re: The Great TOPS Shell Game

What was the price of everything else in the 90s?


But every time the govt tries to make anything more affordable it gets more expensive

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I’m so glad Jindal defunded Higher Ed so he could become President. Worked out so well for Louisiana.

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He shifted more on the burden to the students and allowed universities to raise tuition and fees instead of relying on state funding.

Of course the end around on this is that so many students are TOPS eligible, funding is essentially coming out of the same pockets.

JBE has been trying to shift back, and the state has been sending universities new buildings and degree programs that unfortunately universities will have to continue increasing tuition and fees to cover the maintenance of those new facilities all the while some older facilities are left to rot away or be underutilized.

Another big hurdle facing universities is that my age group did not have as many kids as usual, also the brain drain out of the state from my generation means fewer Louisiana students are coming up to college age and enrolling in Louisiana schools.

For example a 2003 Louisiana college graduate moves to Texas a few years after graduation. He has 3 kids that now have lived in Texas all their life. What incentive do those kids have going to a Louisiana college unless they have an academic or athletic scholarship? TOPS wouldn’t apply in this case. More than likely they would end up at a Texas school.

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So prior to TOPS fees were about 10% of tuition and now 86% of tuition.

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was the “fee” bonanza partly due to the fact that colleges had to get tuition raised via the state legislature, but fees could be tacked on as is?

TOPS has always just been Louisiana funding all of Texas’s new employee base.

It is completely nonsensical to me. Second off, I wouldn’t send my kids to LSU if you paid me to, and I’m an alum.

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We send too many kids to college and too few into trades. Those jobs will probably be more in demand in 10-15 years

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Every time someone tells me this I ask them about their kids and they are usually in college, going to college, or graduated from college. Other people’s kids need trade school but mine need college educations.

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Am I inferring correctly that you are complaining about having to spend $3000 a year on fees and $0 on tuition at a flagship university? See what families in the Big 10 spend on public university tuition and fees for comparison. For example, a Illinois resident can expect to spend nearly $23,000 each year on tuition and fees alone at the University of Illinois.

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Illinois is a tier 1b public research institution, LSU has a bottom feeder endowment.