Four years after President Obama proposed making community college tuition-free, free college proposals are all the rage among the Democratic presidential candidates. From Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s, D-Mass., plan to Sen. Bernie Sanders’, I-Vt., nearly every candidate boasts some version of a free college proposal. The logic is as alluring as it is faulty. Free college would ultimately curtail students’ ability to make the right choices for themselves, by crowding out the emerging innovative options most likely to make a difference in their lives.
The argument in support of free college goes something like this: College costs a lot, and far too many cannot afford those costs. Completing college has significant benefits for individuals in the form of a 14 percent return on investment and, theoretically, for society in terms of more skilled and knowledgeable individuals.
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Therefore, advocates say, free college would automatically benefit students and society in the same way that extending high schools from the domain of the elite few – only one-third of children in the United States who enrolled in the first grade made it to high school in 1905 – to publicly funded settings for all did.
Although the analogy is tempting, following its logic would stunt the kind of innovations in higher education we need to bolster the nation and the livelihood of millions.
Free college would not solve our problems because many students who attend college do not finish. Forty percent of first-time, full-time students fail to graduate from four-year programs within six years. The rate is worse at two-year colleges, where only 39 percent of students complete. Eighty percent entering community colleges expect to transfer and earn a Bachelor’s, but just 29 percent do within six years, according to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center.
Yes, financial hardship is one of the reasons students leave school. But it is not just tuition – which is what most free college plans address –driving students’ financial challenges. If that were the case, we would expect to see far more success at low-priced community colleges where tuition is already covered completely for low-income students by the federal government’s Pell Grants.
According to executives at ReUp Education, a company that helps re-enroll students who have dropped out and then supports them through graduation, factors like life balance, professional commitments, health, lack of satisfaction with one’s school and academics all play significant roles in students dropping out as well.
A challenge is that colleges were never designed with the supports, flexibilities and instructionally sound teaching and learning practices that many students need to succeed. Some faculty members continue to view their teaching roles as sorting students out based on who cannot succeed academically, rather than supporting students thro
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