Southern standard. (McMinnville, Tenn.) 1879-current, 1885-08-01
REFORM IN COLLEGE EXPENSES.
Increase in the Cost of an Education-An
Objectionable System.

Increase in the Cost of an Education-An
Objectionable System.
Boston Herald
The improvement of college instruc-
tionS in the last quarter of a century
has been both rapid and significant.
The great institutions like Harvard and
Yale have gained something like the
breadth and enrichment that belong to
Oxford and Cambridge. They have led
the way in the advance movement for
liberal education, and hundred in
ferior institutions have followed their
example. This is a great gain, for
which the whole country is thankful.
But the increase in college expenses,
which are now nearly double what they
were twenty-five years ago, is not a cor
responding gain, but a serious burden,
both to the colleges and to those who
desire to educate their sons
Some increase in tuition is to be ex-
pected as a return for the increased
facilities furnished, but this is no
ground for complaint. 1t is legitimate.
The present cost for the average student
at Harvard and Yale is 81 900 a year.
He cannot 20 through college respect
ably at much lower rate. This is
twice the sum that it cost in 1860.
The strictly college expenses cannot
now be more than third in excess Of
what they were then; the cost of living
is not more than third greater, and
the increased expenses must represent
things which are not set down in COL
lege education, but purely adventurous
to it. They stand for athletics, for
boating, for luxurious living, for class
dues, which are established by men who
have plenty of money and impose their
social habits upon men who are com.
paratiyely without means.
There seems to have grown up in our
leading colleges system by which
students are compelled to put out money
freely for this, that and the other thing,
which have nothing to do with the ends
for which one goes to college The class
decree this or that, which means that
the wealthy men in the class dictate it,
and those who do not fall in with the
plans Of the ruling men, and pay their
part, are severely snubbed. This is the
spirit that has gradually crept into
many OF our best institutions, and has
run up the expenses TO point where
the cost of four years stay in college
has exceeded the means of many who
intend the higher education for their
sons. This explains the increased OK.
penses of the college course, and reveals
state of things that ought not to be
encouraged.
If our institutions of learning mean
anything, they are intended to make
men of education the leaders of thought
and society in democratic communities,
and the men who usually develop into
leaders are the self-made individuals,
who trace their origin to humble and
honest homes in the country The best
thing that our colleges can do is to in
crease the facilities for the education of
these men. They make the bone and
sinew of the country's greatness, and
the excellence of our colleges has been
that alma mater could point to some of
our strongest men in the various walks
of life, and say that they were her chill
, dren. The large increase in college ex.
penses is serious obstacle in the edu.
cation of these men. f