A few weeks ago as Senior Investigative Reporter, I wrote an article intended to take a deeper look at the impact of previously made decisions on the Institute’s rankings and ultimately life at RPI today. Feedback has ranged from praise from the people who actually got it to ridicule and dismay from those who obviously didn’t.
As a writer I strive to effectively communicate the truths found through investigation. This is what I found: RPI’s rise in the ranking comes at price. Part of this price is higher debt loads and higher percentages of students graduating with debt.
The climb in the Institute’s rankings is in part linked to a policy of “prestige pricing,” which amounts to pricing the cost of an RPI education relative to that of institutions that it counts among its “peer” group and other institutions which it “aspires” to emulate in key areas. This collection of universities is known as Rensselaer’s “peer and aspirant” group—these are the universities across the nation to which we compare ourselves and among whom we hope to be counted. And so “prestige pricing” is the policy of pricing the cost of an RPI education to that of its “peer and aspirant” group. This concept was put before the ultimate governing body at RPI, the Board of Trustees, in 1995 by the Administration.
What was missing and what was critical in this decision was a public debate of the concept of “prestige pricing” by the entire campus community. What will be the effects of such a policy? Do the positive effects outweigh the negative ones?
Today we can see some of the effects. RPI is one of the highest-priced institutions in the nation. The pricing policy has increased the perceived worth of an RPI education and put its worth on par with that of higher-priced universities. This “improvement” in perception has paralleled a climb in the rankings, and increased alumni giving. In theory, because of the improved ranking and perception, graduates can command higher salaries. The number of applicants and revenue from applicant fees has risen, allowing Admissions to be more selective and thereby drive up average SAT scores and GPAs of admitted students. The Institute is also able to increase its percentage of full-paying students.
The flip side of the coin is that today, 76 percent of students leave RPI with debt, and the average debt of those students is $25,100. During one’s stay at RPI, a student can expect tuition to increase from 20 to 25 percent from the time when they entered. Each year students find themselves with increasing expenses and unchanging aid. In response to the perpetual situation of being “gapped,” students take out more loans, find part-time work, go on co-op, or take a leave of absence. In the last ten years, tuition has increased from $15,900 to $26,400. And today the average cost per year after aid is $20,361; RPI also ranks third highest in debt load in the nation, up from sixth place last year.
The question is, do the positive effects outweigh the negative ones—and is a policy like this really worth its true cost? By pursuing this policy, have the financial demographics of the student body changed? Is progress on diversity being maintained? Has financial aid risen in parallel to prestige price?
These and many more are questions that must be answered and would have come to the fore in a public debate. Instead, the campus learned first of this policy five years after it was implemented in former Grand Marshal Joe Greco’s article.
The case was made by the administration and approved by the Board of Trustees without input of the community and decided upon in a non-public meeting. Why are Board of Trustees meeting closed? What are the overarching factors which denying the free flow of information? Why do we allow this to be the the way things are?
Too often this is how RPI operates, and too often we, the student body and faculty, the other two legs of power at the Institute, let the third leg get away with decisions like these unchallenged. And this is the greatest failing of RPI: we do not value public debates of big decisions. Our Administration has a tendency not to engage the public in important decisions. Our Board of Trustees makes decisions in closed meetings and are only accountable to themselves. And our students and faculty, more often than not, refuse to hold their feet to the fire.
This is not a tendency that is new; it was here before our current President, it is embedded in the culture of Rensselaer. What is missing here is an engaged campus community. Simple logic tells you that with a greater number of people discussing an issue, it is more likely a decision will be made that all sides can live with. We have had moments when this type of engagement has occurred, like the formation of The Rensselaer Plan. But these moments number only a few. Greatness doesn’t reside at universities where an apathetic, unengaged public reigns. All sides must choose now for themselves whether to engage or remain apathetic, for this is the requirement of the great.
