I was chatting with my parents (after a long break) yesterday online. I mentioned that I had started looking at graduate studies scholarships because now’s the time to start applying if I want to be in school in 1 to 1.5 years.
I said that there’s no way I’m going to go to graduate school without a scholarship. I can’t afford the debt. Plus, if they don’t give me money, it means they aren’t interested enough in my contributions.
My parents laughed. “Shouldn’t education be for yourself? Shouldn’t you pay?”
But I’ve always had the opposite view. I know I have something valuable to contribute to which ever university I end up at. I’m fully involved in academics, in extra-curricular activities, and I bring a different perspective, from all that I’ve done in the past, to the student experience. If I have something valuable to contribute, shouldn’t the university be, at least, partially funding my studies?
I can learn just as much (although in a different way) by working. And I’m getting paid to work. Shouldn’t I get paid (at least a stipend for living costs) for getting an education?
Am I just turning logic on its head?
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The university should not be funding your education if the primary goal of your education is to increase your marketability for high-paying jobs, since when you get one of those you could very easily pay down your student debt. The university should be funding work that’s essentially for the “public good”. Careers in these fields are generally horribly undervalued as no one can really get money investing in it (development work, abstract algebra, etc.). The trouble is, a PhD in my field could land me either job. I personally think the government should be subsidizing YOUR job, as it’s a lot more obvious you’re not using your job as a springboard into Fortune 500 management.
I need to think about what you said…comment later :)
I don’t think I agree. The outcome of someone’s education is hard to predict. Every job in the world actually serves a purpose, and is probably a public good of some sort. Even if you’re the CEO of a Fortune 500 company, you’re still providing goods that people want (not necessarily need – although the line between wants and needs is very murky).
If the only indicator of whether one’s education should be funded is the potential of how much you would earn once you graduate, then that also excludes a lot of disciplines in public services.
Doctors for example. Doctors definitely provide a public good. Yet, they rarely get any scholarships. I think it’s a shame. Currently, becoming a doctor means you have to come from at least a middle income family because of the high education costs. That excludes people who want to be doctors that come from a less privileged background, essentially baring entry to those who will probably bring different perspectives to the profession.
I still think education for individuals should be funded on the potential of that individual to significantly contribute to that discipline or the student life of the institution.
Actually, I’ll retract my earlier statement for the simple reason that it actually doesn’t serve the purpose it’s intended to. I originally proposed it to either increase the number of scholarships or divert scholarships to more deserving areas. My proposal does neither: it doesn’t increase the number of scholarships because there’s no mechanism for it. It doesn’t divert scholarships to more deserving areas. It doesn’t affect middle-class to rich people (since they’d pick the field in whicih they’d eventually earn more money anyway). They’d, as you say, shoehorn poor people to certain types of jobs. They WOULD help poor people that WANTED to go into resource management, but there are better ways to do it.
As for your doctors comment, I agree. Canada has tons of scholarships for research initiatives, but I don’t know if it has any for professional schools, which I’d argue require (and get) far more people than research does.
New Proposal: if we have to do this zero sum, we start taxing scholarships again. It’s currently the case that all research scholarships are untaxed. This is ridiculous – NSERC CGS recipients get $35,000 a year, and Vanier CGS recipients get $50,000 a year! Taxing these doesn’t really reduce the standard of living of PhD students unless they were looking to rent a house. (You could put in provisions to make it tax-free for people with multiple dependents, but that’s already in the tax laws.) Meanwhile, it frees up ~15% of funds to start new professional degree scholarships.
15% isn’t a lot, and I honestly think there should be more research scholarships. I also think we shouldn’t be thinking zero-sum. Ideally, we’d stop cutting corporate taxes and buying overpriced fighter jets, but oh well.
But aren’t scholarships deemed the lowest amount someone can reasonably live on already? If you also tax them…
I think the government should just have more scholarships that are awarded better. If they government really cares about the future of our human resources, they should fund more education for those who need it.