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1. What are the expenses of higher education that are being borne by parents and students in different countries--by type of expense (that is tuition, other fees, lodging, food, or other expenses) and by sector, region, and academic program? 2. How, in fact, are these expenses currently being met? What are parents actually contributing to the higher educational expenses of their child or children? How do these actual contributions correlate with occupational status, parents’ levels of education, family income, and other attributes such as ethnic or linguistic minority status? How do these actual contributions compare with the “expected contributions” according to the “need analysis” model? Where do parental contributions come from (i.e., from reductions in current living standards, or from savings, or from borrowing), and how do these contributions vary by current income and other family attributes? 3. How much of the expense is being borne by students themselves through part time earnings? How much are students borrowing, and from what loan programs, for what terms, and at what rates of interest? 4. How do these student contributions correlate, if at all, with student attributes such as secondary school academic records, ethnicity, gender, and aspirations? 5. How do these student contributions correlate, if at all, with family characteristics such as occupational status, parents’ levels of education, family income, and other attributes such as ethnic or linguistic minority status? Are students of certain backgrounds significantly more adverse to student indebtedness, or to part-time employment? 6. To what degree and according to what patterns, by student or family characteristics--is actual enrollment behavior affected by expenses (and especially by changes in expenses) such as tuition and student living costs? Do changes in anticipated higher education expenses, to be met either by parents or students, have an effect on either whether, or where, to attend a higher educational institution, and how does this “enrollment sensitivity” vary with the student and family attributes mentioned in the question above? 7. What do parents and students think about these expenses, or changes in expenses, and to what degree have their behaviors been consistent with those professed beliefs? (That is, if students say they are opposed to a tuition increase and will have to drop out if one occurs, do they in fact do so—and if not, why not? 8. As countries or universities pursue a cost-sharing agenda by reducing subsidies to food, lodging, and other formerly subsidized and institutionally provided services, what happens? That is, do private providers come in, under what circumstances, and how can such cost-effective, alternative providers be encouraged and if necessary controlled? How do these two variations of cost-sharing compare in relief to the government’s budget? 9. What are the consequences of alternative forms of securing student loan—such as, e.g., parental co-signatories, requirements for collateral, government guarantees, partial guarantees, and the like? 10. What is the significance of the so-called dual track tuition expectations? Do fellow student and/or professors know? Is there resentment, either on part of the “regular” students, who had to score higher on the entrance examination, on the part of the “marginal” students, who may believe that they are really as academically well prepared as the regular students, and yet have to pay tuition in a country that professes to believe that higher education should be free? These
questions are more descriptive than analytical. Arguably, they need
more data gathering and sensitive description than sophisticated
econometric modeling. The scholarship needs to be conducted with
great sensitivity to the ideological and political context of the
countries (even as some of these ideals and politics are being challenged
and changed) and to the special volatility that has always accompanies
mixtures of students, politics, universities, and tuitions. Cost-sharing
may be better viewed as a concept or a lens through which to assess
higher educational finance than as a prescription or a specific
policy agenda. There have been many false starts and even failures,
particularly in the realm of student loans. But the extraordinary
need for, and the great popularity of, higher education, plus the
apparent limitation of public revenues and the ever more fierce
competition for these scarce public revenues means that the goal
of cost-sharing will continue to intrigue politicians and
policy analysts, even in the face of political opposition and a
less-than-successful record in many countries on such seemingly
simple policy prescriptions as tuition and student loans. |
