These days, a college education isn’t a luxury; it’s a necessity. Workers who need to be more qualified than ever to meet the demands of an evolving job market. Just as college is becoming more important than it’s ever been, it’s also becoming more expensive. The average undergraduate student leaves school with over $26,000 in debt, and interest rates are set to double to 6.8 percent in July.
How can we make higher education more affordable? Recent federal reforms have sought to make student debt easier to bear. Online education could play an important role in lowering higher education costs and improving access.Polls show a majority of people feel that online classes decrease higher education costs while improving accessibility.
The High Cost of Higher Education
More than half of the jobs in the economy’s fastest-growing sectors require a college education, but the United States lags behind other nations in the number of degrees and professional certificates it awards to its students. The cost of higher education is a major obstacle for American students — only 25 percent of low-income students finish college.
Those who do go to college often leave with staggering amounts of debt — an undergraduate degree leaves the average student with $26,600 of debt, but many fields require post-graduate degrees, which means another two to four years or more of debt accumulation. Americans collectively owe more than $1 trillion in student loans — that’s more than they owe in credit card debt.
Making College More Affordable
President Obama has spearheaded a number of federal reforms designed to make higher education more affordable and make student debt easier to bear. As student loan interest rates are set to double to 6.8 percent next month, presidential reforms call for student loan interest rates that more closely match market rates at the time the loan is granted.
Advocates of this plan say it’s more equitable to student borrowers, who are currently paying the highest interest rates applied to any loans in an economy that’s seeing historically low interest rates overall. Of course, to be feasible, the plan will have to include provisions to fix student loan interest rates so that they don’t go up along with overall market rates.
The president has also introduced a new plan that extends income-based repayment plans for student loans, allowing more than 1.6 million students to cap student loan repayment at 10 percent of their total income. President Obama’s plan has set aside $1 billion for education grants and has expanded education tax credits.
Online Courses Could Keep Costs Low
Federal reforms alone can’t do all the work of making college more affordable for those Americans who need it most; our institutions of higher learning must do their part to increase higher education access and affordability for all Americans. According to a poll by USC Dornsife and the Los Angeles Times, a majority of people believe that online education could be the answer.
The USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Time poll interviewed 1,500 California residents from May 27 to June 2, 2013. Fifty-nine percent of those polled expressed the belief that increasing access to online college courses could significantly improve higher education participation and affordability.
Sixty percent of poll respondents older than age 50 expressed a belief that online college courses could make higher education more affordable and increase access. 58 percent of poll respondents ages 18 to 49 concurred. Only 34 percent of those polled appeared concerned that offering increased numbers of online classes to students could devalue college degrees without improving cost.
Many people who take online college classes find them just as valuable as classes taken in a traditional classroom setting. Colleges can afford to offer online classes at a lower cost than traditional classes, since they don’t carry the high overhead costs associated with maintaining a traditional classroom environment.
Online classes also help students avoid the financial setbacks that might accompany leaving the workforce to go to school, since students in online classes can take their courses at night, on weekends or whenever their schedules permit, allowing them to continue working full-time while they earn their degrees.
Students in online courses also save the money they’d spend on gas or other transportation costs associated with commuting to campus. Online college classes allow students to attend courses at universities hundreds of miles away without putting in the time, effort and cost of packing up and moving to go to school.
Higher education is more costly and more essential than ever, and federal student loan reforms can’t entirely relieve the burden on today’s students. Online education is a valuable tool for making higher education more affordable and more accessible for students from all walks of life.
About the Author: Contributing blogger Harry Littlefield holds a Doctor of Education degree. He loved earning his degree online and encourages any readers who are interested in online education to click here for doctorate in education information.