Obama to propose 2 free years of community college for everybody
98 replies, posted
Personally I have had a great experience with community college. Compared to state university its really really cheap and you can still learn a lot of stuff. My college however happens to be a city community college in a pretty well-off city so its probably better than some. There arent as many advanced courses, but if you want an advanced education in a science or something, doing two years for pre-requisites at a community college and then transferring is much cheaper than just doing all four years at a state university.
I've personally learned far more and had much more hands on experience at my current community college than my 3 semesters I went to a 4 year university. That and almost all my professors also have jobs in-field, so they have some great insight.
[QUOTE=JohnFisher89;46887935]If everyone has a college degree it will only devalue it further, this isn't a completely good idea.[/QUOTE]
Oh of course it's YOU that rates this dumb, like in other threads you talk about how easy it is to get a job because you got into an apprenticeship when you were 14.
Considering the apparent actual value of college these days, this is not a bad idea.
Right now I'm at internship on the college in my town, and I'm fucking bored out of my ass browsing Facepunch. While at school I have shit-tons of work to do which I take with my to work on down here.
last time I did my FAFSA, they said that with loans and grant combined I could use federal aid for my entire time at the community college
the problem was the financial aid office at the community college I tried screwed up [i]royally[/i] and I couldn't access it
it's a good thing I haven't gotten started at the other college yet because this looks like a godsend
[QUOTE=AJ10017;46887548]Oh my fucking god please obama i dont want to have to pay 33,000 dollars for [i] just 2 years[/i] of technical college[/QUOTE]
God damn, son! My brother only paid like 30K for 4 years of uni, including living expenses up here in Montréal.
[QUOTE=StrawberryClock;46889915]God damn, son! My brother only paid like 30K for 4 years of uni, including living expenses up here in Montréal.[/QUOTE]
My university charges $10,000 a year if you're in-state, not including lodging or food. A year of dorms costs $10,000, and an entry-level meal plan is another $1000. Out-of-state tuition is double what in-state tuition is, so it's not inconceivable someone at my university could end up paying $80-100k for a four-year degree.
Huh, I already got my first two years of community college for free via dual enrollment. All I had to do was provide the books. Got my Associates in Arts, followed by a degree in Welding soon after. Although I had all the time in the world for it since I was also homeschooled and my mum worked the schedule around for us.
I can see something like this really benefiting those who don't have the luxury of time to manage it in high school, particularly with how insane my younger friends tell me its become.
I'm working for it, can I have my two years from '08 to '10 reimbursed?
[QUOTE=blacksam;46887166]I'd definitely like to see this happen. The stigma associated with getting a community college education is really dumb. Some of my friends go and their not losing money on it. They're going to transfer to a state school with no problem whatsoever. Whereas I have another friend who has to pay out the ass in student loans at an IV league.[/QUOTE]
I go to community college, and I don't believe the quality of education is the same as if I went to a real college. My first semester of CS was bad. There were 2 CS professors at my college, and mine frequently told us wrong information. Though I understand the importance of theory, the entire class was us just copying down the notes he wrote (in broken English) on the board. He wrote the exams the night before and a third of the final was just to verbatim copy out the notes he had written in the last 10 minutes of the last class. Somehow I got a B though so at least I had that. I'm transferring campuses to the main campus in my region to get a higher rated professor.
Statistically, my community college has a 25% graduation rate. That's 25% lower than the national average. A big portion of the students I see there are neckbeards who skip class and play smash bros on the student commons. People at community college dont take community college seriously. It's the 13th grade to them.
I can't wait to transfer. I'm filling my free time with studying by myself (auditing MIT OCW) to make up for the deficit.
[QUOTE=proboardslol;46891165]I go to community college, and I don't believe the quality of education is the same as if I went to a real college. My first semester of CS was bad. There were 2 CS professors at my college, and mine frequently told us wrong information. Though I understand the importance of theory, the entire class was us just copying down the notes he wrote (in broken English) on the board. He wrote the exams the night before and a third of the final was just to verbatim copy out the notes he had written in the last 10 minutes of the last class. Somehow I got a B though so at least I had that. I'm transferring campuses to the main campus in my region to get a higher rated professor.
Statistically, my community college has a 25% graduation rate. That's 25% lower than the national average. A big portion of the students I see there are neckbeards who skip class and play smash bros on the student commons. People at community college dont take community college seriously. It's the 13th grade to them.
I can't wait to transfer. I'm filling my free time with studying by myself (auditing MIT OCW) to make up for the deficit.[/QUOTE]
I suppose it just depends which one you go to. I'm attending a community college as well mostly because off the dirt cheep tuition (only 2k a semester), and because all the classes I need for an Associate's transfer. Yeah I see people screw around on campus, but in class, I see everyone get shit done.
[editline]9th January 2015[/editline]
[QUOTE=PrusseLusken;46891237]So when will the US do like developed countries in Europe and offer free secondary education?[/QUOTE]
As soon as we get universal healthcare.
[QUOTE=proboardslol;46891165]I go to community college, and I don't believe the quality of education is the same as if I went to a real college. My first semester of CS was bad. There were 2 CS professors at my college, and mine frequently told us wrong information. Though I understand the importance of theory, the entire class was us just copying down the notes he wrote (in broken English) on the board. He wrote the exams the night before and a third of the final was just to verbatim copy out the notes he had written in the last 10 minutes of the last class. Somehow I got a B though so at least I had that. I'm transferring campuses to the main campus in my region to get a higher rated professor.
Statistically, my community college has a 25% graduation rate. That's 25% lower than the national average. A big portion of the students I see there are neckbeards who skip class and play smash bros on the student commons. People at community college dont take community college seriously. It's the 13th grade to them.
I can't wait to transfer. I'm filling my free time with studying by myself (auditing MIT OCW) to make up for the deficit.[/QUOTE]
It depends on what you go for as well. If you had gone for one of the more basic degrees, like an English or Arts, or a trades course, you would have infinitely better teachers and classes. The staples will always be better than newer courses, like CS.
It's usually recommended to go for CS at a standard 4-year college anyway, because of the depth of the material and the equipment required.
[QUOTE=JohnFisher89;46887935]If everyone has a college degree it will only devalue it further, this isn't a completely good idea.[/QUOTE]
Aren't college degrees basically papers that say "this man is qualified to work in whatever place"? If anything it might increase employment.
Furthermore, I don't think employers will deny potential educated employees just because their degrees suddenly become common. I doubt these documents are like a currency or something.
Why are people in the US even arguing about it? Just do it already. Education, and healthcare should not be considered as a cost by the gov't, but as an investment.
The overall economy looses money when a 35 year old who's been through free school+high school(wich still costs the state $), paid 30k for college, had a family, got a house mortgage, advanced through his career to low-mid level, and dies because he's afraid of going to hospital because the costs would be too high, for a check in to prevent the aggravation of a disease, or just waits for a mild disease to pass on itself, and instead it aggravates and by the time it's critical there's not much to be done about it.
Or he still gets to save his life but has to pay tens of thousands in hospital bills, and sells his house to pay it, looses his job, the family splits apart and his son will not be able to educate himself in a university because his family ran into financial trouble.
[QUOTE=Kalan Yamato;46891570]Aren't college degrees basically papers that say "this man is qualified to work in whatever place"? If anything it might increase employment.
Furthermore, I don't think employers will deny potential educated employees just because their degrees suddenly become common. I doubt these documents are like a currency or something.[/QUOTE]
That's actually exactly what will happen. The point of a degree initially was further education that would give you a competitive advantage in the workforce. If everybody has one, it's no longer an advantage, it's just an expensive piece of paper (taxes paid for it, it isn't free). At the point that an associates degree becomes free, it becomes an expectation that everyone entering the workforce MUST have an associates degree to even be considered.
This pretty much just extends the education process by two years, as an associates degree would become a requirement for even lower level jobs. In addition to that, because more people will be enrolling in community colleges to get an associates degree, the requirements of passing each class will be lowered in order to keep the same passing percentage.
It's not ideal in the least. There's no reason to give free access to secondary education. Especially considering that colleges don't teach practical skills in the first place. Even those entering the work force from masters degree programs require nearly as much additional training as those leaving associates degree programs. At that point, the value of associates degrees (currently not completely useless, and also able to be gotten for $2,000 - $3,000 roughly) become so common, they lose their value, meaning that a person will be forced to go through a bachelor's degree program (usually in excess of $20,000 just for the two years after the associates degree program, assuming you pay around $5,000 a semester, which is cheap) to be considered for even the lowest positions at a company.
At that point, you increase the cost of skilled labor by a fairly large margin, meaning this will hurt not only those looking for jobs, but employers as well. I really can't see any benefits to giving any amount of secondary education for free. It just doesn't make sense.
[QUOTE=godfatherk;46894292]Why are people in the US even arguing about it? Just do it already. Education, and healthcare should not be considered as a cost by the gov't, but as an investment.
The overall economy looses money when a 35 year old who's been through free school+high school(wich still costs the state $), paid 30k for college, had a family, got a house mortgage, advanced through his career to low-mid level, and dies because he's afraid of going to hospital because the costs would be too high, for a check in to prevent the aggravation of a disease, or just waits for a mild disease to pass on itself, and instead it aggravates and by the time it's critical there's not much to be done about it.
Or he still gets to save his life but has to pay tens of thousands in hospital bills, and sells his house to pay it, looses his job, the family splits apart and his son will not be able to educate himself in a university because his family ran into financial trouble.[/QUOTE]
You don't understand, though. Literally giving the people anything at all is communism, and if we gave out free healthcare and education, we'd be no better than Communist Russia. Suggesting we introduce welfare is literally saying you'd rather the country fall apart and die than support the capitalist system.
That's the hyperbole, anyway.
I would have absolutely loved this a year ago. fuk
He's basing this off the "Tennessee Promise" things we have here, although don't take free too literally. With the standards it is here, gotta have 95% attendance in school, 8 hours community service done, and a c average.
[QUOTE=SandvichBL;46894953]He's basing this off the "Tennessee Promise" things we have here, although don't take free too literally. With the standards it is here, gotta have 95% attendance in school, 8 hours community service done, and a c average.[/QUOTE]
That's not bad at all. Like at all. 95% attendance still means a few days off, 8 hours is nothing and many schools already have that mandatory, and a C average is less than it'd take to get into college already.
[QUOTE=tidus1112;46894392]That's actually exactly what will happen. The point of a degree initially was further education that would give you a competitive advantage in the workforce. If everybody has one, it's no longer an advantage, it's just an expensive piece of paper (taxes paid for it, it isn't free). At the point that an associates degree becomes free, it becomes an expectation that everyone entering the workforce MUST have an associates degree to even be considered.
This pretty much just extends the education process by two years, as an associates degree would become a requirement for even lower level jobs. In addition to that, because more people will be enrolling in community colleges to get an associates degree, the requirements of passing each class will be lowered in order to keep the same passing percentage.
It's not ideal in the least. There's no reason to give free access to secondary education. Especially considering that colleges don't teach practical skills in the first place. Even those entering the work force from masters degree programs require nearly as much additional training as those leaving associates degree programs. At that point, the value of associates degrees (currently not completely useless, and also able to be gotten for $2,000 - $3,000 roughly) become so common, they lose their value, meaning that a person will be forced to go through a bachelor's degree program (usually in excess of $20,000 just for the two years after the associates degree program, assuming you pay around $5,000 a semester, which is cheap) to be considered for even the lowest positions at a company.
At that point, you increase the cost of skilled labor by a fairly large margin, meaning this will hurt not only those looking for jobs, but employers as well. I really can't see any benefits to giving any amount of secondary education for free. It just doesn't make sense.[/QUOTE]
Look, I think your forgetting one huge important factor here. Time. Lots of people would not go through college simply because it takes away 4+ years. If America is something, it's fucking lazy.
I mean look at the Scandinavian countries. They have free Secondary education and they aren't the way you described.
This is not even mentioning the fact that any college degree is already extremely devalued.
[QUOTE=woolio1;46894402]You don't understand, though. Literally giving the people anything at all is communism, and if we gave out free healthcare and education, we'd be no better than Communist Russia. Suggesting we introduce welfare is literally saying you'd rather the country fall apart and die than support the capitalist system.
That's the hyperbole, anyway.[/QUOTE]
Communism means state stripping private owners of their properties.
[URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_market_economy"]The social capitalism[/URL] of the nordic countries, Germany, Austria, Switzerland and others is [B]not communism.[/B]
Those rudimentary things could fit on a leaflet, and as the USA is a democracy, there should be a referendum on what would people rather preffer.
As the USA is amongst the wealthiest nations on earth, those policies could be implemented beautifully, it would perhaps even work greater than in the germanic states of europe.
[editline]10th January 2015[/editline]
[QUOTE][B]The social market economy refrains from attempts to plan and guide production, the workforce, or sales[/B], but it does support planned efforts to influence the economy through the organic means of a comprehensive economic policy coupled with flexible adaptation to market studies. Effectively combining monetary, credit, trade, tax, customs, investment, and social policies, as well as other measures,[B] this type of economic policy creates an economy that serves the welfare and needs of the entire population, thereby fulfilling its ultimate goal.[/B][/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=godfatherk;46897410]Communism means state stripping private owners of their properties.
[URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_market_economy"]The social capitalism[/URL] of the nordic countries, Germany, Austria, Switzerland and others is [B]not communism.[/B]
Those rudimentary things could fit on a leaflet, and as the USA is a democracy, there should be a referendum on what would people rather preffer.
As the USA is amongst the wealthiest nations on earth, those policies could be implemented beautifully, it would perhaps even work greater than in the germanic states of europe.
[editline]10th January 2015[/editline][/QUOTE]
I know that, but it doesn't stop the Right from firing up the cold war propaganda machine.
Also, I know this is a small thing, but we're not actually a democracy. We're a republic with a democratic election system.
[QUOTE=PrusseLusken;46891237]So when will the US do like developed countries in Europe and offer free secondary education?[/QUOTE]
Hopefully if Bernie Sanders wins in 2016.
[QUOTE=LoganIsAwesome;46897470]Hopefully if Bernie Sanders wins in 2016.[/QUOTE]
Is there only one man advocating for the alternative of social market economy in the US?
Also, does the presidents pass laws in the US? I thought it was the congress/parliament etc. that did that.
So,based on my insight, people would rather have to vote for a political party wich is for a social market economy, rather than voting for a president with such inclinations.
[QUOTE]Also, I know this is a small thing, but we're not actually a democracy. We're a republic with a democratic election system.[/QUOTE]
I thought the US was a [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federation#mediaviewer/File:Map_of_unitary_and_federal_states.svg"]federation[/URL].
Also, if all those points apply(wich, to my knowledge,they do), then the US is a democracy.
[QUOTE]Democracy is a form of government based upon four elements: 1) The citizens choose and replace the government through free and fair elections; 2) There is active participation of the citizens in politics and civic life; 3) There is protection of the human rights of all citizens; and 4) There is rule of law, in which the laws and procedures apply equally to all citizens.
Eligible citizens are able to: 1) vote for the passing/rejecting of laws or run for office during elections, 2) join political parties, sit on boards or committees, and criticize or protest, 3) feel that some of their rights are protected, and 4) receive a fair trial if accused of breaking the countries laws. Politicians represent their constituents in the proposal, development and establishment of the laws by which their society is run. [/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=godfatherk;46897590]Is there only one man advocating for the alternative of social market economy in the US?
Also, does the presidents pass laws in the US? I thought it was the congress/parliament etc. that did that.
So,based on my insight, people would rather have to vote for a political party wich is for a social market economy, rather than voting for a president with such inclinations.
I thought the US was a [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federation#mediaviewer/File:Map_of_unitary_and_federal_states.svg"]federation[/URL].
Also, if all those points apply(wich, to my knowledge,they do), then the US is a democracy.[/QUOTE]
We don't vote on our laws as citizens, we vote on our representatives who in turn vote on our laws. That's what makes us a democratic republic rather than a pure democracy.
The biggest problem here is that, realistically, we only have two political parties. Sure, we [I]have[/I] third parties, but they almost never win elections. So you've got a party built entirely of social and fiscal liberals, and a party built entirely of social and fiscal conservatives, and there's nothing in-between. It's incredibly polarized, and both parties have used this polarization to convince their followers that anything less than absolute (liberalism/conservatism) is unacceptable.
[QUOTE=woolio1;46897680]We don't vote on our laws as citizens, we vote on our representatives who in turn vote on our laws. That's what makes us a democratic republic rather than a pure democracy.
The biggest problem here is that, realistically, we only have two political parties. Sure, we [I]have[/I] third parties, but they almost never win elections. So you've got a party built entirely of social and fiscal liberals, and a party built entirely of social and fiscal conservatives, and there's nothing in-between. It's incredibly polarized, and both parties have used this polarization to convince their followers that anything less than absolute (liberalism/conservatism) is unacceptable.[/QUOTE]
That's a problem related to our fucked up first past the post voting system. Here lemme show you a video why:
[video=youtube;s7tWHJfhiyo]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7tWHJfhiyo&index=77&list=UU2C_jShtL725hvbm1arSV9w[/video]
[editline]10th January 2015[/editline]
[QUOTE=godfatherk;46897590]Is there only one man advocating for the alternative of social market economy in the US?
Also, does the presidents pass laws in the US? I thought it was the congress/parliament etc. that did that.
So,based on my insight, people would rather have to vote for a political party wich is for a social market economy, rather than voting for a president with such inclinations.
I thought the US was a [URL="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federation#mediaviewer/File:Map_of_unitary_and_federal_states.svg"]federation[/URL].
Also, if all those points apply(wich, to my knowledge,they do), then the US is a democracy.[/QUOTE]
Yes technically the US's government is a form of democracy in the same way that a direct democracy if a form of democracy. In actuality though, we elect representatives for us to make laws, rather where in a direct democracy is where we would just vote on laws ourselves.
This doesn't have a chance in our current unparalleled Plutocracy.
[QUOTE=Reshy;46887158]I'm sorry, I can't take this as anything more than Obama passing air at this point. He chronically under-delivers.[/QUOTE]
So I was watching Maher last night and everything that the 2012 Republican candidates promised in the campaigns technically has been accomplished under Obama.
This will never work, I'd rather see an initiative to make high school better at accomplishing what community colleges do.
[QUOTE=Ignhelper;46887405]Watch as Republicans call him a communist for making education free[/QUOTE]
A good way to make it capitalist again is making it [I]paid[/I], like here in Denmark for example.
Seriously, I get [I]paid [/I]1000$ a month for taking a Candidate degree in Computer Science and I don't have to pay the University anything.
[QUOTE=woolio1;46891551]It depends on what you go for as well. If you had gone for one of the more basic degrees, like an English or Arts, or a trades course, you would have infinitely better teachers and classes. The staples will always be better than newer courses, like CS.
It's usually recommended to go for CS at a standard 4-year college anyway, because of the depth of the material and the equipment required.[/QUOTE]
So I have to go for a useless humanities degree to get a real education?
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