Stanford cancels plans to bring half of undergrads back to campus

The real “fat” is the admin bloat at most universities. Most schools will continue to be in a precarious financial situation until that fat is cut, imho.

Assuming I take 12 classes a year and my classes average 15 students each, that puts the cost of providing a single class at $58,750.

What the heck is going on for universities to have such an insane cost structure.

Kind of missing the point of what it means to "get it under control"

Read about 'flattening the curve'.

You will have spread no matter what you do. The question is how much.

If prevalence of the virus is high, then the risk of spread is higher. At a high level of prevalence any systematically repeating and mixing groupings of people (such as school) is pretty much guaranteed to lead to an outbreak, which will stop or at least seriously disrupt and hinder that system (not to mention the sick and dead people from the outbreak).

At a low level or prevalence outbreaks will still occur, but only here and there. Some schools will have outbreaks and have to stop, but most will be able to keep going.

Widely available tests with fast turnaround is also part of this because it allows outbreaks to be detected earlier, when they are much smaller, which limits the disruption each outbreak causes (not to mention the deaths and sickness).

The point of all this is to have most of our normal activities and economy until a safe and effective vaccine is widely available.

Did they confirm this? I could also see issues with someone asymptomatic who was quarantined, but was at the 99th percentile for incubation period. With an R0 near 1, with enough people, you could miss the virus for even a few months.

It's really hard to contain, and NZ will likely be dealing with case like this on and off until there's a vaccine.

It's definitely an existential threat to the system. The reason unis might survive are 1) government aid direct and indirect 2) Unis have otherwise heavily incumbent positions and the banks will provide money, maybe on ugly terms.

Most colleges are panicking right now, this is not the kind of situation they are in any way equipped to handle.

[1] https://www.newser.com/story/289974/2/colleges-face-existent...

I'm curious: under what conditions do you think the threat to Carolina (and other similar regional flagship schools) becomes "existential"?

E.g. classes go online for the Fall semester sometime in Spring, with little hope of reopening the campus for Spring.

Forever to thee.

I would much rather just suck it up and enter the workforce at this point. I don't know what I'd do with myself for the year, and I don't have enough credits to speedrun my degree in the spring. There's also some conflicting information about if I would keep my financial aid. I haven't taken the time to dig into it, because at that point I decided it wasn't worth it.

Before now I would agree with you. From what has been reported schools in Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Oklahoma and Indiana are staying open after large outbreaks. These are elementary and high schools, so maybe it'll be different with universities.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/13/us/schools-quarantined-corona...

"Along with student death, these triggers to campus closure include “significant actions” by the governor or other public officials, sharply diminished hospital capacity, testing shortages on campus and unmanageable, widespread clusters of cases."

I’m in university right now. I just finished a term of online classes. I’ve definitely witnessed those benefits being enjoyed by other students but I haven’t had the time to enjoy them myself; my program is simply too difficult for that. The most I’ve enjoyed is going out for drinks with friends once a week, and maybe the occasional meal out on another night.

The ones joining frats, partying constantly, playing sports and all that must have trivial classes. Either that or they’re already so rich and privileged that they can afford to fail courses and keep going.

Happens to people who move to different countries too.

Common enough in basic training that it's got a nickname as well. https://afwm.org/life-during-bmt/bmt-illnesses/

Yes, they can, and do. And they are overwhelmingly likely to have nothing more than a mild illness. The danger has been drastically exaggerated.

In the US, fewer than 300 people under the age of 25 have died from Covid:

https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid_weekly/index.htm

Moreover, when you look at the data, nearly all of those deaths have significant co-morbidities.

Well good luck communicating with other people because is not how anyone else anywhere uses the word ‘trade’.

They’re not ‘trades’ they’re ‘professions’.

And I would guess you already know this and you’re trying to be contrary rather than you’re genuinely misunderstanding a basic word.

I never seen anyone talk about medicine as a trade nor mean doctor when they said trade.

The incentives (mostly via credit, but also social incentive) for regular college is already super-high... as is the incentive of colleges that receive this credit as payment.

You would need to overcome that with even bigger incentives... creating the same inflation problem, but now for trade schools. If you don't, trade schools have to compete with colleges funded by the ever increasing student loan complex.

Imagine a country that has a suburban housing policy similar to the college education policy. Contractors get subsidies, donations, grants. Buyers have access to easy, no money down, no question mortgages backed by a government. Prices inflate. Houses get bigger. A massive debt pool keeps growing.

You say: "this is really inefficient. Don't some of you want downtown apartments instead?" This isn't going to work while competing with the other housing system... no matter how reasonable the plan is. Throw in a stigma about apartment-dwellers... your plan is now doomed.

Unless students are paying out of pocket (student loan schemes don't count), then you need price controls.

This is part of the reason why I think the level of investment needs to remain high. College performs a complex task. It can't just be replaced by coursera.

I do think that in-person lectures, course design and such need a total overhaul. Modern technology does change the equation. In-person lectures no longer make sense, for example. That doesn't mean in-person college doesn't make sense.

1. Anecdotal evidence that you know a few people that didn't grow up for whatever reason does not mean everyone is like that.

2. In most asian culture, people live with their parents for the entirety of life. Somehow according to you more than half the world's population is cowards. I digress because we're talking about american colleges and living in America but it still baffles me that someone educated like you would think there is nothing wrong with a stupid argument using selection bias.

I dunno honestly. Maybe it is different elsewhere, but the college was the most uniform place I have been at. I am not complaining, I liked the experience and did fit in. But it was not diversity in literally any sense of the word.

I agree that the spending time immersed in the university environment is one of the most important parts of the college experience, but you don't have to get expensively kenneled on campus to do that, just spend time on campus with interesting people and interesting organizations.

I would only suggest most people deal with on-campus housing if it is being primarily paid for by a scholarship or grant they won't have to pay back and/or their circumstances don't offer a good alternative. If you're attending a school where there is an option for family (or whatever) that can provide you with a non-distracting environment and a _short_ commute for cheap, do that for a year. Once you establish a cohort of known-reliable friends with similar needs, rent with them, or pick up a modest apartment. I will say, IMO, renting with unknown quantity randos from a campus-predator slumlord _is_ a worse option to university housing, it includes both sets of disadvantages.

I'm also of the opinion that you have a substantial number of gen-eds you still have to take (not covered by APs, etc.), and they won't be paid for by a scholarship, do a year or so at a community college. It will be cheaper and better than the university service courses - gigantic sections taught from materials outsourced to ed-tech carpetbaggers, supervised by disinterested graduate students with alarming English skills, optimized to extract tuition from kids who statistically won't make it. I say this after years of discovering my students who took their early calculus sequence at community college, embarrassingly, tend to be more mathematically literate than the ones who did it at the university. I'm not yet convinced if that is because the ones that had the maturity to do it that way are predisposed and/or usually a little older, or the quality of the early sequence at [intentionally unnamed university] are really that poor.

this might be true of the people you know, but I hope you don't think it holds in general. at the state school I went to, room and board cost the same amount as the in-state tuition itself. for a lot of families, this is not "minimal". if your parents have a spare room and already cook dinner every night, this almost doubles the cost of your education.

if your parents treat you like an adult (ie, you control your schedule, no curfew, etc.), there's no reason why you can't get the full college experience as a commuter.

I did exactly that. Lived at home, attended college, and also worked nearly full time to pay for school. I graduated with nearly no debt, and the the day after graduating college moved out with a good job.

Not sure how that makes someone a coward or afraid to go outside their small circle. Some of the people I went to HS with all went to the same big state school so they could actually stay in the their small circle. Once done, they moved back to where we grew up, are still in the same small circle, and have/had large college debt to go along with it.

I haven't seen anyone from HS in over 15 years, and have lived and traveled all over. I would be cautious to paint people making financially prudent decisions with such a broad brush.

Such strong words! In many countries, it is totally normal to stay at home with your parents and attend a college in your hometown, especially if it is a big enough city with many colleges.

My husband and I both worked our way through college. I didn't get the social experience at school. There is nothing like working for your degree to keep you laser focused on the reason why you are going to college.

We were both reasonably paid for working class jobs as he was a machinist and I was an electronic technician. Post graduate was so much better - he in mechanical engineering and I in software engineering.

Most of our socialization came on the job. We were both lucky enough to work for great companies with wonderful people.

How dare you place judgement on other people's circumstances. Moving away from your family to immerse yourself in your studies is certainly one way to grow as a person, but far from the only way.

Maybe someone has to take care of a family member and can't realistically do that, even if they wanted to. However, taking classes while also taking care of a family member, is that a coward or someone strong?

Maybe someone already knows the path they want to take in life and they see the cost of room and board as an unnecessary expense they can instead save to buy a condo elsewhere. Is that person a coward for being focused or strong?

Maybe someone needs a familiar support network such as a strong family to thrive academically. Is that person a coward for being self aware or strong?

How many people did you meet your freshman year who you thought in the back of your mind, wow they really should have taken a gap year. All they did was waste money on tuition and room and board while they partied and failed courses. Are all these people strong for making lifelong friendships against their better judgement or cowards?

So many reasons why people chose the path they do, I could keep going on here. I would have thought someone getting a liberal arts education would be open minded to other experiences. It sounds like you judge people who not follow in your footsteps, and for that, how dare you!

In reality, required room and board (usually for freshmen) is merely a way for colleges to make money. The whole "experience" angle is a pretext, but not the real reason. I'm glad my undergrad did not require it.[1] I don't doubt some people benefit from it, but I'm sure most don't. Anecdotally, those who stayed in dorms were more likely to party a lot more and be less focused on studies - lots of distractions. I personally knew quite a few who eventually moved off campus for the sole purpose of eliminating those distractions because their grades were dropping.

[1] I did not stay with family, I paid rent in an apartment. Definitely cheaper. The amusing thing is we folks who had our own apartment generally perceived those who stayed on campus as being less mature. They had meal plans, etc, whereas we were responsible for cooking, etc. I forget what else those who lived on campus had spoon fed to them, but it went beyond just meals.

I don't know when the last time you've lived in dorms was, but they're glorified summer camps for adolescents. Having meal plans and an RA aren't exactly badges of courage.

If you don't come from means or have parents that will help pay for you to move out, then taking on living expenses to study is not exactly a good financial choice.

This is also a description of summer camp.

Your experience is true for some and false for others. That's the nature of anecdotes. I moved off campus to save a couple bucks and be "independent" and "spartan" but I missed out on a lot of stuff. I could have been closer to extracurriculars, I could have joined a frat. I get that not everyone has the resources for this stuff, but many do, and we're missing out on something if they can't experience it.

As I said, I have one of these degrees, and have hired and worked with many people with such degrees.

First, I agree that the math and (particularly) the statistics classes are useful. Finance and accounting too, in theory, though the vast majority do not seem to internalize much. Business pretty minimal though. A 3-4 years business degree comes with less math education than the first year of an engineering degree, chemistry, physics, etc.

Also.. the majority of business degrees today allow students to avoid most math altogether... and most students do this. The whole thing is continuously moving downmarket. Most business degrees (graduate & undergraduate) are not recognised BAs anymore.

"The market" wants easy degrees with no math. They also don't want accounting or finance. This leaves just the nonsense.

IMO, at this point, most business degrees are less useful than history, philosophy, etc. Graduate salaries are about the same.

That's right. It's like using a lever to lift that barbell isn't going to make you stronger. Training your brain requires effort, just like training your muscles.

Might as well cut the S and M off that because most people who get a science degree probably aren't working in the filednwithout higher education and even the there's so few jobs available. Most people with math education probably aren't working directly in mathematics, but at least you can make the argument that there are other fields where math is related enough to be somewhat useful.

Most business courses are literally fake. The stuff being taught was invented in order to be taught. Quite a lot of it is learning the meaning of terms that were invented in order to be taught. It's not that there aren't real business subjects. Finance and accounting are real subjects. Economics is a real subject, in the sense that philosophy is a real subject. Statistics, etc.

The trend is (and has been for decades) to teach mostly (or only) fluff courses.

The bottom third of these things are functional equivalents of diploma mills. Ask business graduates over a pint. Most will admit it.

I disagree in that many of the other topics have a real academic history and tradition, involve the expression of genuinely important ideas. Being immersed in that for years has value: in the facts learned, the overall experience, and an appreciation for aspects of the world that you might not have understood or appreciated before.

The fact that that arts degrees often have a very good return on investment /might/ be because they are a waste of time and irrelevant but it seems like the preponderance of evidence indicates that they are not a complete waste of time. https://cew.georgetown.edu/cew-reports/collegeroi/

Pushing students towards STEM and trade schools is probably not a good idea, creating markets that actually work properly and then letting the students sort all that out for themselves seems like a better way.

You are drawing a line that is convenient to your argument.

I have an engineering degree, and worked for a bunch of years in my discipline. As part of the degree, I had to take 3 calculus courses and one differential equations course. Never needed them on the job. I took 2 circuits courses, 3 electronics courses, 2 communications courses, 2 E&M courses, 1 control theory course, and 1 microcontrollers course - all part of my major. About half were mandatory (not electives). Of these, only 2 courses were relevant for my job. I could have done it as effectively as I did without taking all those other courses.

Amongst engineers, my engineering experience is not an outlier. My experience is the norm. Even while I was in college that was the feedback I would get from people in industry: Most of the engineering courses are useless for your job, and getting the degree is merely a formality and not much of an indicator of knowledge/expertise. The whole "a degree shows you can commit to something for a dedicated amount of time" is mostly a post hoc justification.

Your argument that a "small fraction" of people who study them actually go on to use them applies very well to engineering degrees. I suspect they would apply equally well to CS degrees as well. I mean, I'm the perfect example. I took very little CS in school, but make a living as a SW professional.

Most people I know who got math degrees (but not a PhD) use almost none of it in their jobs - even the technical jobs. Ditto for physics. Should we do away with these as well?

In general, look at all the people who have a BS degree in something other than CS and are working in the SW industry. Look at their degrees. While engineers like me often actually do go on to become engineers, for probably all other majors (math, physics, literature, philosophy, etc) you'll find they rarely get a job in their discipline.

I've lived in countries where those subjects are usually not offered in universities. It really sucks. You usually end up with 2 scenarios:

A class full of people who don't care about the subject but are taking it because society has deemed that what they are interested in is not to be taught in universities. This often results in a lowering of the standards to appease them (who are often in the majority). Indeed, many math majors in the US complain about this - calculus, diff eq and linear algebra are usually taught to cater to engineers, and not math majors.

Or you'll get the other extreme, where the standards are made unnecessarily tight to keep those people out, but in effect also then prevent decent students who are interested in the topic from studying it.

I also agree that it's a problem that a lot of people are going into college just because they don't have any other ideas and it's seen as a respectable thing to do. I think the main cause is that our society doesn't give nearly enough support to people entering the workforce, and is oddly determined for people to move from being a full-time student to a full-time worker, with nothing in between.

I think while the correlation may be weaker than what some claim, it is still there. To put it another way, I have seen very few cases of students who hated the field, were force-fed it and then would turn it a successful career. And a few that would do that tend to look for opportunities to change course. Being really interested in a subject is a great encouragement to acquire deep knowledge, not just a good grade. And such deep knowledge can bring benefits for the rest of the life.

As an example: I have a PhD in math but "tossed it" and went to work writing software and algorithms. My employers never cared about my PhD. I never used much of the "PhD" math I learned in grad school and I probably forgot most of it. Computing a homology group? Topological entropy? Forget it.

But was the PhD a waste? I do not think so! As a side effect of being in grad school, teaching undergrad classes and arguing with friends doing math and physics I became friends with many fields and learned techniques that still serve me well. So definitely no regrets for me for spending 5 years learning things I did not directly use afterwards.

I do agree with your last point -- we should not be telling students that anything they study will lead them to success after graduation. They should choose a field with some applications. But among the multitude of such fields they should choose one they genuinely like. My 2c.

Remember, success is way more than half luck. Going to Harvard makes your luck much better.

That Harvard Rolodex will get you a job even if your degree barely certifies that you have a pulse.

The idea that "social desirability" does not reflect actually valuable stuff is foolish. Class exists in some form in every society. People are always hyper-aware of class issues, and it has always been a primary part of the college/career decision process.

This is not unlike the required courses that predominate pre-major studies at a traditional university (in the U.S., at least)

You can start college at 20 as easily as at 18. The problem is that you get nothing for the two years (except, I suppose, you can work as an electrician to pay for college, instead of working at McDonalds).

There are art degrees, for artists, not people expecting to make well paying careers out of it.

But the trades also include indoor trades such as medical technicians and assistants.

So, given the rising costs of Health Care and College both situations are good examples of this. The rising 'costs' are more people in administration. This could be blamed on regulation among other issues (greed).

As for voting in their self interests, I live in California now. University of California is the #1 employer in this State. This doesn't happen by chance. It happens due to stakeholders. Many people in this States want an 'easy' and 'stable' job. The easiest way to do this is require more red tape (regulation/'initiatives'/etc), in the name of 'progress' and then now you just created a 'stable and easy' job to make sure certain quotas are reach.

Professors and students lose out due to admin workers are more aggressive on making the government enrich their interests.

IMHO since removing the gold standard (1970s), this problem came up. I'm glad you have been able to but that possibility was shrinking every year. Less and less people were able to do what you did, starting in the 70s. Financial college administrators kept up with inflation whereas jobs didn't. Income didn't. Expenses took a little time to catch up with inflation as well. So, that might've been why for your situation. It wasn't extremely prohibitive but the issue compounds every year.

Only people I see having kids are those with strong, secure incomes, or those with no prospects at all. The cohort in the middle earning $40k to $120k doesn’t feel secure enough, or at least not until their 30s.

And as you said, a significant part of the begining of the year simply covers what was done the previous year. I'd prefer they simply provided a summer curriculum of 2 or 3 hours a week of such work if review is necessary, which would also eliminate the complete discontinuity from one scho year to the next. I'm fortunate that We can do so on our own, piecing together that sort of thing, but plenty of working parents have neither the time, or ability, or inclination to compose their own mini summer curriculum.7

College students can easily spread it to vulnerable populations.

1. Some live at home.

2. Some will go shopping. Some in places without mask mandates.

3. Older professors and staff (custodial, food services, advisors) will be pressured to work (you probably can't just say "I'm not teaching" without quitting).

4. Some may need to use public transit to get to the school. Again also in some places without mask mandates.

5. And of course, some students are vulnerable. Many schools are not allowing remote work when they open.

Add in dorms being super spreader environments and you've got disasters waiting to happen.

not everyone needs to, or can, move across the country for school living in their own place right out of high school

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/07/brain-fog-heart-dama...

https://newsnetwork.mayoclinic.org/discussion/long-term-symp...

https://www.statnews.com/2020/08/12/after-covid19-mental-neu...

There are studies looking at permanent changes to various bodily systems - see for example, this one finding cardiac differences in recovered patients:

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamacardiology/fullarticle/...

There are similar concerns for liver damage, reduced lung capacity, and neurological effects.

Obviously it’s too soon to have high precision numbers for this or level of impact on the rest of someone’s life but it definitely means that the deniers’ favorite framing of the outcomes as 99% ok, 1% fatal is leaving out a lot for the sake of political correctness.

And so does poo-pooing risk when you have no actual numbers.

Every infectious disease expert I've heard from is puzzled by this disease. The variance of individual outcomes from expected norms is simply impossible to predict. Taking unnecessary risk is the act of a fool.

If you or your close ones invite even a small chance of a dire outcome, then you play it safe. And you hope your good neighbors will be likewise considerate.

[1] https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamacardiology/fullarticle/...