High Cost of Education Who is to blame

I have spent part of my career working at the college level(and most of it working at the High School Level) and in one class I taught there were 10 boys from inner city Detroit and they had been given an "Athletic Scholarship"(which were grants and loans) to attend college. Only one of the students was not on probation and was not taking the remedial High School English and Math courses. By Thanksgiving of their first semester only three boys returned to college. When I asked the one fellow he told me they did not have any money left from their "Scholarship". By the end of the first year only one student remained. He was the only one who met the minimum requirements for college entry. The government set guidelines and quotas on admitting minorities and colleges were hard pressed to find qualified minorities, so they were taking anyone who was even close at a cost of $4,000 to $6,000 per student. It would have been better for the government to stay out and encourage these students to enter a two year program or a technical school program where they could be successful and then try the 4 year school, with credit for courses taken. I am all for helping students who need help, but why should I fund my children's education and then fund the education of students who we know from the start are not going to make it. This is done just because they are poor? I have seen too many qualified students turned down because they had to make room for "disadvantaged students". I would like to see Federal aid based on the financial hardship, plus grades and the potential of the student. One Senator who spoke out against increasing Student Aid pointed to the fact that 20% of the students receiving Federal money were not passing a single course. I forget how many millions of dollars could be save if to receive a Federal Grant you had to be passing your course work. In Wisconsin we have 2 year campus but they all want to be 4 year institutions. We have Technical Colleges that are becoming more like colleges and the High Schools are eliminating vocational programs in favor of College prep courses. We have a great Education institution but the system needs to be overhauled and students need to be guided into careers and areas that will best meet their goals and ability. Why send a student into a situation where you know they will fail. The beauty of the American system is that you can always change and go to college. We just had two ladies featured in the paper who completed their BS degree after age 40. That is success of the system. I do not think you can do that in any other country. But lets not force people to attend college just because someone else is paying for it.

Most law makers do not know the Constitution. My brother questioned one lawmaker about the tenth Amendment and he had no idea that there were limits on what congress could do. It would be interesting to see a few court challenges to some of the laws and programs if we had a court that knew and understood the Constitution.