Life for student-athletes is no longer the quaint Americana fantasy of the homecoming bonfire and a celebration at the malt shop. It’s big business in which everyone is making money — everyone except the eighteen to twenty-one-year-old kids who every game risk permanent career-ending injuries.
"As we all know, there are no free lunches...We are not going to be able to hire anyone...if we do not work out an acceptable arrangement with Koch and its funding partners." - A Florida State University department head, explaining the strings attached to a 2007 Koch donation
Colleges and universities, which receive enormous tax benefits to serve the public interest, should be held to a minimum level of effort to enroll and graduate low-income and working-class students eligible for Pell grants. Governments could also provide financial rewards targeted to universities that commit to increasing socioeconomic diversity and that shift their funds from non-need merit grants to students in actual need.
We recognize that free, quality K–12 education is a right of citizenship. We also need to recognize—as we once did and as many countries still do—that the same is true of higher education.
How Wall Street Skims Higher Education. Richard Pryor & Maya Angelou. Documentary: Citizen Koch. John Lee Hooker, Bonnie Raitt, "I'm In The Mood." John Oliver: Stop Cable Company F**kery.
Wall Street skim is driving up the cost of college. Students are saddled with higher tuition and student debt. Taxpayers are covering risky loans and high interest rate for institutional borrowing. And for-profit colleges are overcharging students to drive profit.
Since the founding of public higher education, our nation has moved progressively toward expanding the doors of access. But in the last generation, we have moved in the opposite direction. State higher education funding on a per-student basis is lower today than it was in 1980. Federal financial aid no longer provides grants robust enough to defray the rising cost of college.
Adjunct abuse is one of higher education's great sins. So why is a leading writing conference not discussing it?
"The academy never stood apart from American slavery," Wilder writes in the book. "In fact, it stood beside church and state as the third pillar of a civilization built on bondage."
The college ranking game diverts from the need for public support to make higher education affordable.
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