By The Gazette Editorial Board | SOURCE: THE GAZETTE
Each fall, Colorado parents have ever greater misgivings as they send another round of freshmen to the state’s colleges and universities.
Foremost among their concerns has to be the skyrocketing cost of higher ed, with tuition ratcheting up year after year. The spiraling price of a college degree seems to outpace even inflation. Colorado students pay higher in-state tuition than the national average.
There’s also a perception of chaos on campus, fostered by a culture in which fringe values are rendered mainstream. Professors and protesters alike have been known to harangue students for holding views that would be regarded as conventional anywhere off campus. Students have been denounced as racist merely for their skin color. And that’s not to mention the deeply troubling surge in campus antisemitism — in what’s supposed to be a haven of tolerance.
And then there is higher ed’s legendarily bloated bureaucracy. We’re not talking about faculty but all the six-figure-a-year administrators with assorted titles and their staffers in the front offices of higher-learning institutions.