Do You Remember What It Was Like Paying For College: Fill & Download for Free

Let’s talk about the rising cost of college, shall we?Here’s my student bill from the University of Northern Colorado for the coming semester:That’s right. $15,500 for one semester.What exactly are all those fees and charges? You’ll notice my tuition (the last one on the list) is only about $7,000.What’s the rest?Rent—$3,345: I need a place to live, and the only way to get student loans/scholarships to cover my housing is to live on campus.Dining plan—$2,355: No kitchen means I need an on-campus dining plan. My plan is the cheapest they offer, giving me ten meals per week.STEP 161 supervision fee—$11: Presumably a fee to compensate my host teacher (or to pay for some aspect of that supervision) during my in-classroom observations.Student Capital Fee—$400: “The Student Capital Fee supports bonded facility debt service and facility operations as well as capital repair and replacement.”[1] I have no idea what this means.LEAF Fee—$10: “The Student Leadership for Environmental Action Fund (Student LEAF) is intended to move the campus community toward a sustainability-minded culture. This fund finances environmental improvements in campus infrastructure and educational initiatives.”Student Services Fee—$444: “Student services and support are funded by this portion of the Student Fees.”Health Insurance—$1,290: You have to have health insurance on campus. You can fill out a waiver proving you have your own health insurance and have this fee removed (which I’ll be doing).Library Fee—$70.80: “Covers print and online library materials.”Online course fee—$45: An extra fee due to the fact that I’m taking one online course. “On-Line Course Fee-online fees pay for adjunct costs resulting from increased course sections and smaller class sizes; it also funds instructional designers, development and training to enhance online course offerings.”THEA 100 and THEA 275 course fees—$40 each: Supposedly to cover the cost of materials and anything consumable used in-course (which really doesn’t exist in these courses).Theatre program fee—$128: No clue. I’m guessing it’s to fund the theatre program, which is bizarre.Technology fee—$160.80: “Used for equipping new smart classrooms, staffing and maintaining computer labs, and providing students access to academic software.”Differential tuition for theatre—$144: Theatre classes are more expensive, so we pay more in tuition to allow the university to keep having them.Tuition WUE—$6,966: My actual tuition. “Covers classroom instruction, student services, administration and facilities. Based on cost and demand, differential tuition may be charged for certain classes (Sciences/SES/Art, Business, Nursing, Theatre).”So that’s how we get to that beautiful number of $15,449.I’m only taking six classes—note that three (THEA 100, THEA 275, STEP 161) had extra fees attached in addition to the over $1,000 they already cost.And on top of that, I pay an extra $250+ dollars in a program fee and differential tuition to cover the mere act of being in my major.And, I already receive reduced tuition as a Wyoming resident. My tuition is, by default, 150% of in-state tuition, which is significantly less than out-of-state. Imagine what this bill would look like if I was from New York and not Wyoming.“Get a job!” you say. “Stop being a lousy freeloader! Work, save up some money, and pay for it yourself!”Let’s take a look at that— “pay for it yourself”. How possible is it for one to pay for their own college?I did some math. The minimum wage in Colorado is $9.30/hour. If you worked 40 hours a week making $9.30 an hour, you’d have $19,344 in one year. That’s assuming you work 40 hours every single week, with no time off.My student bill for one semester (four months of education time) is $15,500.I could take a whole year off from college, work at the minimum wage, and if I didn’t spend a cent of it I could pay for a little more than a semester of college.“Don’t get a minimum wage job, then!” you say. “That’s on you!”Right. The good ol’ “Just make some more money, then” argument. See, I’ve tried that. I currently have a few jobs that pay $20 an hour. If I worked 40 hours a week at $20 an hour, I could make around $41k a year.That’d be fine and dandy, except for the fact that I still have to go to school. At most, I can work 20 hours a week (and even that’s being optimistic).*If I work 20 hours a week at $20/hr (which is well over both the Colorado and federal minimum wages), I could make about $20K a year.Once again, that assumes I never have to get gas. Never go to the doctor. Never buy groceries (remember, my meal plan covers 10 meals a week. The average person eats 21). Never buy clothes. Never fix my car. Never buy shampoo.Even then, I could afford just over a semester of college.The days of “save your pennies from your summer job to pay for college” are long gone.“Well, you should’ve gone somewhere cheaper. That’s on you.”Right. Because it’s on me that the cost of going to a mid-range school three hours from home is so exorbitant.Sure, I could’ve gone to another school. Let’s consider my less expensive options:University of Wyoming—AKA, the only 4-year school I can get in-state tuition at.Casper College—2-year community college.Problem with both?I couldn’t get my degree.As in, neither school offers an equivalent degree program. I couldn’t study to be a theatre educator at either of these schools.So sure, I could go somewhere cheaper, but then why bother spending the money at all if I’m coming out with a degree I don’t even want?There are lots of others, too— “Your parents should’ve been saving up” (their savings went down with the economy, yo). “You should take out loans/apply for scholarships” (done and done. Still not enough). “Not everything in life is fair” (that’s not an argument. It’s just, like, philosophical bullshit). “You need to talk to your school’s financial aid department. There are resources to help you” (Oh, if only you knew…).I’m not saying college should be free. I’m happy to pay for it.I’m saying that it’s insane that college prices keep rising, and there’s no clear way for young people to pay for it. I’ve already taken on $10,000 in student loans from the past year. I’ve applied for every scholarship I can find.It’s still not enough.Jobs are requiring college degrees, but to get a college degree, you need a damn amazing job to pay for it (or parents who can afford it).It’s a vicious cycle. I don’t know what the solution is.I just know that it’s one of my top complaints about the US.I don’t need free college—I need affordable college. Please.*Ignoring the fact that few jobs will hire you for that much without a college degree, and that my current $20/hr gigs are really limited as to how many hours I’m allowed to work (one is max 5 hours a week).Footnotes[1] How Undergraduate Tuition and Fees are Used

When I was in college I was always an average student compared to the people around me.I did go to all the extra classes, got an amazing GPA and studied Psychology in Germany (for which you need at least a 1.5 GPA, which is 3.5 in the USA).Yet… I only got by, especially compared to all the others around me.Every time I sat in class I had to ask my class mates for help understanding and they would seem like they already learned this stuff years prior.Eventually I got sick and tired of not knowing anything and talked to those people, asking them if I could join them in their studies and learn like they do.I learned how to study effectively from smarter people than myself, how to remember what I learned and what the most efficient way to study really is.Here is what I learned:1. Start early.The reason most of them were able to seem like they already studies this stuff, was because they already did.For every hour of class time they would spend 1 hour before and 1 hour after the class studying (in Germany we had 20 hours of classes a week, meaning they did 60 hour workweeks).As soon as the first class was over they went to the professor and asked what books would be relevant to study and then they got started that day.Most of us believe we can just study for a test a month or a week prior to the exam, and, although this may work, you are not going to remember most things.Smart people ensure they remember what they learn instead of putting it into the hands of chance.2. Treat your time in class as review time.All your professor is is a paid tutor; and most often a very expensive one at that!They are not supposed to teach you everything you know; that is your job.Instead your professor is supposed to review the important material in class and you are supposed to learn the rest on your own.When you treat it like that you will do a couple things differently.Here are the most important things:Read the relevant chapter and aim to understand at least 80% of it before you go into class. This will make sure you actually treat it as a review and are able to ask questions about the last 20% you do not understand.Review those 20% after class. This is what you weren’t able to understand on your own so make absolutely sure you understand it now so that you do not have to ask your professor again later.You will pay attention and make the most out of your time in class instead of just being physically present. Imagine if you paid this money not to go to school but instead to have all of these tutors. Would you not treat college differently?3. Make note cards only for stuff you do not remember.One of the most interesting things that my smart classmates did was that they read a couple of note cards every day without fail.Some had them stuck to their door, others had them in a folder on their desk and again others had them in a flip-book on their dinner table so they would see them as often as possible.These people did not just review once, they reviewed the material consistently over months until they remembered and then some.4. Reviewing the material once a week with friends.Once a week they had a 3–4 hour study session with a group of friends on the most important subjects, or the ones with the hardest exams.This was their own little mastermind group!They grabbed only the people that could benefit the group and participate in discussions (which is why I was not invited to begin with), and so they had experts on every subject in their group without noticing it.This allowed them to go over the material they did not know more in depth again at least once a week and they would also be able to teach others what they knew, which made them remember a lot more (90% of what you teach you remember yourself).All of these things allowed them to study smart and seem like they studied hard at the same time, even though they did nothing else.They did not spend sleepless nights over studying, did not stress themselves out and still had a lot of hours every week to spend how they wanted to!But what it did do was this:They were able to focus on the material closest to the time of the exam with all their might instead of learning everything from 3–6 months prior as well.They had barely any stress before the exam because they already knew 95% of everything and only needed to focus on the last 5.They felt confident through repetition and were treated smart by others, which had a subconscious, positive effect on them.Note that these are only things they did to remember the material.All of my classmates studied in very different ways but these factors were always constant, which is why they all remembered things a lot better than I did.These are not all the factors but the ones that will do 80% of the work for only 20% of the effort (Pareto’s Principle).I would encourage you to try all 4 of these out for one semester and judge the difference for yourself.But I guarantee you that if you start treating your time in school as work, and as a must, then your whole attitude will change, which will change the way you study and remember everything you study/read.

I need to tread carefully here.Let me first say that I really love my American friends and I have a high regard for the USA. I also think that the attacks on September 11th 2001 were heinous terrorist actions.Ok. Are we good?I was in a college dorm in Iowa hanging out with a group of friends. Two of them were Australians, one a New Zealander, and three were Americans. All of a sudden I heard a shout from one of my American friends yelling that America was under attack. We all went into his room since he had a television and we watched the fiery buildings. The Americans were shocked and baffled and could not move their eyes from the screen. The Aussies and Kiwi (myself included) watched for a couple of minutes and then got bored. We went back to my room and hung out playing guitar and chilling out. A few hours later we realized that this was a really big deal to the Americans. They were all in utter shock and couldn’t understand why this would have happened.By the time night had fallen I’d had several hushed conversations with my various foreign friends and the theme was the same every time. We all agreed that the attacks were horrible but we had all been expecting something like 9/11 to happen for years. It wasn’t a surprise to us at all. We had to walk a fine line when we were talking to Americans because they had no idea how incredibly unpopular America had become abroad nor had they heard about any negative action that America had ever taken in other countries. They didn’t know about America arming the mujahadin in Afghanistan. They didn’t know about the USA’s bombing of the Al Shaifa pharmaceutical plant. They didn’t know about the USS Vincennes shooting down a passenger plane and killing 290 civilians.In short they had no idea why anyone would have hated America enough to want to attack it. Even in my home country of Australia -a staunch US ally- there was a lot of anger towards America due to its alleged involvement in deposing a popular, democratically elected leader.To all of us foreign students 9/11 seemed like the most obvious thing that could have happened. Now again I want to reiterate that the 9/11 attacks were heinous crimes against humanity. It’s just that to me and all of my friends they were completely unsurprising and completely expected.———Edit: please read before commenting.This answer is blowing up and people are misunderstanding what I’m saying. I have no ill-will towards America nor did I in 2001. I’m certainly not saying that America deserved it or “had it coming.” My wife, my children, and my father are American. I love America. When I say that a lot of people hated America I’m not referring to myself. I was just aware that others felt that way. I also understand the haters’ reasons for feeling that way even if I don’t agree with them. It’s possible to think America is an awesome country and also be aware of historical events that have made some people hate America.If you think my answer is insensitive then please consider how long you spent caring about all the Australians who were killed by (Al Qaeda affiliate) Jemaah Islamiyah in 2002 and 2005. Did any of you donate money to the charities supporting those victims? Did you pay attention to the news for more than a few minutes? Did you call your Australian friends and offer condolences for the loss of their dead countrymen? Did you respectfully visit the memorials to those victims? I have done all the above for victims of 9/11.Edit 2: comments closed. Folks, I’m not interested in debating this. I’m not trying to hold up my response as being ideal or making any broad statements about America. I’m just being honest about the way I reacted when I was a college student 18 years ago. I’d probably respond differently if it happened now. This answer was originally written at 2 AM when I had insomnia. I didn’t include every detail about my thoughts on terrorism, America, and 9/11. I was just reporting what happened in my dorm building on that day. Read the comments if you want. There’s more detail there. If you are a much better person than me, then congratulations. Write your own answer.God bless America.