Senior Alex Shoucair, a Hatchet columnist, calls on the University to improve the financial options of students who wish to study abroad.
I could write an editorial every week for a year focusing on GW’s student financial failings without ever addressing them all. But for those that study abroad, the unfairness of the school’s study abroad tuition policies are particularly egregious. For years, students have bemoaned the fundamental injustice of GW’s study abroad tuition policies, to no avail. Why should people pay a GW tuition for a non-GW school? It’s a simple question, for which the university has never given a satisfactory answer.
I understand your point, and I completely understand where the frustration is coming from, but you talk about GW’s policy as if it is the only school in the country doing this. There has been a trend over the past several years of schools moving toward this policy as the number of students studying abroad continues to increase. The University operates on a budget, most of which coming from students enrolled at the University. Policies like this help to keep balance and predictability in the budget despite a yearly increase in the number of students who go overseas. The ability to bring one’s entire scholarship and financial aid package during study abroad is also reliant on this. Sure you can study abroad for less money than the total amount of GW, but for the vast majority of GW students that have some scholarship money and choose to go to Europe, the policy ends up working out in their favor or at least not nearly as bad as your particular experience. Maybe in places like China and Africa these numbers don’t quite work out, but your example is not the norm. Again, I’m not saying that the policy is necessarily fair or efficient in all cases, but I think that there is definitely a logic behind it that people choose to ignore, choosing instead to find more reasons to complain about GW. Stoke all the anger you want, but this “scam” is increasingly the norm and a change like that which you are looking for would probably bring with it a cap on the number of students that can study abroad.
I agree with Frank. I think GW’s policy is fair. When you became a GW student, there was an assumption that you would pay your tuition for four years. If you choose to study abroad at a less expensive program, that’s your decision and GW should not have to take the hit for that. My daughter studied abroad at GW and found their policies to be extremely flexible. They were very good about accepting her credits. We did not experience any of the numerous “financial failings” you allude to in your article– just the opposite.
Yes, but you conveniently ignore the fact that GW is what….the 3rd most expensive school in the country(?). For other schools it can either be a wash, or only slightly higher because there tuition isn’t outrageous. Furthermore, despite the fact that this is being used at other schools, the policies are being challenged in court. It remains to be seen if the court system will even allow this practice to continue. Finally, the status quo exists in large part because GW has done an incredibly poor job of boosting its endowment…if the school didn’t have to rely so heavily on actual tuition payments (or claim to), then the issue of a few hundred students going abroad each semester wouldn’t have to represent the purported ‘gaping budgetary hole’ that the administration claims they do.
Point being….who does the current system work for? The university, or its students? The answer is obvious.
Susan’s logic is awesome. Apparently GW would be the one to ‘take the hit’ if a student were to pay what their program ACTUALLY cost when they went abroad. Huh? If GW is saying the education they’re giving me is worth $25k a semester (which they are) and I am not even AT the school for a semester…shouldn’t their costs be $25k lower? It is an overly simplistic question to be sure, but one should consider how much costs would be increased to the university if the 400-500 students (represents about 5% of the student body) that currently go abroad each semester were to stay here instead…The university can get away with fewer classrooms, fewer professors, fewer staff, fewer of everything because we go abroad. So I guess those that study abroad are supposed to subsidize students that stay here and get a more expensive education? As well as subsidize those that study in very expensive countries?
Co’mon. The GW admin should stop commenting on the Hatchet web site and get to work figuring out how to make this a cheaper more accessible school for students.
The costs for GW are not going to be lower at all if these students study abroad, and if they are it will be a trivial difference. If these students stay on campus, classes get more crowded and lines get longer. GW will not necessarily hire more professors or bring in more staff. You are assuming that each student at GW is paying for what they, as a student, are taking advantage of and only that. That is simply not true. Every student is paying for the general upkeep of the University as a whole, the different services that are offered to the University community, building projects, events, etc. Studying abroad does not eliminate these costs from GW’s budget. If you don’t go to Fall Fest, join a student group, or take advantage of some other included benefit at GW, do you expect GW to issue you refunds for your portion of the money that went to pay for it? Of course not, because you are a GW student and by being such you have to pay a share for certain expenses. I’m not at all making an argument that it is “morally right” that this is the policy, but there is definitely reasoning behind it. GW students have to pay GW tuition, whether or not you’re at GW (which I no longer am). It allows you to bring your scholarships and other financial aid, it pays for the operations of the study abroad office, it pays for some program staff in a few different countries, and it covers GW’s operating expenses. The payments beyond the cost of the program are, in large part, not profit for GW, but rather go back to the GW community and keep those who don’t study abroad from having to make up the difference.