"ANYONE living in the U. S. that wants a college education can get one. True, it won't be handed to them on a silver platter, but it is available. How? Work for it!"

When I first enrolled at the University of Washington in 1949, the quarterly tuition, as I recall, was $53.00. There were a few additional fees that amounted to maybe another $10.00, and textbooks averaged about $25.00. I lived at home with my parents (about ten minutes from campus) and my father financed my tuition. We were doing all right, but we weren't rich. When I returned to the U. of W. to study music in 1957, quarterly tuition had gone up to around $75.00. I paid for it by teaching guitar in the evenings.

The cost of everything has risen considerable (at least ten-fold) in the decades since then, but the cost of education, at least at a state university, has multiplied by about seventy times during the same period. Undeniable fact. Do the figures.

Current quarterly tuition requirements at the University of Washington:—

In State Tuition: $3638.00
Additional Required Fees: $777.00

That works out to $13,245 for a school year, assuming attending three quarters and taking the summer off. This doesn't take into account textbooks which, these days, can run an extra couple hundred dollars per quarter.

The schedule of fees for attending the U. of W. is much longer than this, including room and board if one wishes to live in the dorms. That runs $5844.00 per quarter (in the early Fifties, it was about $50.00 a month). But I included only the absolute minimum of what a resident student (having lived in Washington State for a minimum of a year) has to ante up when registering. Tuition for someone from out of state is $12,029 per quarter, plus the Additional Required Fees of $777.00, and he or she would have to either live in the dorms ($5844.00 per quarter) or find a nearby apartment (going price for a studio apartment within reasonable distance to campus is about $800.00—if you get lucky).

And this is a state university. Not a private school. Not Ivy League.

Let us assume that I'm eighteen and fresh out of high school. Let us also assume that I'm a good student, but not hot enough to qualify for a scholarship or grant—and being relatively sane and not much of a gambler, that I'd rather not graduate from school with a $40,000 to $60,000 student loan debt hanging over my head, especially when a fair percentage of today's university graduates find that there is a scarcity of the jobs they have prepared for out there (more than just factory jobs are being "off-shored"). The only way I could go would be if PhD ("Papa has Dough"), or if I could get a part-time job that paid me adequately to cover my school costs. So what is "adequately?"

Assuming I find a job that allows me to work full time during the summer and part-time during the school year, and assuming that I live at home with my indulgent parents, and assuming that I allow myself $25.00 a week spending money (out of which comes lunches, any CDs or non-textbooks that I might want to buy, bus fare to and from campus if I don't live within walking distance, an occasional cup of coffee between classes, etc., don't date, and otherwise have a highly limited social life), I would have to have a job that pays me a minimum of $12.00 an hour.

Now, where is an eighteen-year-old kid fresh out of high school going to get a job that pays $12.00 an hour, with a boss that will let him work part-time during the school year and full-time during the summer? He could maybe get a job throwing hamburgers out a window at passing cars, but those jobs only pay about half that. Well, of course, he could get two jobs. But when would he go to class? When would he study? When would he sleep?

How would you advise me, Doug?

"Our constitution does not guarantee success or happiness. It guarantees our right, the right of everyone to pursue it."

True. But there are countries in Europe where I could go to university for no cost and get a really excellent education. In at least one of the Scandinavian countries, depending on what courses you want to take, they will pay you to go to school, because they consider it an investment in the future of the country. I don't really expect egg in my beer, but why can't the richest country in the world do a little be better in this area than it does?

Don Firth