Hockey Advisers

Poll

Should all NCAA sports allow advisers?

Only registered users are allowed to vote for this poll.
35 votes were received.

Yes	27		77%
No	8		23%

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NY Times opinion piece on the NCAA and hockey advisers.

I agree with the author that the sole point of banning agents is to make the kids more tied to the NC$$. Anything to weaken the NC$$'s greedy grip on college sports is OK by me.

This immediately makes me think of the cognitive dissonance involved in the Ivy League: its main purpose was to keep collegiate athletics non-professional, which means it is probably best understood as a cartel designed to keep from having to pay big-time athletes anything at all for the work they do for their respective schools; but now they basically do pay their athletes, which they accomplish by recruiting less-wealthy kids and juicing their financial aid packages. Needless to say, I find this disingenuous, and I think the League's moral high ground illusion is becoming harder and harder to maintain.

Kyle Rose
This immediately makes me think of the cognitive dissonance involved in the Ivy League: its main purpose was to keep collegiate athletics non-professional, which means it is probably best understood as a cartel designed to keep from having to pay big-time athletes anything at all for the work they do for their respective schools; but now they basically do pay their athletes, which they accomplish by recruiting less-wealthy kids and juicing their financial aid packages. Needless to say, I find this disingenuous, and I think the League's moral high ground illusion is becoming harder and harder to maintain.

The question is are the athletes' financial packages "juiced" any more than the cellist's or the molecular biologist's? If not, then I'd argue that the athletes are still safely being kept in a condition of servitude. As they should be -- it's college, not cheer camp.

BTW, the one thing that jumped out at me was this quote:

A rational person might say: What a great system! It makes perfect sense to have agents advise young hockey players as they approach critical life decisions. Naturally, anything this sensible has to violate N.C.A.A. rules.

A "rational" person might say that, sure, if that person was either a shill for agents or completely ignorant of the history of abuses between agents, coaches and athletes going back the last sixty-odd years in college sports.

Trotsky
The question is are the athletes' financial packages "juiced" any more than the cellist's or the molecular biologist's? If not, then I'd argue that the athletes are still safely being kept in a condition of servitude. As they should be -- it's college, not cheer camp.

Sorry, why? Why "safely"? Why "should [they] be"?

BTW, the one thing that jumped out at me was this quote:

A rational person might say: What a great system! It makes perfect sense to have agents advise young hockey players as they approach critical life decisions. Naturally, anything this sensible has to violate N.C.A.A. rules.

A "rational" person might say that, sure, if that person was either a shill for agents or completely ignorant of the history of abuses between agents, coaches and athletes going back the last sixty-odd years in college sports.

Even in the worst of worlds, surely having a choice of masters is better than forcing athletes to deal with a single cartel. Two competing parties trying to screw you—the agents vs. the NC$$—are going to give you a better deal than either in a vacuum.

Kyle Rose

Trotsky
The question is are the athletes' financial packages "juiced" any more than the cellist's or the molecular biologist's? If not, then I'd argue that the athletes are still safely being kept in a condition of servitude. As they should be -- it's college, not cheer camp.

Sorry, why? Why "safely"? Why "should [they] be"?

BTW, the one thing that jumped out at me was this quote:

A rational person might say: What a great system! It makes perfect sense to have agents advise young hockey players as they approach critical life decisions. Naturally, anything this sensible has to violate N.C.A.A. rules.

A "rational" person might say that, sure, if that person was either a shill for agents or completely ignorant of the history of abuses between agents, coaches and athletes going back the last sixty-odd years in college sports.

Even in the worst of worlds, surely having a choice of masters is better than forcing athletes to deal with a single cartel. Two competing parties trying to screw you—the agents vs. the NC$$—are going to give you a better deal than either in a vacuum.

It's not a vacuum, it's a....

Kyle Rose
This immediately makes me think of the cognitive dissonance involved in the Ivy League: its main purpose was to keep collegiate athletics non-professional, which means it is probably best understood as a cartel designed to keep from having to pay big-time athletes anything at all for the work they do for their respective schools; but now they basically do pay their athletes, which they accomplish by recruiting less-wealthy kids and juicing their financial aid packages. Needless to say, I find this disingenuous, and I think the League's moral high ground illusion is becoming harder and harder to maintain.

While the purpose of the Ivy League is a cute bit of history, the current Ivy League is hardly full of big time athletes. Awarding financial aid to athletes on the same terms that other students receive it is not particularly disingenuous. It leaves the same gap of not-rich-enough-but-not-poor-enough that the general student population has.

The NCAA has adopted this cartel strategy whole-hog, though, and is a grotesque parody of amateurism. The word slavery is thrown around a bit too freely, so I won't call it slavery... but the power imbalance between institution and athlete and the byzantine regulations designed to prevent market compensation is about as close as we'll get in the modern era.

Trotsky
I'd argue that the athletes are still safely being kept in a condition of servitude. As they should be -- it's college, not cheer camp.

As for whether the current level of "safe servitude" is fair, I'd say that in the revenue sports it is preposterously unfair. Alabama would willingly spend an order of magnitude more on their football players if they were allowed to. Instead, they have locker rooms full of mahogany, the football coach is the highest-paid state employee, and they spend the money on recruiting baubles instead of directly as salaries. The intraschool spending battle still exists but the only people who don't benefit are the ones getting concussed on a daily basis.

Trotsky
A "rational" person might say that, sure, if that person was either a shill for agents or completely ignorant of the history of abuses between agents, coaches and athletes going back the last sixty-odd years in college sports.

You don't have to be a shill for agents to realize that a cartel deeming "receiving help navigating our stupid rules" a violation of those rules is not acting in the interests of the athletes.

ugarte

Kyle Rose
This immediately makes me think of the cognitive dissonance involved in the Ivy League: its main purpose was to keep collegiate athletics non-professional, which means it is probably best understood as a cartel designed to keep from having to pay big-time athletes anything at all for the work they do for their respective schools; but now they basically do pay their athletes, which they accomplish by recruiting less-wealthy kids and juicing their financial aid packages. Needless to say, I find this disingenuous, and I think the League's moral high ground illusion is becoming harder and harder to maintain.

While the purpose of the Ivy League is a cute bit of history, the current Ivy League is hardly full of big time athletes.

The sports in which the Ivy League is nationally-competitive in a non-trivial sense absolutely are full of big-time athletes. And those are the athletes in question: I'm not talking about basketball or squash. It may be a small minority, but it exists. For example, Cornell is still able to attract top talent to its hockey program because of the recent changes to the financial aid system: Schafer himself said so.

Awarding financial aid to athletes on the same terms that other students receive it is not particularly disingenuous. It leaves the same gap of not-rich-enough-but-not-poor-enough that the general student population has.

The fact that poor non-athletes qualify for the same packages doesn't in any way negate the validity of the observation that financial aid amounts to scholarships for poor athletes in a practical sense. Recruiters just know where to concentrate their efforts.

Trotsky
A "rational" person might say that, sure, if that person was either a shill for agents or completely ignorant of the history of abuses between agents, coaches and athletes going back the last sixty-odd years in college sports.

You don't have to be a shill for agents to realize that a cartel deeming "receiving help navigating our stupid rules" a violation of those rules is not acting in the interests of the athletes.

Agreed.

Kyle Rose

ugarte

Kyle Rose
...but now they basically do pay their athletes, which they accomplish by recruiting less-wealthy kids and juicing their financial aid packages.

While the purpose of the Ivy League is a cute bit of history, the current Ivy League is hardly full of big time athletes.

The sports in which the Ivy League is nationally-competitive in a non-trivial sense absolutely are full of big-time athletes. And those are the athletes in question... Cornell is still able to attract top talent to its hockey program because of the recent changes to the financial aid system: Schafer himself said so.

If the school is "juicing" the financial aid packages for athletes, it is an issue. If athletes are subject to the same formula as any other student, I have no idea why it is problematic that it leads the coaches to focus their efforts on "athletes that can/will attend the school under its current financial aid rules." That's how a smart person allocates resources. It doesn't turn the financial aid into an "athletic scholarship" any more than a similarly situated Hotelie who doesn't play sports could be said to have received an "hotel management scholarship."

I voted "no". Without reading the article because I don't care. And neither does anyone else, really.

PLAY BALL (or PUCK or BIRDIE or WHATEVER)!!!

ugarte

Kyle Rose

ugarte

Kyle Rose
...but now they basically do pay their athletes, which they accomplish by recruiting less-wealthy kids and juicing their financial aid packages.

While the purpose of the Ivy League is a cute bit of history, the current Ivy League is hardly full of big time athletes.

The sports in which the Ivy League is nationally-competitive in a non-trivial sense absolutely are full of big-time athletes. And those are the athletes in question... Cornell is still able to attract top talent to its hockey program because of the recent changes to the financial aid system: Schafer himself said so.

If the school is "juicing" the financial aid packages for athletes, it is an issue. If athletes are subject to the same formula as any other student, I have no idea why it is problematic that it leads the coaches to focus their efforts on "athletes that can/will attend the school under its current financial aid rules." That's how a smart person allocates resources. It doesn't turn the financial aid into an "athletic scholarship" any more than a similarly situated Hotelie who doesn't play sports could be said to have received an "hotel management scholarship."

The implication that Schafer makes is that he can get money that matches the packages offered by Princeton, Yale and Harvard. I am not sure of the current dollar amount but in the news for the 2006-2007 academic year was a household income below $180,000 being the break point for essentially free tuition.

Unless Cornell has matched that for all students then it is juicing the packages.

Under HFAI, families that earn less than $60,000 per year pay no tuition to send students to Harvard. Students whose families earn up to $180,000 are typically asked to pay no more than 10 percent of the family’s income.

2011 historical sucks

marty
The implication that Schafer makes is that he can get money that matches the packages offered by Princeton, Yale and Harvard. I am not sure of the current dollar amount but in the news for the 2006-2007 academic year was a household income below $180,000 being the break point for essentially free tuition.

Unless Cornell has matched that for all students then it is juicing the packages.

Under HFAI, families that earn less than $60,000 per year pay no tuition to send students to Harvard. Students whose families earn up to $180,000 are typically asked to pay no more than 10 percent of the family’s income.

I find it difficult to characterize $18,000/year, even for a family with a $180,000 annual income, as "essentially free tuition."

Under HFAI, families that earn less than $60,000 per year pay no tuition to send students to Harvard. Students whose families earn up to $180,000 are typically asked to pay no more than 10 percent of the family’s income.

If you thought the TUC cliff was steep, try to imagine being the parent of a Harvard admittee earning $180,001.*

* This joke probably only works with the imperfect information I have to go on. Don't correct it.

ugarte

Under HFAI, families that earn less than $60,000 per year pay no tuition to send students to Harvard. Students whose families earn up to $180,000 are typically asked to pay no more than 10 percent of the family’s income.

If you thought the TUC cliff was steep, try to imagine being the parent of a Harvard admittee earning $180,001.*

* This joke probably only works with the imperfect information I have to go on. Don't correct it.

I promise, I'm not going to correct anything... but I do suspect that parents are asked to pay a higher percentage of the portion of their income that's over $180,000, rather than a higher percentage of their income in general, once they're earning over $180,000. Just like marginal tax rates. Unfortunately, then you probably run into people like the idiots who try not to earn more than $174,400 because they think that suddenly their entire income will be taxed at 33% instead of 28%, rather than just that portion of their income that's over $174,400, or that they'll lose money by getting a raise.

marty

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Kyle Rose

ugarte

Kyle Rose
...but now they basically do pay their athletes, which they accomplish by recruiting less-wealthy kids and juicing their financial aid packages.

While the purpose of the Ivy League is a cute bit of history, the current Ivy League is hardly full of big time athletes.

The sports in which the Ivy League is nationally-competitive in a non-trivial sense absolutely are full of big-time athletes. And those are the athletes in question... Cornell is still able to attract top talent to its hockey program because of the recent changes to the financial aid system: Schafer himself said so.

If the school is "juicing" the financial aid packages for athletes, it is an issue. If athletes are subject to the same formula as any other student, I have no idea why it is problematic that it leads the coaches to focus their efforts on "athletes that can/will attend the school under its current financial aid rules." That's how a smart person allocates resources. It doesn't turn the financial aid into an "athletic scholarship" any more than a similarly situated Hotelie who doesn't play sports could be said to have received an "hotel management scholarship."

The implication that Schafer makes is that he can get money that matches the packages offered by Princeton, Yale and Harvard. I am not sure of the current dollar amount but in the news for the 2006-2007 academic year was a household income below $180,000 being the break point for essentially free tuition.

Unless Cornell has matched that for all students then it is juicing the packages.

Under HFAI, families that earn less than $60,000 per year pay no tuition to send students to Harvard. Students whose families earn up to $180,000 are typically asked to pay no more than 10 percent of the family’s income.

2011 historical sucks

I thought that Cornell did match the other schools packages, for all students. Correct, anyone?

Jim Hyla

marty

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Kyle Rose

ugarte

Kyle Rose
...but now they basically do pay their athletes, which they accomplish by recruiting less-wealthy kids and juicing their financial aid packages.

While the purpose of the Ivy League is a cute bit of history, the current Ivy League is hardly full of big time athletes.

The sports in which the Ivy League is nationally-competitive in a non-trivial sense absolutely are full of big-time athletes. And those are the athletes in question... Cornell is still able to attract top talent to its hockey program because of the recent changes to the financial aid system: Schafer himself said so.

If the school is "juicing" the financial aid packages for athletes, it is an issue. If athletes are subject to the same formula as any other student, I have no idea why it is problematic that it leads the coaches to focus their efforts on "athletes that can/will attend the school under its current financial aid rules." That's how a smart person allocates resources. It doesn't turn the financial aid into an "athletic scholarship" any more than a similarly situated Hotelie who doesn't play sports could be said to have received an "hotel management scholarship."

The implication that Schafer makes is that he can get money that matches the packages offered by Princeton, Yale and Harvard. I am not sure of the current dollar amount but in the news for the 2006-2007 academic year was a household income below $180,000 being the break point for essentially free tuition.

Unless Cornell has matched that for all students then it is juicing the packages.

Under HFAI, families that earn less than $60,000 per year pay no tuition to send students to Harvard. Students whose families earn up to $180,000 are typically asked to pay no more than 10 percent of the family’s income.

2011 historical sucks

I thought that Cornell did match the other schools packages, for all students. Correct, anyone?

Pretty certain they do. Doesn't matter if your an athlete or not, but it may come up more in athlete's cases because they might be a bit more likely to get an offer from HYP than your average student

css228
Pretty certain they do. Doesn't matter if your an athlete or not, but it may come up more in athlete's cases because they might be a bit more likely to get an offer from HYP than your average student

Ding! Ding! Ding! You're a winner! This is part of why I say it's a smokescreen: it looks equitable on paper, but in reality its application skews toward athletes.

But really, my point is largely related to the fact that the financial aid system is a scam designed to extract the maximum amount of money from students and parents by doing very fine market segmentation. The matching of other Ivys' financial aid packages is just another term in the segmentation formula: offer a better package if there's more competition among our peer group for the student. So, regardless of the precise semantics employed in justifying (or rationalizing) the fairness of such a system, in effect this is a merit scholarship, whether applied to athletics or academics (though as indicated it's more likely to be an issue in athletics).

Kyle Rose

css228
Pretty certain they do. Doesn't matter if your an athlete or not, but it may come up more in athlete's cases because they might be a bit more likely to get an offer from HYP than your average student

Ding! Ding! Ding! You're a winner! This is part of why I say it's a smokescreen: it looks equitable on paper, but in reality its application skews toward athletes.

Lotta "mays" and "mights" in that premise. Show us data.

Al DeFlorio

Kyle Rose

css228
Pretty certain they do. Doesn't matter if your an athlete or not, but it may come up more in athlete's cases because they might be a bit more likely to get an offer from HYP than your average student

Ding! Ding! Ding! You're a winner! This is part of why I say it's a smokescreen: it looks equitable on paper, but in reality its application skews toward athletes.

Lotta "mays" and "mights" in that premise. Show us data.

The data would be in the individual schools' AI numbers, which they ain't sharing.

Weder

Al DeFlorio

Kyle Rose

css228
Pretty certain they do. Doesn't matter if your an athlete or not, but it may come up more in athlete's cases because they might be a bit more likely to get an offer from HYP than your average student

Ding! Ding! Ding! You're a winner! This is part of why I say it's a smokescreen: it looks equitable on paper, but in reality its application skews toward athletes.

Lotta "mays" and "mights" in that premise. Show us data.

The data would be in the individual schools' AI numbers, which they ain't sharing.

Hard to reach any conclusions without data, I'd say.

Al DeFlorio

Weder

Al DeFlorio

Kyle Rose

css228
Pretty certain they do. Doesn't matter if your an athlete or not, but it may come up more in athlete's cases because they might be a bit more likely to get an offer from HYP than your average student

Ding! Ding! Ding! You're a winner! This is part of why I say it's a smokescreen: it looks equitable on paper, but in reality its application skews toward athletes.

Lotta "mays" and "mights" in that premise. Show us data.

The data would be in the individual schools' AI numbers, which they ain't sharing.

Hard to reach any conclusions without data, I'd say.

Not at all. Have you ever read a social science journal???

Kyle Rose

css228
Pretty certain they do. Doesn't matter if your an athlete or not, but it may come up more in athlete's cases because they might be a bit more likely to get an offer from HYP than your average student

Ding! Ding! Ding! You're a winner! This is part of why I say it's a smokescreen: it looks equitable on paper, but in reality its application skews toward athletes.

But really, my point is largely related to the fact that the financial aid system is a scam designed to extract the maximum amount of money from students and parents by doing very fine market segmentation. The matching of other Ivys' financial aid packages is just another term in the segmentation formula: offer a better package if there's more competition among our peer group for the student. So, regardless of the precise semantics employed in justifying (or rationalizing) the fairness of such a system, in effect this is a merit scholarship, whether applied to athletics or academics (though as indicated it's more likely to be an issue in athletics).

I have read this over and over and, even with your antagonistic gloss, I can't figure out what your problem is. That people make decisions about things other than "merit"? That merit scholarships are bad? You've lost me.

I don't understand why "athletes" would be more likely to get an offer from HYP than your average student. HYP have higher admissions standards than Cornell does. Anyone who gets into those schools, and gets their financial aid awards, is also likely to get into Cornell and be eligible for matching. I would not have been eligible for matching under those criteria but only because I wasn't an athlete OR a particularly good student.

ugarte
I have read this over and over and, even with your antagonistic gloss, I can't figure out what your problem is. That people make decisions about things other than "merit"? That merit scholarships are bad? You've lost me.

That the Ivy League schools' looking down their noses at other schools by supposedly not giving athletic merit scholarships is simply false. This ties into the original conversation through my unstated contention that to dislike what most of the NC$$ schools do (provide stingy renumeration) means that one must also dislike what the Ivy League does (provide stingier renumeration along with a dose of hypocrisy).

Getting back to the NC$$ in general: the NC$$ is a cartel formed to suppress the price of labor and marketing, plain and simple. For people who complain about the abuses of corporate monopolies and cartels, you are all awfully quiet on this point. Personally, I'd like to see athletes get paid relative to the value they bring to their schools. The notion that the NC$$'s purpose is to keep collegiate athletics "amateur" is true only in a sinister way.

Edit: BTW, to be clear, the NC$$ is very good at promoting the viewpoint that puts its behavior in the best possible light: "most of us will go pro in something other than sports", etc. It sounds so noble, keeping money out of athletics, right? Except that it doesn't: the same amount of money comes in either way, but under NC$$ rules it just stays with the institutions instead of being distributed to the athletes.

I don't understand why "athletes" would be more likely to get an offer from HYP than your average student. HYP have higher admissions standards than Cornell does. Anyone who gets into those schools, and gets their financial aid awards, is also likely to get into Cornell and be eligible for matching. I would not have been eligible for matching under those criteria but only because I wasn't an athlete OR a particularly good student.

Exactly, thus putting you at a financial disadvantage to those students aid-wise because you could not have gotten into the schools with better default aid packages. Hence, a merit scholarship for the better students and athletes. I can't really get any clearer than this.

Kyle Rose

ugarte
I have read this over and over and, even with your antagonistic gloss, I can't figure out what your problem is. That people make decisions about things other than "merit"? That merit scholarships are bad? You've lost me.

That the Ivy League schools' looking down their noses at other schools by supposedly not giving athletic merit scholarships is simply false. This ties into the original conversation through my unstated contention that to dislike what most of the NC$$ schools do (provide stingy renumeration) means that one must also dislike what the Ivy League does (provide stingier renumeration along with a dose of hypocrisy).

Getting back to the NC$$ in general: the NC$$ is a cartel formed to suppress the price of labor and marketing, plain and simple. For people who complain about the abuses of corporate monopolies and cartels, you are all awfully quiet on this point. Personally, I'd like to see athletes get paid relative to the value they bring to their schools. The notion that the NC$$'s purpose is to keep collegiate athletics "amateur" is true only in a sinister way.

I don't understand why "athletes" would be more likely to get an offer from HYP than your average student. HYP have higher admissions standards than Cornell does. Anyone who gets into those schools, and gets their financial aid awards, is also likely to get into Cornell and be eligible for matching. I would not have been eligible for matching under those criteria but only because I wasn't an athlete OR a particularly good student.

Exactly, thus putting you at a financial disadvantage to those students aid-wise because you could not have gotten into the schools with better default aid packages. Hence, a merit scholarship for the better students and athletes. I can't really get any clearer than this.

So it seems that your biggest beef is with Cornell's matching policy (which disproportionately rewards kids with better academic credentials). I can see that argument. But why are you throwing the Ivy League as a whole under the bus? How are HYP disproportionately rewarding their better students (or better athletes) compared to their worse ones?

Robb
So it seems that your biggest beef is with Cornell's matching policy (which disproportionately rewards kids with better academic credentials). I can see that argument. But why are you throwing the Ivy League as a whole under the bus? How are HYP disproportionately rewarding their better students (or better athletes) compared to their worse ones?

My objection is many-faceted. Relative to the Ivy League (and similar schools), my problem is with the financial aid system that answers the question "How much does it cost?" with "How much you got?"

Basically, I think higher education's financial model is fundamentally broken, but I don't really want to write a treatise in a thread: maybe at some point I'll explain it in a blog post and link it here.

Kyle Rose
Basically, I think higher education's financial model is fundamentally broken, but I don't really want to write a treatise in a thread: maybe at some point I'll explain it in a blog post and link it here.

Sounds good - I would be curious to read it. The current state of things seems pretty bad, but better than any alternative that *I* can come up with, so I would like to see what you've pondered up.

Fundamentally, I think that a huge number of people believe that the benefits of education are crystal clear, so there is naturally going to be a high demand for the "product," which naturally raises the price. As prices go up, the best educations would end up being reserved only for those already born into privilege, which does not seem desirable if society is to remain vibrant with good possibilities for social mobility. To avoid such stagnation, either the poorer kids need to be subsidized in some way (bad, the situation we have now) or the price of education needs to be artificially statutorily capped (worse).

What else ya got?

Kyle Rose
Getting back to the NC$$ in general: the NC$$ is a cartel formed to suppress the price of labor and marketing, plain and simple. For people who complain about the abuses of corporate monopolies and cartels, you are all awfully quiet on this point.

A-fucking-hem.

I would not have been eligible for matching under those criteria but only because I wasn't an athlete OR a particularly good student.

Exactly, thus putting you at a financial disadvantage to those students aid-wise because you could not have gotten into the schools with better default aid packages. Hence, a merit scholarship for the better students and athletes. I can't really get any clearer than this.

I've always understood this aspect of your point. I don't have any problem with Cornell doing this, though. If Cornell can boost the "paper merit" of the overall student pool by matching HYP, I'm fine with that even though it would have been at my expense had the policy been in place in the 90's.

ugarte

Kyle Rose
Getting back to the NC$$ in general: the NC$$ is a cartel formed to suppress the price of labor and marketing, plain and simple. For people who complain about the abuses of corporate monopolies and cartels, you are all awfully quiet on this point.

A-fucking-hem.

Ok, I should have said "most".

I've always understood this aspect of your point. I don't have any problem with Cornell doing this, though. If Cornell can boost the "paper merit" of the overall student pool by matching HYP, I'm fine with that even though it would have been at my expense had the policy been in place in the 90's.

That I don't have a particular problem with merit scholarships is an obvious corollary to what I've been saying (all other things being equal, of course), but they should call it what it is: trying to maintain this holier-than-thou "we don't provide *scholarships*, my god, only those plebian schools do that!"¹ posture in the face of overwhelming fact is laughable.


¹Make sure you say this with your best George Plimpton impression.

tl;dr on most of this, but it's always bothered me when people write "NCAA" as "NC$$." Firstly, I find that sort of name-calling puerile and distracting from any substantive argument that may also be there; but more importantly, "$" is the substitution for "S", not "A." I keep reading it in my head as "N-C-S-S." Where does the "$" come from, the fact that the NCAA makes money and two of its letters are doubled up? That makes as much sense as "G$$gle" or "$$$$$$" (that's "Disney," in case you struggled to read it).

Robb

Kyle Rose
Basically, I think higher education's financial model is fundamentally broken, but I don't really want to write a treatise in a thread: maybe at some point I'll explain it in a blog post and link it here.

Sounds good - I would be curious to read it. The current state of things seems pretty bad, but better than any alternative that *I* can come up with, so I would like to see what you've pondered up.

Fundamentally, I think that a huge number of people believe that the benefits of education are crystal clear, so there is naturally going to be a high demand for the "product," which naturally raises the price. As prices go up, the best educations would end up being reserved only for those already born into privilege, which does not seem desirable if society is to remain vibrant with good possibilities for social mobility. To avoid such stagnation, either the poorer kids need to be subsidized in some way (bad, the situation we have now) or the price of education needs to be artificially statutorily capped (worse).

What else ya got?

I didn't say I had a solution. I can just point out where it's broken. Seriously, what do you think I am, an engineer?

I'll try a really short version. The problem fundamentally is one of supply of funds, not of demand for education or supply of such. Demand for higher education is something like demand for health care: it rises almost inexhaustibly with the dollars available to pay for it. Supply similarly seems not to be a problem: many parents seem happy to drop $40G/year on no-name private schools. The problem is the easy money. What government has been doing the past 30 years by providing so much money to higher ed in the form of aid grants, low interest guaranteed loans, research dollars, matching funds, new campuses, etc. is to concentrate price inflation in that sector: only a fool would refuse money offered with few or no strings attached, so the schools have been saying, "Shit, gotta find more things to do with all this money coming in!" Colleges buy new things—fancy new buildings, high-tech lecture halls, dorms, attractions, labs, superstar researchers, you name it—with all this easy money, forcing costs up, and therefore prices. This, my friends, is how a bubble behaves.

Like in any other bubble, the effect of this has been to create massive misallocations of capital within individual schools and in all of higher education in the aggregate. In effect, the availability of easy money has driven the increases in price through increased costs moreso than the availability of money has responded to increases in those prices, though there is certainly a cyclical effect here as legislators respond to cries of "college costs too much!" with even more easy money.

This is going to fail at some point. It's not clear when or how, but I have no doubt that the college bubble is in the process of bursting, though it won't fail in quite the same way as a normal asset bubble.

I actually wrote many posts on this very topic (under my other handle "squarooticus" on a thread on my own message forum a few weeks back. Please feel free to peruse and/or respond if you're interested.

[pmpub.krose.org]

ftyuv
tl;dr on most of this, but it's always bothered me when people write "NCAA" as "NC$$." Firstly, I find that sort of name-calling puerile and distracting from any substantive argument that may also be there; but more importantly, "$" is the substitution for "S", not "A." I keep reading it in my head as "N-C-S-S." Where does the "$" come from, the fact that the NCAA makes money and two of its letters are doubled up? That makes as much sense as "G$$gle" or "$$$$$$" (that's "Disney," in case you struggled to read it).

Age should just write a filter that converts it back to NCAA. Or to $$$$, which would be even funnier.

(Incidentally, at the same time he could fix the double quote/close paren " problem that produces a winking smiley for no good reason I can tell.)

ugarte

Kyle Rose

css228
Pretty certain they do. Doesn't matter if your an athlete or not, but it may come up more in athlete's cases because they might be a bit more likely to get an offer from HYP than your average student

Ding! Ding! Ding! You're a winner! This is part of why I say it's a smokescreen: it looks equitable on paper, but in reality its application skews toward athletes.

But really, my point is largely related to the fact that the financial aid system is a scam designed to extract the maximum amount of money from students and parents by doing very fine market segmentation. The matching of other Ivys' financial aid packages is just another term in the segmentation formula: offer a better package if there's more competition among our peer group for the student. So, regardless of the precise semantics employed in justifying (or rationalizing) the fairness of such a system, in effect this is a merit scholarship, whether applied to athletics or academics (though as indicated it's more likely to be an issue in athletics).

I have read this over and over and, even with your antagonistic gloss, I can't figure out what your problem is. That people make decisions about things other than "merit"? That merit scholarships are bad? You've lost me.

I don't understand why "athletes" would be more likely to get an offer from HYP than your average student. HYP have higher admissions standards than Cornell does. Anyone who gets into those schools, and gets their financial aid awards, is also likely to get into Cornell and be eligible for matching. I would not have been eligible for matching under those criteria but only because I wasn't an athlete OR a particularly good student.

By average student I meant one that is not an athlete or a prodigy in some art or something like that. Basically it goes back to the wholistic application model. I mean think about it this way you have two equivalent students gpa wise, and score wise- schools of the HYP get tons of applicants with essentially the same scores (so do we) - so they look for something to set them apart, and if you're choosing between the student with that gpa who just ran a few clubs or a Carnegie Hall pianist or a hockey player who can help make the team good then your going to take the student with the equivalent scores that did something more extraordinary. Its not necessarily being an athlete, but its having that extra hook above and beyond your average student here that makes them more likely to get an offer from HYP. Which in my opinion is totally fair. If Im a three season athlete in high school and I've maintained the GPA and scores of someone else who hasnt done that, why wouldn't it be fair that I'm the more attractive candidate. The same goes for hockey players or physics prodigies, if you're special you're more likely to get an HYP offer which tends to come with better financial aid. So yes of course it ends up being merit money, but at the same time it doesnt mean someone who wouldn't need aid anyway is getting the money as might be the case in a regular merit scholarship situation. Personally, as long as a person has demonstrated financial need, I have no real misgivings about them getting a little extra because they earned it.

ftyuv
tl;dr on most of this, but it's always bothered me when people write "NCAA" as "NC$$." Firstly, I find that sort of name-calling puerile and distracting from any substantive argument that may also be there; but more importantly, "$" is the substitution for "S", not "A." I keep reading it in my head as "N-C-S-S." Where does the "$" come from, the fact that the NCAA makes money and two of its letters are doubled up? That makes as much sense as "G$$gle" or "$$$$$$" (that's "Disney," in case you struggled to read it).

Until they throw Sucks out of the organization, I make the argument for NCAA.

Eh?

ftyuv
tl;dr on most of this, but it's always bothered me when people write "NCAA" as "NC$$." Firstly, I find that sort of name-calling puerile and distracting from any substantive argument that may also be there; but more importantly, "$" is the substitution for "S", not "A." I keep reading it in my head as "N-C-S-S." Where does the "$" come from, the fact that the NCAA makes money and two of its letters are doubled up? That makes as much sense as "G$$gle" or "$$$$$$" (that's "Disney," in case you struggled to read it).

You're entitled to think NC$$ is puerile. I think it captures the focus of an organization that claims to be all about "student-athletes". It's long standing usage back to the HOCKEY-L days.

OTOH The complaint that $ should only be used to replace S is silly. NCAA isn't a swear word that we're trying to "sanitize" by switching a letter to a symbol. It's commentary. Deal.

So, here's Bloomberg on the Patriot League beginning to offer football scholarships.

The NCAA would be hard-pressed to keep a student from having the advice of a lawyer.

KeithK
OTOH The complaint that $ should only be used to replace S is silly. NCAA isn't a swear word that we're trying to "sanitize" by switching a letter to a symbol. It's commentary. Deal.

And I commented on the commentary. I still think it's stupid, distracting and detracting. Deal.

ftyuv

KeithK
OTOH The complaint that $ should only be used to replace S is silly. NCAA isn't a swear word that we're trying to "sanitize" by switching a letter to a symbol. It's commentary. Deal.

And I commented on the commentary. I still think it's stupid, distracting and detracting. Deal.

But what's indisputable is the fact that JFK is clearly the farthest of the 3 airports from Manhattan.

RichH

ftyuv

KeithK
OTOH The complaint that $ should only be used to replace S is silly. NCAA isn't a swear word that we're trying to "sanitize" by switching a letter to a symbol. It's commentary. Deal.

And I commented on the commentary. I still think it's stupid, distracting and detracting. Deal.

But what's indisputable is the fact that JFK is clearly the farthest of the 3 airports from Manhattan.

RichH

ftyuv

KeithK
OTOH The complaint that $ should only be used to replace S is silly. NCAA isn't a swear word that we're trying to "sanitize" by switching a letter to a symbol. It's commentary. Deal.

And I commented on the commentary. I still think it's stupid, distracting and detracting. Deal.

But what's indisputable is the fact that JFK is clearly the farthest of the 3 airports from Manhattan.

Is that a reference to something? It feels like it is, but I can't place it.

RichH

ftyuv

KeithK
OTOH The complaint that $ should only be used to replace S is silly. NCAA isn't a swear word that we're trying to "sanitize" by switching a letter to a symbol. It's commentary. Deal.

And I commented on the commentary. I still think it's stupid, distracting and detracting. Deal.

But what's indisputable is the fact that JFK is clearly the farthest of the 3 airports from Manhattan.

Instead of having to manually pollute every thread with every other thread, Age should just switch to a Clarkson Hockey Roundtable threadless style.

Kyle Rose

RichH

ftyuv

KeithK
OTOH The complaint that $ should only be used to replace S is silly. NCAA isn't a swear word that we're trying to "sanitize" by switching a letter to a symbol. It's commentary. Deal.

And I commented on the commentary. I still think it's stupid, distracting and detracting. Deal.

But what's indisputable is the fact that JFK is clearly the farthest of the 3 airports from Manhattan.

Instead of having to manually pollute every thread with every other thread, Age should just switch to a Clarkson Hockey Roundtable threadless style.

No he shouldn't.

Beeeej

Kyle Rose

RichH

ftyuv

KeithK
OTOH The complaint that $ should only be used to replace S is silly. NCAA isn't a swear word that we're trying to "sanitize" by switching a letter to a symbol. It's commentary. Deal.

And I commented on the commentary. I still think it's stupid, distracting and detracting. Deal.

But what's indisputable is the fact that JFK is clearly the farthest of the 3 airports from Manhattan.

Instead of having to manually pollute every thread with every other thread, Age should just switch to a Clarkson Hockey Roundtable threadless style.

No he shouldn't.

Our KNIGHTS are
AWESOME!!!!

You left out "absolutely." Maybe they are only probably awesome?

jtwcornell91

Beeeej

Kyle Rose

RichH

ftyuv

KeithK
OTOH The complaint that $ should only be used to replace S is silly. NCAA isn't a swear word that we're trying to "sanitize" by switching a letter to a symbol. It's commentary. Deal.

And I commented on the commentary. I still think it's stupid, distracting and detracting. Deal.

But what's indisputable is the fact that JFK is clearly the farthest of the 3 airports from Manhattan.

Instead of having to manually pollute every thread with every other thread, Age should just switch to a Clarkson Hockey Roundtable threadless style.

No he shouldn't.

Our KNIGHTS are
AWESOME!!!!

I once wrote there "Our Knights are Awful". They didn't like that, even though it was in a year when they were.

jtwcornell91
Our KNIGHTS are
AWESOME!!!!

We should have brought the 3D glasses back from Avatar.