It
is no doubt that the cost of a college degree in Kenya has continued to soar
despite the mushrooming of new and new colleges. With each dawn, nations are
striving to achieve the required capacity; be it an adequate pool of engineers,
planners, doctors, economists; a prerequisite for attaining the envisioned
macro-economic stabilities, that is, low unemployment levels, single digit
inflation level, maximum production levels etc.
As
such, you would expect education to be the most affordable item yet the reality
on the ground tells of quite a different narrative altogether. Why then, has
the cost of acquiring a university degree continued to rise day by day?
To
start with, we have to realize that the education sector is affected by the
basic forces of demand and supply. Take for example, admission applications
received at a public university in Kenya per intake. Recent statistics shows
that there for a 100 students admitted for a particular programme, more than
double the admitted are locked out.
This
simple scenario illustrates a situation whereby the market for university
education is faced with an excess demand and since universities are not able to
expand overnight i.e. the supply of education facilities is not perfectly elastic,
the only reasonable thing for them to do, is to increase their pricing for a
degree so as to be able to meet the demand without upsetting the market. In so doing,
the cost of a college degree rises and has continued to do so exponentially.
Of
interest to us here, however, is why the sharp rise in demand for a college
education? Here, we look at two things:
(1)Government
Subsidies and Loans/Grants
When
governments subsidize the cost of university education, this has the effect of
making it less costly (to the student) and thus affordable. Parents and
students interpret this to mean that it is now cheaper and thus many parents
rush to get their children admitted. What they do not realize is that this has
the net overall effect of raising the cost of that degree. This is how: When
many students rush to be enrolled, yet the universities cannot expand the classrooms,
the universities ends up increasing the fee for that particular programme so as
to be admit only those students the classrooms can accommodate.
(2)Job Prospects
It
is assumed that acquiring a college degree raises the chances of securing a job
and thus many students rush to secure one again raising the demand and
consequently the cost.
In
addition, since the demand for a degree
continue to rise, universities has opted to invest not in education utilities
but rather invested heavily in modern eateries and luxurious facilities like
the state of the art swimming pools, gymnasiums, etc which have had the
ultimate effect of raising even further, the cost of a degree without
necessarily adding the value of that degree.
In
this light, don’t you think students loans, government subsidies etc serves to make education out of reach for
the majority ?Or are they the necessarily evils that works a for a common good?
What
is your take?
Am
Dubois Maina.
The
University of Nairobi.
