American Higher Education Loves Money

The business model for American higher education is costly. And the reason may be traced to a requirement of “regional accreditation” that courses be offered from classrooms.

A regionally accredited institution must maintain a physical campus and that drives up tuition cost to about $900 per course on the low end.

One education entrepreneur figured out that he could base an online enterprise on the back of an existing regionally accredited university and sell degree programs via the Internet.

Here is the tuition cost that university, Southern New Hampshire University, charges for courses in its online graduate degree programs:

Online Graduate Programs	Per Course*	Per Credit Hour*
Degree/Certificates	$1,881	$627

Most colleges and universities are transparent about tuition cost, but not Southern New Hampshire University.  After entering “Tuition Cost” at this institution’s website, I had to wade through a list of individual degree programs.

Why is that?

Because American higher education loves money.

At $1,881 per course, the state university system in New Hampshire is charging the same tuition for online courses as they would for a course that required attendance in a classroom.

That is nuts!  A solely online course with a personal educator to grade assignments need cost no more than $350 per course, not $1,881.

You can read about this scam at today’s edition of InsideHigherEd.com or read about how to reform the high cost education at “Education Reform.”