Wednesday, Aug. 19, 1987/University Daily Kansan
Unpublished school study sparks debate about costs
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — An unpublished U.S. Department of Education study that concludes the total cost of a bachelor's degree is 54 percent higher at private colleges than public colleges is triggering a battle between higher education groups and the Reagan administration.
Private college leaders long have argued that despite their sharply higher tuitions, overall costs at private colleges were on a par with the real costs of public higher education, including all state appropriations and subsidies.
But a paper prepared by Duc-Le To, a research associate in the Department of Education's Office of Educational Research and Improvement, estimates that the full institutional cost of a bachelor's degree at all U.S. campuses in 1983 was $24,713, with the four-year cost averaging $18,474 at public colleges and $28,386 at private ones.
To said the reason public colleges cost less was that they enrolled more students, including part-timers, and put them in larger classes. The most efficient size of a university may be somewhere beyond 20,000 students — a scale that few private campuses match, or want to match, he said.
"I think people should recognize I didn't consider quality of the degree in my paper," he said. "High cost doesn't necessarily mean inefficiency."
The study's critics say it is riddled with errors and simply the latest ploy by Secretary of Education William J. Bennett to stir up public resentment of rising college costs.
“It’s really a dog,” said Elaine El-
Khawas, the American Council on
Education's vice president for policy analysis and research. "It's full of mistakes and debatable assumptions."
Julianne Thrift, senior vice president of the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities said, "No (other) study has ever been done that shows a radical difference" between public and private costs.
Allan W. Ostar, president of the American Association of State Colleges and Universities, said the study "is poorly done and a disservice to everyone who is interested in understanding higher education... I deplore this attempt to drive a wedge between public and independent institutions."
Chester E. Finn Jr., the assistant secretary of education for research, defended the paper, which he said was still being edited.
But Finn asked, "Why are they so interested in suppressing this? Is this proper behavior for higher education, to want information not to see the light of day?"
Finn said the paper, "Estimating the Cost of a Bachelor's Degree: An Institutional Cost Analysis," contained "an interesting and important discovery (that) does go contrary to the conventional wisdom. We can't tell you why that gap is there, but as far as we can make out it is."
Finn characterized it as "a first shot at finding an answer to a legitimate question."
"To our knowledge, no one has ever done this before," he said. "You can find out what is the cost of a new Mercedes. That's simple. In that case, the cost equals the price. But what is the cost of a bachelor."
Most colleges say tuition only covers a portion of their costs. That is especially true at public colleges, where state appropriations help keep tuition relatively low.
degree?"
To, a native of Taiwan who holds a doctorate in economics from the University of Pittsburgh, derived his figures from the Higher Education General Information Surveys that the Department of Education conducts each year. He estimated the cost per credit hour of educating undergraduates, then multiplied that by the 120 hours needed for a bachelor's degree.
But To's critics said the survey figures often omitted how much states spent on construction, faculty pensions, security and other costs at public campuses.
To write that "the public has the right to question the operation of higher education, which it supports with millions of dollars."
But To said his numbers were "ballpark figures" and that, "Beckless interpretation can lead to disastrous consequences."
Robert Zemsky, a University of Pennsylvania professor and director of its Institute for Research on Higher Education, attacked To's methodology.
Zemsky, who was on a panel of advisers that criticized drafts of To's work, said, "It is an absolutely legitimate question. (But) the department has totally muddled the problem."
Thrift, the private colleges' official, said Bennett's department already had made plans to distribute the paper widely, with a mailing list including all the nation's governors.
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