Finance & Policy News

Hardwick-Day searches for and posts stories here from (mostly) outside the higher-education media. The focus is on angles specific to college finance, family finances, public policy, and issues in the greater economy that affect colleges. The firm also fishes for stories in the popular media that are likely to grab the attention of our clients' potential students and their parents. Are you keeping up with what "your" parents are reading?

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High unemployment and the education deficit (Reuters)
2 days 16 hours ago

The idea of lining up shovel-ready jobs with stimulus money may sound good, but our economy is not a shoveling one. ...the churning of labor markets revealed by the unemployment gap between holders of a bachelor degree and those with a high school diploma reflects more than a stimulus. Hard times bring a sharper definition of the U.S. comparative advantage.  As we observe the shuttering of some businesses and the stability or expansion of others, we are seeing U.S. economic muscle laid bare. And, what we see is a knowledge-based economy.
Online donations fight student debt (Politics Daily)
4 days 16 hours ago

[Jim Day] has discussed scholarship websites in meetings with clients, but the discussions are often short-lived-partly because colleges want to respect each student regardless of financial status.  "They try hard to make sure each student feels herself to be, and is seen as, a full member of the campus community, with aid status invisible except between the student and the aid office."  
Textbooks: Sympathy for the debt-laden (Boston Globe Editorial)
4 days 16 hours ago

[The Higher Education Opportunity Act] doesn’t alter the underlying problem — that professors and universities lack strong incentives to minimize the burden on students. Even so, educators should see paring down those required reading lists as a duty to their debt-laden pupils. They should also investigate more imaginative alternatives.
U.S. falls in graduate rankings (Washington Post)
1 week 2 days ago

Canada is now the global leader in higher education among young adults, report shows.
Avoid costly colleges to graduate debt free (Boston Globe)
1 week 2 days ago

Zac Bissonnette, a student at University of Massachusetts at Amherst, blogger and author of the recently published book "Debt-Free U" [writes] "If you look at sending your kid to an expensive elite school in terms of an investment, it just doesn't make sense...It's simply an emotional appeal, and looking at the facts, you would never make a similiar deal that involves taking a mortgage on your house."
Govt cuts thousands of college work-study jobs (US News)
1 week 3 days ago

The title is a bit alarmist.  "A spokesman for the Department of Education said the number of subsidized campus jobs has simply dropped back to its historical norm after climbing because of a temporary influx of stimulus funding."  But it's still bad news.  The number of federally-funded work-study college jobs nationwide will drop by 162,000 for the 2010-2011 academic year. 
Burned-out students choose a time out (Boston Globe)
1 week 5 days ago

Burned out at 18!  "While there is no data showing how many Americans opt for a gap year, some admissions deans say they are seeing an increase this year following more publicity about the benefits of delaying enrollment".  Some schools are promoting and even sponsoring gap years. 
Do state constitutions really require free public higher education? (Greensboro News & Record)
1 week 5 days ago

This editorial writer has figured out on his own what was first documented by a Lilly Foundation-sponsored study in 1991—that less affluent families subsidize affluent ones when it comes to public higher ed.  Are there constitutional "outs" at the state level from paying taxes to provide “free” education at public universities?  Will rising taxes and deficits be the forces that burst the HE bubble for public systems?  Could this guy be the Tea Partier in the coal mine?    
A modest proposal for improving a dull game (WSJ)
1 week 5 days ago

One of the best policy analysts going--and the most entertaining for sure---is P.J.


Most public colleges face budget cut threats in 2011 (US News)
2 weeks 4 days ago

To help parents and students understand what they can expect from public colleges around the country, U.S.News & World Report has combined data on the economic and budgetary strength of each state with funding for each state's public university system to show which state systems will likely face budget pressure in the coming 18 months.