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College costs go up, standards go down. But 2020 Democrats want to increase spending.


Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders speaks during a campaign stop at the Carson City Community Center Gymnasium, Friday, Sept. 13, 2019 in Carson City, Nev. (Jason Bean/The Reno Gazette-Journal via AP)
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders speaks during a campaign stop at the Carson City Community Center Gymnasium, Friday, Sept. 13, 2019 in Carson City, Nev. (Jason Bean/The Reno Gazette-Journal via AP)
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WASHINGTON (SBG) – As Democratic candidates are talking about increasing public funding for higher education, a key concern is whether taxpayers will get a return on their investment that’s intended to support student success.

According to conservative watchdog group Campus Reform, the University of South Carolina is offering “Tailgating 101” but hasn't fit in a state-mandated Constitution class. Emma Meshell, correspondent director for Campus Reform, recently wrote an opinion piece highlighting her concerns about where people’s money is already going based on some schools’ apparently “ridiculous” offerings at public colleges and universities across the country, including Harry Potter, Beyonce and Game of Thrones-themed courses.

These are for credit classes; they are paying professors to offer them. And when the cost of college is such a pressing issue, it does raise the question: are these clearly worth requiring tuition money for and putting school resources toward,” asked Meshell? “Colleges are continuing to provide less and less value to students at a higher and higher cost. And this is especially concerning given that 2020 Democratic candidates are proposing for us to make college tuition-free.

Decreases in state funding and increases in administrative bloat are commonly cited as the chief culprits for many of the problems in higher education. High-profile higher education hawks Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., both promise to tackle these problems through their respective free public college plans. They and others running in the race including Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., and South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg have also zeroed in on penalizing predatory for-profit schools that don’t deliver courses or programs that result in better financial prospects for graduates.

Though learning how to throw a terrific tailgating party might be a useful skill to learn in college, some of these easy electives do point to a broader question as to whether public institutions are adequately preparing students for life after they graduate. Researchers from a recent Brown University study concluded that universities have likely decreased standards only for fewer to graduate, leading to more young people without prospects and worse- swimming in debt.

There’s an incentive there to get [students] to pay more in tuition to provide more of an income flow to the university. And definitely having these easy classes on hand is probably an easy way for students to rack up a few extra credits,” said Meshell, pointing to a for-credit course at University of California-Berkley that trains student how to catch Pokemon.

Though affordable higher education has become a rallying cry for progressive presidential candidates this election cycle, polling from center-left think tank Third Way shows that Democratic voters rate accreditation reform as a higher priority than free college. And though the vast majority surveyed agreed across party lines reported that they still believe post-secondary education is still worthwhile, only about 60% believed that schools are providing a good return on the investment.

Tamara Hiler, education analyst for Third Way who co-wrote the survey, told Sinclair Broadcast Group that though some of the most egregious exploiters are for-profit schools, she said many of the public institutions that would benefit from the influx of taxpayer dollars from some of these free or debt-free proposals are also failing to ensure that their students affordably graduate with degrees that will further their careers. Moreover, they tend to overlook some of the severe problems she and her co-authors highlighted in the study "What Free Won't Fix: Too Many Public Colleges are Drop Out Factories."

That’s why we want to make sure we’re pairing some of those policies, if they are going to be enacted, with strong guardrails and oversight to make sure that we’re not just creating a system in which even more federal tax dollars are going to schools that are not getting results for students,” said Hiler.

Some of the other Democratic presidential candidates are trying to find a middle ground by giving money to schools but with strings attached. Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., has proposed boosting funding to community colleges with state-led institutional reforms to ensure quality and affordability, with former congressman John Delaney emphasizing the importance of working to create seamless transfers from two-year to four-year schools.

I don’t think anyone is looking to limit what types of courses institutions are offering, especially assuming there might be some benefit or higher-level meaning behind a Pokemon class,” said Hiler with a laugh. “But I think what people need to be thinking more about is whether we are creating clear pathways that are going to get people from a to z.”

Meshell, who is finishing up her bachelor’s degree in marketing online after spending her first two years at community college out of cost concerns, said that getting the educational quality at the price that students want is ultimately dependent on their own decisions.

“It really comes down to what the students choose to do. At the end of the day these students are the ones signing up for student loans," said Meshell. "So for this to really change its going to take students demanding these things."

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