College Tuition

Unable to recruit enough high-tech wworkers in Maryland, business leaders urged legislators yesterday to approve a new college scholarship program for top students who major in science, engineering and computer fields.Representatives of Bell Atlantic, brokerage T. Rowe Price and several computer companies warned of a serious shortage of workers in lobbying for the scholarship plan, which would be the first of its kind in the nation.Gov. Parris N. Glendening's proposal -- which is given a good chance of General Assembly passage -- would offer $3,000 a year to any Maryland high school graduate with a B average or better to study a technology-related field at a four-year college in the state.

Affording college tuition not an impossible dreamI must take issue with the substance and the implications of Denis Horgan's column on college tuition ("Anxiety about college costs rising," Sept. 2).Families already have an inaccurate view of the affordability and accessibility of college, and are not aware of the options available to them in choosing and paying for an appropriate college.Unfocused and inaccurate diatribes like Mr. Horgan's column only increase the number of students who will walk away from a college education because they are convinced it is out of their reach.

Unable to recruit enough high-tech workers in Maryland, business leaders urged legislators yesterday to approve a new college scholarship program for top students who major in science, engineering and computer fields.Representatives of Bell Atlantic, brokerage T. Rowe Price and several computer companies warned of a serious shortage of workers in lobbying for the scholarship plan, which would be the first of its kind in the nation.Gov. Parris N. Glendening's proposal -- which is given a good chance of General Assembly passage -- would offer $3,000 a year to any Maryland high school graduate with a B average or better to study a technology-related field at a four-year college in the state.

THOSE "NIGHT of the Living Dead" types you see Boris Karloffing around are not actually people who have been paying too much attention to the news. (Whatever happened to the "Dog Days of August"? The Good Old Days.) No, the zombies are stunned people who have just written college tuition checks.You could think, out of a sense of solidarity, that when the kids finish up college you'd fling yourself down the cellar steps a few times as autumn approaches just to bring back the exquisite sensation of paying college tuition.

NO MATTER how you look at the latest statistics on rising college costs, parents are taking a hit in the pocketbook.One headline read, "Price of college education is up 50 percent over a decade." Another noted that "College tuition rises 4 percent, outpacing inflation" and a third said simply, "College tuition continues to rise."It's all true, true, true.Over a decade, tuition rose a whopping average of 50 percent at four-year public colleges, to $3,243 this school year; and 40 percent at private institutions, to $14,508, according to the College Board.

Losing sleep: If you lose one hour's sleep every night for aweek, it's the equivalent of pulling an all-nighter, says James Maas, a Cornell University psychology professor and sleep researcher, who also says people who sleep one hour longer a night find their alertness boosted by 25 percent. More than half of shift workers fall asleep on the job at least once a week, and employers report they lose $70 billion in productivity, accidents and health costs.Start saving: The beginning of the year is a good time to begin financial planning, and Joyce Hall, director of financial aid at Purdue University, advises parents that they should start planning early for college tuition, even as soon as a child is born.

With a 3-year-old, a 5-year-old and a third child due next month, Paul and Kira Muller stare down a long, dark tunnel at college costs beginning in 2009, 2011 and -- it seems inconceivable -- 2014.So the prospect of guaranteeing today's tuition rates for their children when they enter college in the 21st century is very attractive to the Mullers. "It looks like a hell of a deal to me," says Paul Muller, 32, who lives in Upper Falls in northeastern Baltimore County and is guidance chairman at Catonsville High School.

It's not that educators are unhappy with the $51 billion "crusade for education" President Clinton announced in his State of the Union address. The money is good, they say, and the attention is even better.But national and local campus experts and administrators suggest that Clinton's measures are unlikely to accomplish his goal of making it possible for all students to afford college. Instead, they said yesterday, Clinton's initiatives are generally geared toward easing the burden for students who already intend to enroll.

An article Sunday about tuition breaks given to university researchers understated the value of the benefit at the Johns Hopkins University. Hopkins annually offers the equivalent of half its tuition -- or $9,400 -- for all employees and their spouses and dependents to attend college. Last year, 627 employees took part in the program.Also, the last name of Jean and David Sack was spelled incorrectly.The Sun regrets the error.For people like Jean Sacks, a research librarian at the Johns Hopkins University, a campus policy that helps to pay for her two children's college education has saved her about $36,000 -- nearly a year's salary.

Edwin Downs is a hard-working college freshman. He's also a convicted murderer serving a sentence of life plus 20 years in a maximum-security Jessup prison.It's a combination that doesn't sit well with Congress, which appears poised to stop paying for college tuition for Downs and other inmates.One provision of the anti-crime bill under final consideration in Washington would prohibit inmates from receiving federally funded scholarships known as Pell grants.Prisoners should not be getting college scholarships when many middle-class taxpayers can't afford tuition, proponents of the ban say.Others say a ban would be a short-sighted abandonment of the concept of rehabilitation.

Maryland is receiving more than $1 billion in federal stimulus money earmarked for education, and Gov. Martin O'Malley said yesterday he would use some of it to increase funding for community colleges and maintain the freeze on undergraduate tuition at state universities. The governor's initial budget for next year did not include an increase for community colleges, which are seeing thousands more students enroll to gain new skills to help them find jobs in the recession. But with the stimulus money, O'Malley is increasing state aid by 5 percent over the next two years.

College tuition is keeping pace with inflation, rising about 6 percent this year, the College Board reported yesterday. But officials warned that tuition could soar as the economy tightens and universities' endowments and state funds shrink. Nationwide, tuition and fees went up 6.4 percent at public four-year universities, to $6,585, and 5.9 percent at private four-year universities, to $25,143, for the current academic year. In Maryland, tuition at state universities has been frozen for the past three years.

There was a time when the community college was the neglected stepchild within the higher-education family. No longer. Today, big business looks to community colleges as a primary source of the skilled labor necessary to sustain the information economy. Government turns to community colleges to close the education deficit that has the United States lagging other industrialized nations. The National Governors Association is asking four-year colleges and universities to replicate the responsiveness to regional economic needs that has long been standard practice at community colleges.

The No. 1 question North Carroll High School students had for career day presenters: How much money do you make? There were more probing questions for the speakers, who represented everything from environmental science to robotics to graphic design. At North Carroll's first school-wide college and career day this past Wednesday, students heard from speakers in more than 70 fields and browsed tables, staffed by representatives from local universities, law enforcement and military branches.

Maryland's prepaid college tuition plan clarified its recent contract changes yesterday, saying benefits are not being cut in half for students attending private or out-of-state schools as some parents feared. Officials with the Maryland Prepaid College Trust received as many as 40 phone calls and 40 e-mail messages from families concerned that the state plan slashed benefits, said Joan Marshall, executive director of the College Savings Plans of Maryland. State officials mailed letters Friday describing the changes.

LOS ANGELES -- As tuition continues to outpace gains in financial aid, students' chances of attending a U.S. college and finishing with a degree increasingly have become linked to their families' income, the College Board reported yesterday. The nonprofit group, in releasing two reports on college costs and financial aid, pointed out big gaps in graduation rates even among students who have high test scores. Those from families with the highest income and education levels finished college at more than double the rate of high-scoring students from the lowest socioeconomic grouping.

The cost of signing up for a Maryland prepaid college tuition contract this year will go up about 10 percent, far less than in the past two years, a sign that tuition inflation may be ebbing. The board of the College Savings Plans of Maryland approved new contract prices yesterday for the prepaid plan that begins enrollment Nov. 15. Depending on a child's age and other factors, the price increases range from 10.1 percent to 10.8 percent, said Joan Marshall, executive director of the program.

THEY TEACH America's children. They build our bridges and highways. They keep our streets safe and our factories running. They fight our wars and protect our peace. They raise the children who will be America's future. And they should be the centerpiece of presidential and congressional campaigns across the country. They are America's middle class. And they are in trouble. Since 2000, family incomes have remained stagnant while costs for the basics - a home, health insurance, utilities, gasoline, day care, college tuition - have surged by an average of 24 percent.

Who foots the college tuition bill and whether the student can be claimed as a dependent are determining factors in claiming a tuition deduction. If you paid for your 25-year-old son who lives at home to attend college full time, you can't get the tuition deduction because he does not qualify as a dependent. He, however, can get the deduction as long as he meets the modified adjusted gross income requirement, even if he didn't pay a cent. If your 19-year-old daughter paid her own way, then you get to lay claim to the credit, as long as she can be claimed as your dependent, even if she files her own return.

LEGISLATORS WHO are agog over the $70 million actuarial shortfall in Maryland's prepaid college tuition plan should remember that they hold levers affecting the program's future health. They share these controls with the university officials who set tuition rates. Plan managers attribute roughly 85 percent of the shortfall to the last two years' spikes in Maryland's public college tuition, increases that were prompted by a hefty decrease in state support for higher education. The slump in the market only piled on the hurt.