The Student Aid Game: Meeting Need and Rewarding Talent in American Higher Education

by Michael McPherson, Morton Schapiro

Overview

Student aid in higher education has recently become a hot-button issue. Parents trying to pay for their children's education, college administrators competing for students, and even President Bill Clinton, whose recently proposed tax breaks for college would change sharply the federal government's financial commitment to higher education, have staked a claim in its resolution. In The Student Aid Game, Michael McPherson and Morton Owen Schapiro explain how both colleges and governments are struggling to cope with a rapidly changing marketplace, and show how sound policies can help preserve the strengths and remedy some emerging weaknesses of American higher education.


McPherson and Schapiro offer a detailed look at how undergraduate education is financed in the United States, highlighting differences across sectors and for students of differing family backgrounds. They review the implications of recent financing trends for access to and choice of undergraduate college and gauge the implications of these national trends for the future of college opportunity. The authors examine how student aid fits into college budgets, how aid and pricing decisions are shaped by government higher education policies, and how competition has radically reshaped the way colleges think about the strategic role of student aid. Of particular interest is the issue of merit aid. McPherson and Schapiro consider the attractions and pitfalls of merit aid from the viewpoint of students, institutions, and society.



The Student Aid Game concludes with an examination of policy options for both government and individual institutions. McPherson and Schapiro argue that the federal government needs to keep its attention focused on providing access to college for needy students, while colleges themselves need to constrain their search for strategic advantage by sticking to aid and admission policies they are willing to articulate and defend publicly.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780691230917
Publisher:	Princeton University Press
Publication date:	05/11/2021
Series:	The William G. Bowen Series , #31
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	176
File size:	7 MB

About the Author

Michael S. McPherson is President of Macalester College. Morton Owen Schapiro is Dean of the College of Letters, Arts and Sciences at the University of Southern California.

Table of Contents

Figures and Tables
Foreword
Acknowledgments
Pt. 1	Introduction	1
1	Meeting Need and Rewarding Talent: Student Aid in the U.S. System of Higher Education Finance	5
2	Changing the Rules: The New Strategic Role of Student Aid	15
Pt. 2	Student Aid and Educational Opportunity: Are We Keeping College Affordable?	23
3	Prices and Aid: The Growing Burden on Families	25
4	Access: Student Response to Higher Prices - and Higher Returns	37
5	Choice: How Ability to Pay Affects College Options	42
6	The Future of College Affordability	49
Pt. 3	Student Aid and Institutional Strategy	53
7	Student Aid in Institutional Finance	55
8	How Government Aid Shapes Colleges' Behavior	81
9	Student Aid as a Competitive Weapon	91
Pt. 4	The Special Case of Merit Aid	105
10	Merit Aid: Its Place in History and Its Role in Society	107
11	The Institutional Perspective	116
12	The Student Perspective	122
13	Conclusion: Merit Aid - Good or Bad?	130
Pt. V	The Future of Student Aid	133
14	Where Do We Go from Here?	135
Notes	145
Bibliography	153
Index	157

What People are Saying About This

Ronald Ehrenberg, Cornell University

This is a wonderful book. The authors' many years of thinking about admissions and financial aid policies and their econometric research on the topic provide the foundations for a nontechnical book that addresses many of the fundamental issues facing society, federal and state government, individual institutions, and students and their families.

From the Publisher

"This is a wonderful book. The authors' many years of thinking about admissions and financial aid policies and their econometric research on the topic provide the foundations for a nontechnical book that addresses many of the fundamental issues facing society, federal and state government, individual institutions, and students and their families."—Ronald Ehrenberg, Cornell University

Ronald Ehrenberg

This is a wonderful book. The authors' many years of thinking about admissions and financial aid policies and their econometric research on the topic provide the foundations for a nontechnical book that addresses many of the fundamental issues facing society, federal and state government, individual institutions, and students and their families.
— Ronald Ehrenberg, Cornell University

Editorial Reviews

If you really want to understand how undergraduate education in this country is financed get The Student Aid Game, by Michael S. McPherson, president of Macalester College, and Morton Owen Schapiro, dean of the College of Letters, Arts and Sciences at the University of Southern California. These two scholars have written the definitive guide to this complex and emotional subject. It's a must-read for anyone who is concerned about higher education and its financial availability to low- and middle-income students.

New Orleans Times-Picayune

"Confusion and apprehension often drive families into the arms of private counselors, who offer, for a price, to help them master the [student aid] system. They would be well advised to save their money and consult McPherson and Schapiro instead."—-Donald Kennedy, Atlantic Monthly

From the Publisher

"Because they are primarily interested in how federal policy might more effectively open the doors to college for low-income youth, McPherson and Schapiro, like good economists, analyze the effects of financial-aid programs on the incentives of colleges and parents, and anticipate the impact of recent changes in the tax code on colleges' tuition and aid policies."

Harvard Magazine

Confusion and apprehension often drive families into the arms of private counselors, who offer, for a price, to help them master the [student aid] system. They would be well advised to save their money and consult McPherson and Schapiro instead.

Atlantic Monthly - Donald Kennedy

Confusion and apprehension often drive families into the arms of private counselors, who offer, for a price, to help them master the [student aid] system. They would be well advised to save their money and consult McPherson and Schapiro instead.
— Donald Kennedy

Atlantic Monthly