Universities need to rethink their curriculum

in order to lower the cost of tuition and increase the relevance of education

The American university system needs a fundamental rethink of its business model. It faces existential threats that must be overcome in the next generation, including:

• Rapidly growing tuition costs

• Declining number of youths in the 18-23 age range

• Declining percentage of youths within that age range who are choosing to go to college, particularly among boys

• Declining public support for universities

• A declining wage premium for college graduates

• Increasing dependence on foreign student tuition

• A low graduation rate

• Increasing competition from online teaching

• An increasing ideological gap between universities and the general populace

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This article is part of a multi-part series on making university tuition more affordable without undermining the quality of education. As a former college professor, I have some unique insights into the problem and how to solve it.

In previous articles, I made the case that:

• Vocational schools are better than college for most youths.

• To lower the cost of tuition, amenities should be a separate optional line item.

• State legislatures should require public universities to radically cut their bureaucracy.

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The following is an excerpt from my book Promoting Progress: A Radical New Agenda to Create Abundance for All. You can order e-books at a discounted price at my website, or you can purchase for full price on Amazon.

Other books in my “From Poverty to Progress” book series:

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More Required Courses

Another reason for increasing tuition has been the dramatic decline in the number of required courses. A relatively short list of required courses has been replaced by a large number of optional courses from which students can choose.

Freedom of choice seems like a great thing, but it has serious cost implications. Each additional course requires a new professor who is capable of teaching it, and it shrinks the overall number of students per class. As the number of students per class shrinks, the cost per student goes up as well.

In the past, universities had a large number of required courses. Many of these courses revolved around the concept of a liberal arts education, while others were more science and mathematics-oriented.

Starting in the 1960s, universities began to cut back on the number of required courses. Some required courses have been replaced by breadth requirements, whereby students can choose between many classes within a broad category, such as science, social studies, and foreign languages. Other required courses were simply abolished.

Even within majors, students can typically fulfill many of their requirements by choosing between many different classes. So a history major may no longer be required to take a “History of Western Civilization” course. Instead, that student can choose between courses that focus on Latin America, Africa, East Asia, South Asia, or Central Asia.

Finally, most students can also take a large number of completely optional classes on any topic. In many cases, these optional courses are far less challenging than the previously required courses.

The result has been a dramatic increase in the number of classes. Each requires a professor or teaching assistant, so this increased variety leads to increasing costs, which are then passed on to the tuition bill.

While this may seem like a benefit, the typical college student is often overwhelmed with choices. These choices slow down their progression toward a degree, leading to lower graduation rates and five or six years of tuition payments for those who do graduate.

A Common Curriculum

A very simple reform that would save money, increase graduation rates, and improve the quality of education would be to have more required courses in the freshman and sophomore years. Students should choose between coherent, compatible programs, not hundreds of individual courses. This was widespread before the 1960s, but the pressure to give students greater options has led to their decline.

A typical college experience during that time included required courses filling up the first two years of classes. The second two years were reserved for concentrating on required courses within a specific major that was chosen by the student.

Having a common curriculum for the first two years has many advantages. This lowers the number of courses that a university needs to offer, which limits the number of professors that they need to hire. Or universities could hire more professors to shrink class sizes.

I believe that it also creates a better learning experience for students. I personally went through a one-year Technical Writing program at my local community college.

If memory serves correctly, we took courses every day for three hours straight. Every class had different professors, but the same students. Rather than having different courses at different times and different locations, all of the students had their classes in the same room back-to-back. We got to know each other far better than I ever did when it came to students in more traditional college courses. It was a very enjoyable and intellectually challenging environment.

Each university could establish a core curriculum for the first two years that is in line with their academic orientation. This format might encourage universities to experiment in ways they could not do when students all took different courses.

Some universities might focus the core curriculum on a traditional liberal arts education with many courses in philosophy, history, and language. Others might focus on a science-based or technology-based core curriculum.

Some universities might also break the core curriculum into a handful of meta majors, such as arts, social sciences, science/engineering, health care or business, which students can choose between. Alternatively, the core curriculum might cover a little bit of every track to enable students to make an informed choice on their majors.

By the third year, students would have a solid foundation and then be able to take classes in their declared major. There is no reason why the same general philosophy cannot continue within each major. Rather than having many classes to choose from within each major, each student within the same major would be required to take the same courses.

Having the same classes also makes it possible to schedule those classes back-to-back on the same day. Having experience as both a professor and a student who works full-time, I know how inconvenient schedules are when classes are scattered throughout the week. This is a real inconvenience for professors, students who work, who commute from off-campus housing, or who have parental responsibilities. Clustering all the classes together in time and place makes the college experience much more convenient for everyone.

State Universities Should Specialize

State university systems could also benefit from having different common curriculums. The vast majority of public universities are run by state governments. Typically each state has several universities, state colleges, and community colleges within one overall system.

Universities within the same system almost always have roughly the same curriculum. But what if we change that? What if each university specializes in different fields?

To give one example, the California university system consists of ten university campuses, 23 state campuses, and 115 community college campuses. Rather than have each teach roughly the same courses, each campus could focus on one or a handful of related disciplines.

Each campus might offer the same courses for freshman and sophomore years but specialize in a field for students in their final two years.  Students might attend one campus for the first two years, choose a major, and then attend a different campus that offers courses in that subject for their last two years. Or some campuses might specialize in required courses for the first two years.

One big campus in each metro area that focuses on teaching freshmen and sophomores would enable any student to save money by living at home for their first two years. This specialization would reduce costs while enabling students to receive a high-quality education in the field of their interest.

To be clear, I am not arguing that the federal government should force universities to adopt any of these models. I do believe, however, that state legislatures should use the power of the purse strings to force public universities to adopt cost-effective ways to reduce tuition costs, while still maintaining a high-quality learning experience for students. Enabling students to choose between coherent programs rather than hundreds of individual courses will help to do so.

Major-based Tuition

Another very big problem in universities is the number of majors that lead to jobs that pay far below the average income for college graduates. A major reason why governments subsidize universities is that they teach critical skills that are necessary in the workforce. Some skills, however, are far more valuable to society and therefore pay higher wages. Governments and parents pay hefty tuition bills, largely because they believe that it will lead to higher lifetime incomes.

After they graduate from college, however, many youths face underemployment. About 33% of college graduates are underemployed. Particularly among those who do not get a degree in a technical field, a sizable percentage work in relatively low-paying service jobs that do not require a college degree (Federal Reserve Bank of New York).

And this is not always a short-term situation. A sizable percentage of college graduates are still in non-college jobs a decade after graduating (Burning Glass, Strada).

While parents obsess over getting into the right college, in many ways the choice of majors is more important. There is a huge variability in lifetime incomes based on college majors.

The median annual wage of college-educated workers ages 25-59 varied greatly in 2013. It varied between $136,000 for petroleum engineers and $39,000 for early childhood education. By comparison, the average high-school graduate earned $36,000. Not surprisingly, STEM majors did well, as did those who had studied health care and business. Social sciences came out about average (Carnevale).

Universities can potentially play an important role in promoting long-term economic growth by passing on the key skills needed in the economy. The best method of measuring the importance of those skills is to compare the lifetime earnings of their graduates.

Particularly when underemployment is such a widespread problem among college graduates, it will also benefit young people if their chosen major is more focused on viable employment after graduation. Our society tells young people that, in order to be successful, they should “go to college,” but the evidence is clear that this is not enough. Just as important is choosing a major that leads to gainful employment.

Taxpayers also have a vested interest in ensuring that money being spent in state universities goes toward the acquisition of critical skills necessary for economic growth. Public universities should not be solely devoted to promoting long-term economic growth, but it should at least be a part of their goal.

State legislatures should seriously consider charging tuition based on the declared major of the student. They could establish a sliding scale where the majors that paid the highest get the most state support in the form of subsidized tuition. Students who choose majors that lead to jobs that pay well below average would receive no state subsidies. This would mean that they paid higher tuition fees.

The market is very good at rewarding those who learn skills that benefit others. Consumers buy products based on what they want or need. Businesses that produce those products broaden their product range and have a strong incentive to hire more skilled workers to make those products. Over time, this increases the salaries of coveted workers, while not doing so for others.

It is no secret that many students and most parents want a college degree leading to a field that pays well. Unfortunately, many students who choose majors that pay relatively poorly still expect to live a comfortable professional-class lifestyle. If parents are willing to pay for those choices, they should be allowed to, but taxpayers should not be forced to do so too.

Departments that repeatedly produce students who earn incomes well below the average for college graduates should not be subsidized by taxpayers. This does not mean that those departments should be shut down. Those departments can still fundraise from philanthropic sources and alumni. And some professors in those departments will be needed to teach required courses. This would effectively mean that those departments function more like private universities.

Setting up a competition between departments to ensure that their students acquire the skills for long-term success should be encouraged. Currently, departments have no institutional incentive to ensure that students get what they need. This should not spell the end of social sciences or humanities, but it will force them to analyze what their students need to learn in the long run and monitor results.

College Drop-Out Rate

While there is often talk about high-school dropout rates, relatively little is said about the problem of college dropout rates. Only about 40% of those who go to college obtain either a 2-year or 4-year degree by their mid-twenties. Only 19% of full-time students who attend four-year schools graduate within four years. Moreover, only 56% graduate within six years.

Most universities do not mind, because longer time periods increase the level of tuition that they harvest from students. And universities get paid regardless of whether or not a student graduates. The worst possible outcome, not receiving a degree while incurring a large debt load, is becoming increasingly common. This wastes taxpayers’ and parents’ money (Complete College America).

This results in higher levels of college debt and lost wages. Each additional year of four-year college attendance costs $22,826 in higher tuition and living expenses and $45,327 in lost wages. Each additional year for 2-year Associate degrees costs over $50,000 (Complete College America).

Minimum Course Load

One important reason why college students do not graduate is that they are not taking enough courses. Students who take enough courses to graduate within four years have much higher graduation rates than students who take fewer classes (Complete College America).

Universities that require students to take a full course load have much higher graduation rates than universities that do not. In combination with lower spending on amenities and more affordable tuition, this one simple requirement could shift the emphasis of the college experience back to education (Complete College America).

State legislatures should seriously consider mandating all students who enter a four-year public university under the age 25 to enroll in enough courses to graduate within four years. The same requirement should be made for 2-year Associate degrees and 1- to 2-year certificates. In addition, the federal government should mandate that any student who receives tuition subsidies or government-backed loans do the same.

We know that students can do this, because it was a routine schedule in the past. In combination with my previously-discussed reforms, a minimum course load would be possible and effective today.

With lower tuition fees, students will have to work less in gainful employment, giving them more time to focus on their studies. And with fewer on-campus amenities, they will have fewer distractions from their studies. Students who need to work to pay for living expenses will still have plenty of time in the evenings and the summer to work.

Obviously, not all students have the luxury of taking a full course load. Older students, in particular, have family and work obligations. That is why I suggest that, in order to be fair to older students with full-time jobs and family, we should exempt students who first enroll in college at age 25 or higher.

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The above is an excerpt from my book Promoting Progress: A Radical New Agenda to Create Abundance for All. You can order e-books at a discounted price at my website, or you can purchase for full price on Amazon.

Other books in my “From Poverty to Progress” book series: