I hope Columbia isn't the last school to get hit for trying to keep their students' money and not providing everything the students paid for:
Columbia University has agreed to pay $12.5 million to resolve a lawsuit seeking tuition and fee reimbursements in the wake of coronavirus-spurred campus closures, according to a settlement proposal filed in New York federal court...
At least 261 lawsuits have been filed against U.S. colleges and universities over their alleged failure to refund tuition and fees when the pandemic forced them into remote learning, according to the law firm Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner.
I'm curious how much that $12.5 million is per student.
Quick Google search shows Columbia had enrollment of 6,398 students in Fall 2019. Assuming roughly the same for the Spring semester, that would be about $1,950 per student. Minus lawyers fees of course.
ReplyDeleteColumbia has a student population of about 30,000. Thus, about 400 bucks, is distributed equally. Their average tuition is about $63,500 (not including fees). Take out the attorneys' fees and each student probably gets around $250.
ReplyDeleteOne of our kid's profs used covid as an excuse to phone in his entire college class. He said he didn't want his lectures online, since that would jeopardize his intellectual property. No in-person by school edict, no zoom because the prof didn't want to.
ReplyDeleteSo, the prof gave the students a syllabus, had a couple writing assignments, was available a little for email questions, and that was it. It was literally a self-study class, with the prof grading some papers and answering some emails.
And we were paying for it! Kid doesn't like to make waves, so refused to complain to the department about it.
I just got my Master's from a directional state university, and about half of that was during COVID. We had weekly live Zoom lectures, profs and TAs active in Blackboard/Canvas, and actual teaching. I paid about $1400 per course. I think I got a better deal than those Columbia kids.
ReplyDelete