My teenage daughter is on the campus of a prestigious Northeastern university right now, attending one of those pre-college summer sessions that offers a taste of what higher education is like.
Its goal, if I'm not mistaken, is to introduce the experience of writing big checks to well-endowed educational institutions. I count this as a rite of passage. For me, of course.
I'm struggling with it. The kid, I infer from her text messages, is doing fine with whatever this is supposed to do for her.
She has a year of high school left, with every indication that she will follow that by going to a fine college. Her mom and I will be delighted to empty our bank accounts, if need be, to support that next step in her growth.
But that doesn't mean I'm not obsessed, as many parents are, with the ever-rising cost of higher education. And that's why a lot of us have been following with great interest the back-and-forth in Congress over student loan legislation.
Nothing I have heard or read suggests that college will be getting any less expensive or that the federal government won't soon hike the interest rates on loans that many families depend upon. In moments of reason, I recognize both of those facts as understandable. Sometimes, though, they're infuriating.
Since the Reagan administration, a growing share of higher education costs have shifted from taxpayers to individual families. Meanwhile, college tuition and fees have been outpacing family income and inflation.
Blame that partly on simple economics: Demand for higher education has been rising. Enrollment in American colleges and universities grew by 11 percent between 1990 and 2000, but by 37 percent from 2000 to 2010. More Americans want to buy what colleges are selling.
Nor is that the only demand pressure on colleges. Students expect a first-rate college experience, from state-of-the-art fitness centers and more comfortable dorms to cutting-edge technology in the classroom and plenty of options to study abroad.
To further compete for the best students, schools have engaged in an academic arms race, laying down cash to lure faculty stars and top administrators. Mind you, great professors still are paid a whole lot less than ordinary football coaches, and we shouldn't begrudge compensation for people we entrust with furthering our understanding of the world and educating our kids. But it has an impact on the expense side of the institutional ledger.
At a lot of colleges, the notion of increasing revenues by admitting more students is a non-starter, since what students are billed doesn't nearly cover the full cost of an education. A National Association of College and University Business Officers survey found that last fall many colleges offered an average of 45 percent off tuition for incoming freshman.
If your kid qualifies for a scholarship, that's great. If not, it means you're paying for the kids who do — you and the fine donors who keep colleges afloat.
But, then, there are those loans. We all pay for them, since they're subsidized by our tax dollars. Everyone in Washington agrees, it seems, that the federal subsidy will drop and the loans get more expensive as the government cuts spending. The fight involves how much and how fast.
Congress and the White House haven't been able to agree on that. Unsurprisingly, those most likely to be hurt by this inaction are the least able to pay.
The bickering has revolved around the doubling of interest rates that took effect Monday on so-called subsidized Stafford loans, from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent. They're aimed at families that can't afford to pay for college. There were 8.9 million of the loans this year, for a total of $28.6 billion. But there also were 11 million unsubsidized loans, for $59.2 billion, to families with higher incomes. They're already at 6.8 percent, and nobody is talking about rolling back those rates. And there are 1.3 million PLUS loans, at 7.9 percent interest, also not on anybody's cost adjustment track.
Overlooked in the loan fight are the Pell grants. The federal government gives those outright grants to students from poor families — more than $34 billion this year. But they cover only a fraction of college costs, and they have been cut sharply recently.
Most distressingly, a year ago Congress took away Pell grants from anybody who hasn't gotten a high school diploma or GED certificate. Rep. Chris Gibson, a Kinderhook Republican, argues that the shift was a mistake, since those people often are poor and most in need of career training, such as a trade program.
He's right, surely, though job training is only part of what education beyond high school is about. It's about broadening horizons and introducing opportunities, giving young people a sense of the possible. That's what my kid is lucky enough to be getting a glimpse of this week. It's what we as a society ought to accept as a shared responsibility for as many Americans as we can, so that the treasure of education isn't just for those whose parents can write a check.