High-quality education is a costly thing," began President Richard Brodhead in his Feb. 29 press conference announcing a 4.8-percent bump in tuition. And with the cost of a Duke education about to top $47,985 next year, students hardly need reminding.
But should tuition really be that high? Unsurprisingly, senior administrators swear up and down that it should. In an interview last spring, Executive Vice President Tallman Trask even insisted to me that Duke pursues cost savings wherever possible. But even a cursory look under the hood (so to speak) reveals that that's blatantly false.
Take Duke's exorbitant student fees. A glance at any undergrad's bursar statement reveals that Duke students pay $546 per year toward a "health fee." I remember assuming as a freshman that this fee represented some sort of Duke-mandated health insurance, but that actually costs an extra $1,564 if you want it.
No, the health fee is a required subsidy for Duke's largely ineffective student health programs, particularly the Student Health Center, which can't do anything for you if you're actually sick (well, besides offering you the "cold/flu/allergy self-help table"). It also funds Counseling and Psychological Services, which hardly has time for kids who are suicidal.
And in the unlikely event that Healthy Devils' "Sex Jeopardy" and "Outercourse: Intimacy without Intercourse" programs don't meet your special needs, those $546 further ensure that peer educators can customize their X-rated offerings for you.
Of course, students are also on the hook for Duke's $200 recreation fee; a $206 student activity fee; a $250 student services fee; a $108 residential programming fee; a $42 post office box rental fee (I totally thought those were free!); and, my favorite, a $39 "Dining Plan Contract Fee," which I pay for the privilege of renewing my required meal plan each semester.
Oh, and let's not forget the artificially inflated rent we Central residents pay so that West will seem more affordable to poor kids like... well, us.
But where do those thousands of dollars in student fees actually go, you ask? The answer, oftentimes, is to Larry Moneta, who can "administratively" increase them at will-see the student activities fee's 45-percent hike in 2006. And what L-Mo doesn't siphon off for Student Affairs' own "structural support" usually goes to student groups, including ones like the 20-member Students of the Caribbean Association, which received $1,865 in funding for the 2006-2007 school year.
Now I have nothing against students hailing from the Caribbean (far from it), but it's frankly insulting to pay thousands of dollars each year to support clubs I'll never join, services I don't use and "quad barbecues" I don't attend. This, my fellow financial aid recipients, is what we're borrowing money to finance-events we'll never enjoy run by people we don't know.
And what about those elite professors we all came to study under? Well, they have a pretty cushy deal too. With a five-hour-per-week teaching load common throughout the humanities, today's Duke professors spend much less time in the classroom than their predecessors. In fact, teaching loads at Duke used to be as heavy as 15 hours per week until the 1960s, including mandatory Saturday classes.
Seeing as undergrads pay an average of $4,291.88 per course (that's $17,167.50 in semesterly tuition divided by a standard load of four courses), it appears we're not getting our money's worth. And although there's a very good chance that I'll be run out of the English department on a rail for saying this, there is no good reason why humanities-based professors can't teach more than five hours per week-or at least as much as their colleagues in the sciences.
In the long run, though, I think most of us still believe our Duke educations will have been worth their cost; as a soon-to-be graduate, I'd probably sell my soul for Duke all over again if I had to.
But next time Dick Brodhead waxes poetic about the high cost of a good education, let's not forget that Duke's tuition bills fund much more than just academic excellence.
Kristin Butler is a Trinity senior. Her column runs every Tuesday.
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.