How to Make College Cheaper
怎樣才能讓大學更便宜一些
Better management would allow American universities to do more with less
改善下管理就能讓美國大學少花錢多辦事
Derek Bok, a former president of Harvard, once observed that “universities share one characteristic with compulsive gamblers and exiled royalty: there is never enough money to satisfy their desires.” This is a bit hard on compulsive gamblers and exiled royals. America’s universities have raised their fees five times as fast as inflation over the past 30 years. Student debt in America exceeds credit-card debt. Yet still the universities keep sending begging letters to alumni and philanthropists.
哈佛前校長德里克·博克曾經(jīng)注意到，“大學與病態(tài)性賭徒和流亡皇族們有一個共同特征：永遠沒有足夠的錢來滿足他們的欲望�！边@對于病態(tài)性賭徒和流亡皇族們未免有些刻薄。在過去30年中，美國大學提高費用的速度是通貨膨脹速度的5倍。在美國的學生債務超過信用卡債務。然而，大學依然向校友們和慈善家們發(fā)募捐信。
This insatiable appetite for money was bad enough during the boom years. It is truly irritating now that middle-class incomes are stagnant and students are struggling to find good jobs. Hence a flurry of new thinking about higher education. Are universities inevitably expensive? Vance Fried, of Oklahoma State University, recently conducted a fascinating thought experiment, backed up by detailed calculations. Is it possible to provide a first-class undergraduate education for $6,700 a year rather than the $25,900 charged by public research universities or the $51,500 charged by their private peers? He concluded that it is.
在經(jīng)濟景氣的年份，這種對金錢貪得無厭的胃口讓人厭煩。而在目前中產(chǎn)階級收入縮水、學生為找一份好工作絞盡腦汁之際，這種胃口簡直是讓人憤怒。因此也就有了一陣對高等教育的重新思考。大學是不是非要如此昂貴呢?最近，俄克拉荷馬州立大學的Vance Fried完成了一個迷人的思維實驗(有詳細計算支持)。提供第一流的本科教育僅花費6700美元，而非公立研究型大學收取的25900美元或私立研究型大學收取的51500美元，這是否可能?Vance Fried認為答案是肯定的。
Mr Fried shunned easy solutions. He insisted that students should live in residential colleges, just as they do at Harvard and Yale. He did not suggest getting rid of football stadiums (which usually pay for themselves) or scrimping on bed-and-board.
Vance Fried回避了簡單的解決方案。他認為學生應當在寄宿制大學學習生活——正如哈佛和耶魯現(xiàn)在那樣。他并沒有建議去掉足球場(足球場可以自給自足)或者節(jié)省膳宿費用。
His cost-cutting strategies were as follows. First, separate the funding of teaching and research. Research is a public good, he reasoned, but there is no reason why undergraduates should pay for it. Second, increase the student-teacher ratio. Business and law schools achieve good results with big classes. Why not other colleges? Mr Fried thinks that universities will be able to mix some small classes with big ones even if they have fewer teachers. Third, eliminate or consolidate programmes that attract few students. Fourth, puncture administrative bloat. The cost of administration per student soared by 61% in real terms between 1993 and 2007. Private research universities spend $7,000 a year per student on “administrative support”: not only deans and department heads but also psychologists, counsellors, human-resources implementation managers and so on. That is more than the entire cost of educating a student under Mr Fried’s scheme.
他削減開支的策略如下。第一，將教學和學術(shù)研究的資金分離開來。他認為，學術(shù)研究是一種公益，不過大學生就應當為此買單毫無道理可言。第二，增加學生與老師人數(shù)的比率。商學院和法學院上的是大課，但是收效更佳。其他學院為什么就不能呢?Vance Fried認為，即便學校的老師再少一些，大學也能夠?qū)⒃S多小班跟大班混在一起。第三，剔除或者加強那些不能很好吸引學生的課程。第四，削弱行政膨脹。實際上，行政管理的費用在1993年至2007年之間上漲了61%。私立研究型大學一年在每位學生“行政支持”上要花掉7000美元。所謂行政支持，對象不僅有院長、系主任，還有心理學家、輔導員、人事科的執(zhí)行人員等等。這比Vance Fried方案下培養(yǎng)一位學生的全部費用都要多。
Veteran university-watchers may dismiss Mr Fried’s ideas as pie in the sky. (“The only part of college not mired in tradition is the price,” grumbles Ben Wildavsky, a co-editor of “Reinventing Higher Education”.) Yet some universities are beginning to squeeze costs. The University of Minnesota’s new campus in Rochester has defined teaching as “job one”. The Harrisburg University of Science and Technology has abolished tenure and merged academic departments. Regents at the University of Texas are talking about a $10,000 undergraduate degree.
資深大學觀察家或許會對Vance Fried的主意不屑一顧，認為那是天方夜譚。(《重塑高等教育》的合著者Ben Wildavsky批評說，大學價錢飆升，其余的東西保持傳統(tǒng)，改革阻力很大)。不過，一些大學正在開始擠壓成本。明尼蘇達州大學在羅切斯特市的新校區(qū)已經(jīng)將教學定義為“第一工作”。哈里斯堡科技大學已經(jīng)廢除了終身職位并合并了學術(shù)部門。德克薩斯大學的校董們開始談論10000美元的本科學位。
Mr Fried fails to mention an obvious source of savings. Americans could complete their undergraduate degrees in three years (as is normal elsewhere), instead of four. In practice, most American students take even longer than four years, not least because so many work to pay their tuition. Surprisingly, America’s future chainsaw-wielding corporate titans take a leisurely two years to complete their MBAs; most Europeans need only one.
Vance Fried忘了提及一種顯而易見的節(jié)省開支的渠道。美國人可以用3年取得本科學位，而不是4年。(在其他國家也很正常)。實際上，許多美國人取得學位的時間都要超過4年——尤其是因為要做許多工作來支付學費。奇怪的是，美國未來的企業(yè)巨頭需兩年，方可從容完成MBA學位，大多數(shù)歐洲人只需要1年。
Shai Reshef, an educational entrepreneur-turned-philanthropist, is pioneering an even more radical idea. His University of the People offers free higher education (not counting the few hundred dollars it costs to process applications and mark exams), pitching itself to poor people in America and the rest of the world. The university does this by exploiting three resources: the goodwill of academic volunteers who want to help the poor, the availability of free “courseware” on the internet and the power of social networking. Some 2,000 academic volunteers have designed the courses and given the university some credibility. Tutors direct the students, who so far number 1,000 or so and hail from around the world, to the online courses. They also help to organise them into study groups, and then supervise from afar, dropping in on discussions and marking tests. Mr Reshef pays for incidental expenses with $2m of his own money and donations.
一位受過教育的企業(yè)家出身的慈善家Shai Reshef提出了更為激進的觀點。他的人民大學提供免費高等教育(過程應用和改卷子的數(shù)百美元不算在內(nèi))，向美國和世界其他地方的窮人推銷自己的學校。這所大學利用三種資源來運轉(zhuǎn)：想要幫助窮人的學術(shù)志愿者的善意、互聯(lián)網(wǎng)上可獲得的免費“課件”和社交網(wǎng)絡。約2000個學術(shù)志愿者設計了課程，使大學有了一些信譽。指導老師們將那些迄今已有1000左右來自世界各地的學生帶到網(wǎng)絡課程。老師們同樣幫助學生組織學習小組，在遠方監(jiān)督他們，不時加入探討、進行考試。Shai Reshef額外支付200萬的花費，這些錢來自自己的腰包或者募捐。
There are plenty of questions about Mr Reshef’s project. Can you really build a university on volunteerism and goodwill? Can students really be relied upon to do most of the teaching themselves? Will free courseware remain free? (Newspapers that used to give away content online are now putting up pay barriers.)
關(guān)于Shai Reshef的項目有諸多疑問。大學能真正地建立在志愿者服務和善意上嗎?學生們是否真正能夠自己完成那些教學?免費的課件會一直免費嗎?(過去其內(nèi)容在網(wǎng)上免費派送的報紙現(xiàn)在紛紛設置支付障礙)
Mr Reshef’s university has yet to win accreditation, which could take years. But he can take comfort from Clayton Christensen’s classic book “The Innovator’s Dilemma”. Mr Christensen points out that innovators often start by offering products that are cheaper, but markedly inferior. Quickly, however, they learn how to improve their offerings. Even if Mr Reshef fails, there are plenty of other disruptive innovators around. In America, one tertiary student in ten already studies exclusively online. One in four does so at least some of the time, and a growing number of bodies, including elite universities, think-tanks, governments and international organisations, are putting first-rate material online.
Shai Reshef的大學目前還在資格鑒定中，這可能會耗時數(shù)年。不過，他能夠從克萊頓·克里斯坦森的經(jīng)典大作《創(chuàng)新者的窘境》中獲取慰藉�？死锼固股赋�，創(chuàng)新者經(jīng)常從提供價廉物不美的產(chǎn)品起步。不過，很快他們就學會改進他們的產(chǎn)品。即便Shai Reshef失敗了，依然存在許多有破壞性的創(chuàng)新者。在美國，十分之一的受高等教育學生已經(jīng)完全通過網(wǎng)絡學習。四分之一的學生至少在某段時間通過網(wǎng)絡學習。不斷增加的實體，如精英大學、智囊、政府和國際組織將一流的資料放到網(wǎng)上。
The coming campus rumpus
即將到來的大學爭吵
Sometimes when academics grouse that there is “never enough money”, they are justified – big science costs big bucks. But higher education is nevertheless marred by inefficiencies and skewed incentives. Students pay to be taught, but their professors are rewarded almost entirely for research. Mr Fried’s calculations suggest that one can slash costs without sacrificing much that students value. Mr Reshef’s experiment may fail, but there is no doubt that universities need more experimenters. The cost of tuition cannot forever rise faster than students’ ability to pay. Industries that cease to offer value for money sooner or later get shaken up. American universities are ripe for shaking.
有些時候，當一些學者抱怨說“錢總是不夠”時，他們是情有可原的——科學研究耗資巨大。然而，高等教育還是陷入了低效率和刺激不當?shù)哪嗄�。學生們?yōu)槭芙逃脱�，而他們的教授卻幾乎完全從科研中得到回報。Fried的計算表明，可以削減成本，同時不犧牲學生所珍視的那些東西。Reshef的實驗或許會失敗，不過大學毫無疑問需要更多的實驗者。學費的增長不能一直超過學生的支付能力。不再能為(消費者花的)錢提供價值的行業(yè)一定遲早面臨巨變。美國大學作出改變的時機已經(jīng)成熟。
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