Posted on 05/17/2014 10:12:52 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Point Lookout, Mo.
Looking for the biggest bargain in higher education? I think I found it in this rural Missouri town, 40 miles south of Springfield, nestled in the foothills of the Ozark Mountains. The school is College of the Ozarks, and it operates on an education model that could overturn the perverse method of financing college education that is turning this generation of young adults into a permanent debtor class.
At this college the tuition is nowhere near the $150,000 to $200,000 for a four-year degree that the elite top-tier universities are charging. At College of the Ozarks, tuition is free. That's right. The school's nearly 1,400 students don't pay a dime in tuition during their time there.
So what's the catch? All the college's studentswithout exceptionpay for their education by working 15 hours a week on campus. The jobs are plentiful because this schooljust a few miles from Branson, a popular tourist destinationoperates its own mill, a power plant, fire station, four-star restaurant and lodge, museum and dairy farm.
Some students from low-income homes also spend 12 weeks of summer on campus working to cover their room and board. Part of the students' grade point average is determined by how they do on the job and those who shirk their work duties are tossed out. The jobs range from campus security to cooking and cleaning hotel rooms, tending the hundreds of cattle, building new dorms and buildings, to operating the power plant.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
well, they are taking work study to a whole new level.
We have gotten away from the idea of students working their way through college. With college costs where they are, it would be good for students and families to consider that.
And, they should reconsider whether it’s worth it to get a degree in unmarketable fields such as women’s studies. Studying women may be fascinating, but, very few jobs or career paths recruit people with such degrees.
Fascinating and great system!
Most college programs are a complete joke, filled with nothing more than progressive inanities meant to produce atheists and democrats. I never saw so many infidels disconnected from the real world, actually, gathered in one place, than at a university.
Academia needs serious reforming.
My jobs while in college: 1)Bagboy at a supermarket, 2)Night auditor at Ramada, 3) Two summers working for Mobil Oil as a Summer Roustabout, 4) Summer Camp Counselor, 5) Worked Christmas holidays at Service Merchandise. At the end of my college, I only owed $1000, which I could’ve paid off my first paycheck after graduating. However, mom and dad told me to make the $30 payments because the interest was only 3%.
We looked into this. There’s only about a 3-5% acceptance rate to the college. My kids could definitely do it and are qualified, but it’s pretty hard to gain entry.
It certainly is but you don't need college courses to do it!
It's a lot harder to work your way through college now than when you did it. A representative quotation of the author's argument: "[T]he average student in 1979 could work 182 hours (a part-time summer job) to pay for a year's tuition. In 2013, it took 991 hours (a full-time job for half the year) to accomplish the same."
I actually had a friend whose son went there-wasn’t much of a worker; got booted. His dad was some kinda po’d!
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