From Wisconsin to California, the decline of public higher ed continues

One factor underlying the drain of higher education resources is that for many politicians, the value of higher education is an abstraction. They understand — enough to mouth the words, at least — that an educated and well-trained population is a plus for a competitive state. But they don’t have any idea how much that effort can or should cost or how to measure the benefits of a process that unfolds over years, or decades, or a lifetime. So they hack away at the state university budget and raise tuition, which eats into the effectiveness of the institution and places it more out of the reach of middle- and low-income residents, which makes it look more like an institution for the elite, which leads to more budget cutting…you get the drift.

Read full article [here].
by Michael Hiltzik, The Los Angeles Times.

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