The endowment experienced a 6 percent increase over the 2010 fiscal year, and I can tell you what Director of Financial Aid Virginia Hazen is not doing: ensuring free Dartmouth educations for the poorest students. One hundred and eighty million dollars would go a long way towards funding the roughly $4 million it would take to educate 100 deserving students for free. The odds, though, of such a plan emerging from Hazen's office are zero. This is not only a sad commentary on Ms. Hazen's commitment to "financial aid," but also an alarming reality which shows Dartmouth is more concerned with appearances than principles.
I have never been one to shy away from controversy in my life. My pay as a public employee with the second-largest school district in the country is currently being garnished for unpaid Federal student loans to the tune of 25 percent of my take-home (after-tax) pay. It's not a pleasant situation, especially considering that teachers in the same employ are getting their Federal student loans forgiven tax-free.
The situation has caused a lot of anger and sadness for me. I don't write these lines for sympathy however my mother provides more than enough but instead to send a message to Dartmouth that saddling unsuspecting kids (I was 17 when I matriculated) with onerous debt is an unsustainable moral proposition.
Business-wise, though, it makes a lot of sense what Hazen does. In my case, my father, who delivered newspapers all four years I attended Dartmouth, was required to chip in for my education by Hazen's direct predecessor, Karl Furstenberg. In addition to my father's contribution, I was required to sign quarterly promissory notes for Dartmouth and an in-state student loan outfit called the New Hampshire Higher Education Assistance Foundation. After four years, I owed roughly $20,000, which ballooned to approximately $30,000 after I stopped paying. In the next eight months, the garnishment will be over, and I will be a proud owner of a fully paid Dartmouth education. My only question now, though, is the cost really worth it?
Hazen and College President Jim Yong Kim continue to believe that their business model of partial scholarships, federal grants and federal or private loans is the best for Dartmouth. What's best for the poor students they so proudly recruit from inner-city and rural high schools every year? What's best for those who choose to go into professions after college which are not Wall Street or financial related? What's best for ministers or municipal employees or self-starters in non-profits? There must be a better way than what is currently being offered: Paying ridiculously high loan amounts back over many, many years.
I would ask Hazen to answer this, but she does not like me because I have made clear to her and Kim that they way they do business does not comport with the Financial Aid Office's stated vision: "Dartmouth College is committed to the philosophy that the cost of a college education should not be a deterrent to prospective or current students."
A Dartmouth education must be free if this philosophy should be interpreted as true. If not, Hazen should change it to, "Dartmouth College is committed to the philosophy that the cost of a college education should be passed on to the future earnings of prospective or current students." I think that would save everyone a lot of heartache and misunderstanding.
Other Ivies did away with the loan components of their financial aid packages a long time ago. I'm wondering what the hold up is with Dartmouth. I guess it's easier to have all the advantages of appearing to be philanthropic without really being philanthropic. Whatever works best.
