropriate, but the student is never required to pay tuition (room and board, books, etc. are TBD). The students agree by contract upon enrollment to pay the institution a percentage of their earnings following graduation for an agreed-upon period. It could be 10 years, or 20 or until retirement. I'm not sure how the numbers would work out, but it would likely correlate to the reputation of the institution for turning out successful professionals.
If the school is not successful in fostering a good career for the student, the student owes them little, or nothing. If there is a widespread failure to provide relevant education (hard to imagine...), the taxpayers are not on the hook to back bad loans paid to students with little chance of making a go of it with their degree in Art History. The institutions responsible would be...well...responsible.
I think this idea is honorable and workable in many respects but there is a major flaw in thinking any individual or institution has the ability "to ensure that each student achieves financial success after graduation".
ReplyDeleteThere are already a plethora of free market enterprise education systems popping up, mostly online, and especially within the tech markets. Many of them offer job placement programs as well as financial choices of payment.
These institutions DO have it in their best interests to not only fulfill the selling point of having you not only fully educated in the chosen field but to also help place you in employment. These education enterprises must build their reputation from past performance in order to maintain regular future enrollment.
But it is highly flawed to think that financial success can be "guaranteed" by the school staff and then to have their financial system modelled after the notion is a further absurdity. This facet of the idea is hardly different than the promises state controlled "schooling" systems provide.
There are two main reasons (among others) for my contention here:
1. The particular school which would rely upon such a method for payment for services cannot predict nor control the future of the markets.
2. The same school cannot predict nor control the behaviors of the individual student before, during or after the education process is performed.
I'll add that every transaction is a two way transaction where the individuals involved are giving up something for something they value more than the article they are giving up. There is hardly an incentive within the above proposed idea of an institution to work on the mere promise that the said student is going to actually perform within the markets as well as pay the school back.
The individual must forego future income (to pay the balance of the loan should one be necessary) or forgo money in the present in exchange for provided education. This individual's investment upon himself is the motive for future financial success and is still NO guarantee. The school can only aid in placement of employment, but guarantee nothing further.
This above proposed notion is similar to how the K-12th grade compulsory "schooling" system operates, only it is the "taxpayer" who is burdened with footing the bill and on the notion that the collective so-called "nation" has "invested" in its future by doing so.
I think the idea is great other than the proposed financial setup. To date there are already education systems of this nature working profitably as we speak. There are even some that are open-sourced and "free" in the way that your only real payment seems to be in time waiting for help from a tutor when you are stuck on an exercise. There is ALWAYS a "price".
Codeacademy is one that I am using now.
None of my comments here are meant to offend so please read with an open mind.
:^)