David Labaree On The Value Of Education

As much as we would like to believe that education is not political, we cannot deny that there are absolutely no political motivations behind the purpose of education or certain educational rulings. Across the country we are seeing differential pricing regarding college majors, like in Florida where it costs more to pursue a humanities major. As for closer to home, the University of Maryland adopted a similar policy. Undergraduates in The Smith School of Business and Management, The Clark School of Engineering, and the Department of Computer Science are being charged a higher tuition than the rest. Why did the University of Maryland enact this policy in the 2015-2916 school year? Officials explained that it was because it costs the university

I believe that this policy is linked to the democratic equality purpose of education. Published in the American Educational Research Journal is an article called “Public Goods, Private Goods: The American Struggle over Educational Goals” by David Labaree. In his article Labaree states that the democratic equality approach to schooling believes that education is seen as a public good and that “it prepares all of its young with equal care to take on the full responsibilities of citizenship in a competent manner” (Labaree, pg. 5). I translate this by first tackling the fact that education is a public good, or a commodity that is provided without profit to all members of society. The university is not collecting the extra tuition money for their own financial benefit, but because more of the public’s money goes to educating these students. This is when I consider the “full responsibilities of citizenship” to come into play. Essentially, you get what you pay for, and as a citizen it is the undergraduates duty to pay a little more for their expensive lab spaces, textbooks, and other materials. It is more justifiable to charge these undergraduates more because the connotation of being selfish or greedy is not placed upon the school. These students are essentially

According to Theodore Schultz in his article “Investment in Human Capital”, human capital is the investment in a person’s knowledge, skills, and experiences (Schultz, pg. 3). The University is investing in these business and computer science majors by putting a higher value on their degree. This can be explained by Schultz through his statement that “the simple truth is that people invest in themselves and these investments are very large” (Schultz, pg. 2). Schultz is saying that the University is investing in their own future by producing more of what they think is necessary for society, computer science and business employees. The human capital factor can also explain the differential tuition for some of the science and engineering majors. The University is investing in these students by putting more money in their education, however their investment in turn becomes an investment in themselves since these students pay back the difference. Nevertheless, Schultz even states that there are reasons to be wary about investing in human capital. He explains that there are deep-seated philosophical and moral issues that intertwine with human capital and that “the mere thought of investment in human capital is offensive… Our values and beliefs inhibit us from looking upon human beings as capital goods” (Schultz,