California Dream in Higher Education Research Paper (Essay Sample)

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California Dream in Higher Education
Increase in the amount of tuition in the public universities in California has elevated concerns about the affordability of the higher learning education, particularly to the individuals with relatively lower incomes. In-state full tuition in colleges such as University of California (UC) and California State University (CSU) has increased remarkably compared to other institutions in other states. Meanwhile, the federal, state and the institutional grants that assist learners from low-income families expanded progressively, enabling the individual’s to afford the higher education. The grants and scholarship allowed the students to keep pace with the continuously increasing tuition; however, the cost of education has continued to grow beyond their ability to pay. Thus, it is necessary to understand the main issue affecting the cost of higher education because it has reached a point whereby the students from middle- and low-income backgrounds can no longer afford.
In 1960, President Clark Kerr established one of the most leading systems in the world. The Master Plan developed would influence the entire education system across the globe. The strategy was a tapering pyramid because it matched higher education to the various hierarchical levels of wealth in the society as well as labor categories. The plan was expected to be used for approximately 20 years (Marginson, par. 2). The plan was effective for an additional decade before the foundations started eroding by 1990. The ability of the state to cater for the higher education financially was undermined by the imposition of the tax proposition 13 in 1978 (Marginson, par.3). Since then, the new era was characterized by federal cuts and reduction in the role of government.
The cost of attending universities in California has been mainly due to tuition increase over the past decade. The changes in the fees have concerned many people who are worried that they may not afford acquiring university education or find themselves being forced to lend money to finance their education. According to Lewin (par. 1), UC is struggling to adapt to the sharpest decline in the state financial support, which has caused the entire workforce to incur 8% pay cut. Besides, among the learners and faculties, there is a prolific notion that the rise in the financial cuts is leading the institution into a decline. The financial allocation for higher education from the state was reduced by $2.8 billion in 2009 (Lewin, par. 10). This implies that the institution will not be able to maintain its ranking which has remained since the adoption of the master plan in 1960.
In most institutions, minor communities have been underrepresented due to the increase in the university tuition fees. For example, besides the continued discourse and the legal wrangling concerning the aggressiveness of the college affirmative actions, the Hispanic and black students are still underrepresented in the top institutions than it was the case in 1980 (Goldstein, par. 10). Pomona College has managed to recruit the underrepresented groups because it allocates half of its budget in admitting such people. Amherst College managed to accept more than a quarter of the new students from black and Hispanic groups by ensuring that it facilitates the traveling of 200 prospective applicants. Amherst has promised a full financial support of students as in the case of Pomona College. This will help in ensuring that most of the low-income students can access postsecondary education, hence keeping the education promise that was contained in the master plan for higher education (Carey, par. 4).
California’s situation gets worse when it comes to the rate of graduation. According to Maxwell article, in 1999 California ranked 35 for producing graduates who had completed baccalaureate degrees according to the report drawn up by the National Center. This drop can be attributed to the behavior of spending lavishly on the education in good times and cutting the support completely during the bad periods. This has reduced the quality of the education in the universities as most institutions are not able to provide the required facilities to all the students to ensure they get the required quality of education.
What may not have been understood well is that elevating financial help plays a significant role in reducing the expenses to the learners, thus making the postsecondary education affordable for both the low-income families. Comprehension of how the costs vary among the learners can contribute substantially in framing the discourse about the increasing tuition fees and the accessibility of the higher education in the state. In the Maxwell article, David Longanecker said that the success of keeping higher education accessible to a range of learners is the participation rate. In 1996, approximately 61% of high school graduates joined colleges and universities while in 2000 the percentage had reduced to about 43% (Maxwell 209).
The big challenge facing the education is the way to reach the low-income learners who qualify for, but they do not consider applying for the available grants. Most of the individuals from the low-income backgrounds and the elevating number of the middle class are eligible for financial grants but they may not access them or may not bother applying for them. This has caused the college prices for the learners in substantial need of financial help, eventually making the college and university fees more expensive. As the state looks forward to restoring the facilitation to higher education, the UC and the CSU have tried to respond to the financial subsidies provided by the state by reducing the level of the institution tuition (Lewin, par. 4-5). Besides, the California policymakers should consider utilizing the incentives to facilitate further alignments of the university and college education objectives.
The vision of the master plan can still be realized for the higher education in the state. In the entire United States, end solution is to have a preferable notion of the state government and education for the good of all the people and implementation of policies to ensure the goal is achieved (Maxwell 207). Therefore, there is a need for a sea change in the entire political economy and have a significant reduction in the income differences and redevelopment of the taxation system. This brings to the attention of two important issues which include the fiscal capacity of the state authority and the increasing cost of education. The other element is about the structuring of the California pyramid.
The way to access community colleges is not retracting all the higher education tuition fees because this may worsen the situation of institutional poverty wit...