What can we do about the high cost of education?

For a lot of people a post-secondary education is something they consider vitally important to success later in life. Studies have consistently proven that that earning a college or university degree or a skilled trade will exponentially increase the amount of money you will earn. Chances are also likely that you will have a more fulfilling job and will have more career opportunities no matter what you want to do.

As the need for a higher education grows seemingly by the day, so do the hurdles potential scholars need to overcome on their way to a better life.

Some provinces have instituted a tuition freeze, there is no guarantees on regarding how long these niceties will last. During the 1990s, tuition rose at a rate of 9.6% per year—a rate well above inflation. And while the tuition freezes are nice, none of the other (high) costs that students face remain in a range they can easily handle. Everyone knows the saying “starving student,” and for a great deal of people working toward a university education the cliché holds true.

In cities like Calgary and Vancouver, unless you live with your parents the cost of living expenses can be very prohibitive. Almost every Canadian city that contains a university is also seeing a rise in cost of living, making the cost of an education even higher from coast to coast. And already tuition, books and other academic costs only account for roughly 25% of the total cost of a university education!

So, while employers are increasingly requiring their recruits to have strong educations (as high as 70% of all new job opportunities in some provinces), these educations are becoming harder and harder to acquire.

A number of countries throughout the world (Germany, Cuba, etc.) provide post-secondary education to their citizens at a tuition cost of zero, or a nominal charge of a few hundred to a thousand dollars a year. While I don’t pretend to think that this would work as is in Canada, I think we need to strive to lowering the total effective cost for an education in this country. By providing more affordable housing to students (and not just dorms, because dorms suck unless you’re a freshman), we would be making a great first stride toward doing something.

Students have enough on their plate trying to study and get all of their assignments done to worry about the skyrocketing cost of their education.

Like this article? Subscribe and get Too Real articles sent directly to your feed reader or, if that isn't your thing, rock your inbox with an email subscription.