Do you feel as if your tuition dollars are being used properly for the good of the school? Do you realize tuition was $27k year in 2001. Why so high now? Is it doing good for the VLS community? What are your thoughts?
I think that there are several different reasons that tuition is so ridiculously high:
1. We are a private law school that is completely unaccountable. Neither the students nor any accounting organization requires that VLS spend money wisely, efficiently or effectively. Two years ago the administration published an info sheet on expenditures and nearly a quarter of their expenditures went to "other." Really? How about publishing exactly what the money is spent on so that at least we know we are being ripped off.
2. The nature of our school does not lend itself well to effective fundraising. People are not normally making 160k coming out of VLS and those that do are not giving back because they resent being ripped off by VLS. That has been my experience. Otherwise, the people who are fundraising are doing a poor job. Either/or.
3. We don't spend money efficiently and in the best interests of the student body. How about a career fair? Maybe a bus to Boston or Albany? Let's not have administrative assistants for every possible situation, including duplicative administrative assistants (I name no names). Also, publish the Deans budget...I don't know what he spends his money on, but I'm sure it is absurd. I would argue that we have a right to konw what our money is being used for.
Those are 3 possible reasons our tuition is ridiculous. As I go to pay off my massive debts, I'll be sure to not give VLS any of the minuscule profits that I get to "keep" at the end of the day.
Baruch - why in the world would people making 160k coming out of VLS RESENT being "ripped off by VLS?" That is a contradiction that cannot be reconciled. The problem is not those that are making 160k, it is with those making 30k. Keep your eye on the ball.
I agree on the job fairs - we need to get our students to as many as possible, because the employers just aren't coming to Soro. The problem isn't the tuition, it is the job prospects after paying the tuition.
Absolutely! Employers won't come to SoRo and I found out that Career Services doesn't do much in the way of help either. I know, I worked there one semester.
I was told by my current employer that there is a negative vibe about VLS and many employers don't bother. They have a negative impression. A completely wrong impression, but a negative one at that. One of those being that of a school full of idealistic hippies who claim tolerance, while being intolerant of opposing views, who have no clue. Kinda like Bill O'Reilly. You and I know that is not totally true, but unfortunately it is the picture people have.
HI, I am a student, entering my third year. This is a bit about my experience with VLS. VLS does have positives. It focuses on areas of interest to me, it has an SIP program, the ENRLC clinic is wonderful, and they have some excellent professors with incredible expertise. But, it has more problems than positives. Tuition is so high because the administration and faculty made a conscious decision to climb rankings (I've been told by reputable faculty members, not just one, but three). A few years ago VLS hired a consultant to advise the school on it's future. The consultant came back with two options. VLS could climb rankings through increased bar courses and other measure to play the "rankings game". Or, they could focus on what makes them special, programs like SIP that allow experiential learning to spread the VLS name. The school obviously chose to seek rankings. VLS's solution seems to be hiring expensive deans. The Dean makes 300K (a fortune in Vermont), has a personal chef, uses his secretaries to do his taxes (stealing school resources for his personal gain), lives in the Dean's house, but is not a man of action. For example, rather than taking leadership in organizing VLS into action, he asked student leaders to organize a march on Washington to protest the lack of climate change legislation. He did this immediately after the same student leaders organized the school's biggest environmental law conference. Rather than taking a leadership role in an idea, likely motivated by spreading VLS's name, he asked overworked and exhausted students to take care of it. On a side note.. I have friend who was working in an office that was being painted. The Dean entered the office and tripped on a carpet. Rather than tack the carpet down himself, a solution requiring about three minutes of his time, he make a stink about it, calling Buildings and Grounds (who of course, were busy working) time and tima again. He also checked back multiple times throughout the day to see if had been done. A man of action, the type of leader VLS needs, would have gotten a couple tacks and taken care of the problem and gone back to doing more important things. Our Dean is a dean of mid-afternoon walks, a Dean who hires others to do his work for him (cooking and farming), and is symbolic of the VLS switch from common sense to top-heavy administrative inefficiency and inaction. Rather than focus on what VLS does well, the school is trying to remake itself into a rankings climbing machine. Coincidentally, focusing on the programs that give VLS students unique experiences, thereby making us more marketable, might be a better solution to raising our rank than by copying other schools ranked higher. It is starting by limiting SIP students (cheap credits). It pushes the joint degree program, which is essntially five two week courses for 22K (the internship portion of degree in all likelihood requires about an hour work per person for filing). This is highway robbery. And one of the main reasons I cannot in good conscious advise prospective to attend VLS. The school makes moral decisions for the students, disallowing military recruiters for "the don't ask don't tell" policy, rather than allowing students to decide for themselves. A better solution is to accept the money, allow the recruiters on campus, and then use a portion of the recruiting money to fund student lobbying groups (cheap credit production). The school could accept the money, lower tuition, protest the policy, and create cheap credits. Realistically, the recruiters would not spend much time at VLS anyway, cause let's face it, it's not a fertile recruiting ground for JAG lawyers. So, rather than explore other, better options, VLS makes the moral decision for students at a serious cost to students, experientially, and monetarily. The school also retains terrible, over the hill, faculty. Unafraid to cut them loose, the school keeps them around, allowing them to teach bar courses, putting VLS students at a major disadvantage immediately. These professors teach Civil Procedure, Evidence, and other core courses. Property courses are taught by brand new professors with absolutely no experience in the topic. So, property for most 1st years is a joke, and some sections are widely unattended because the class is at best a recap of the textbook with no professor insight offered. Students often find that internet sources are better than professors. And I know professors who've taught the course that admit this. For 4K a course, VLS students deserve better professors. Administration employees have increased about 500% in the last 20 years while student enrollment is only up 50% (info from VLS graduates, faculty, and employees, all reputable). And, enter any VLS office, and most administrators are not busy. This increased administration seems to be motivated by upper-level administrators desire to delegate, effectively removing themselves of the burden of doing actual work. Yes, VLS has lots of problems. Yet, the administration does not listen to students. "That's something we'll have to look at" is not a promising or genuine answer the upper level deans give student leaders when they verbalize their concerns to the deans. The Board of Trustees ought to take a day or two to hear students for ten minutes each so that they can get a real gauge on what's actually happening. There is a serious disconnect problem, and I believe it's caused by admionstrators insulating themselves from the concerns of students. Students who want to work at NGOs and low paying gvt jobs cannot, because they are too in debt. This problem is foreign to administrators. The fact is that the VLS education is far inferior to the education promised to me, and until the Board of Trustees opens their ears to student concerns, the school will continue to have poor quality applicant and will remain broke. After all, it's how students are treated today that determines how generously students will give back in the future. I for one will give nothing back to VLS. I give generously to my high school and college, but VLS will not get any money from me.
The tuition is so high for one simple reason: financial aid has been extremely easy for students to get. The more access to free or low interest loans, the more debt institutions feel they can place on their graduates. While I also feel the pains of my VLS loans, look around and try to find an affordable education in VT. All tuitions in this state are high.
Certainly the administration is responsible for some of the increase, and the schools lack of an endowment also affect tutition, but it is the market at play.
Tuition has risen steadily since I graduated, yet so has enrollment. If the tuition is too high or out of proportion with the market, applications should decline. However, that's just not the case.
What VLS needs to focus on is helping their graduates who do choose to take public interest careers manage their debt load. LRAP is far too small and far too restrictive.
Bravo! Well said. I myself saw similar instances. As well as being the pampered Dean, he has also done a great job of alienating the locals in the area.
I just wonder why the board or the Alumni office can't reel him in and cut the wasteful spending and the lack of leadership. One of his goals when he became Dean was to move the school in the direction of corporate law. NOT what VLS was about.
I just want to know what the 25% to other is in the school's budget. Anyone know?
8 comments:
I think that there are several different reasons that tuition is so ridiculously high:
1. We are a private law school that is completely unaccountable. Neither the students nor any accounting organization requires that VLS spend money wisely, efficiently or effectively. Two years ago the administration published an info sheet on expenditures and nearly a quarter of their expenditures went to "other." Really? How about publishing exactly what the money is spent on so that at least we know we are being ripped off.
2. The nature of our school does not lend itself well to effective fundraising. People are not normally making 160k coming out of VLS and those that do are not giving back because they resent being ripped off by VLS. That has been my experience. Otherwise, the people who are fundraising are doing a poor job. Either/or.
3. We don't spend money efficiently and in the best interests of the student body. How about a career fair? Maybe a bus to Boston or Albany? Let's not have administrative assistants for every possible situation, including duplicative administrative assistants (I name no names). Also, publish the Deans budget...I don't know what he spends his money on, but I'm sure it is absurd. I would argue that we have a right to konw what our money is being used for.
Those are 3 possible reasons our tuition is ridiculous. As I go to pay off my massive debts, I'll be sure to not give VLS any of the minuscule profits that I get to "keep" at the end of the day.
My two cents.
Baruch - why in the world would people making 160k coming out of VLS RESENT being "ripped off by VLS?" That is a contradiction that cannot be reconciled. The problem is not those that are making 160k, it is with those making 30k. Keep your eye on the ball.
I agree on the job fairs - we need to get our students to as many as possible, because the employers just aren't coming to Soro. The problem isn't the tuition, it is the job prospects after paying the tuition.
Biglaw,
Absolutely! Employers won't come to SoRo and I found out that Career Services doesn't do much in the way of help either. I know, I worked there one semester.
I was told by my current employer that there is a negative vibe about VLS and many employers don't bother. They have a negative impression. A completely wrong impression, but a negative one at that. One of those being that of a school full of idealistic hippies who claim tolerance, while being intolerant of opposing views, who have no clue. Kinda like Bill O'Reilly. You and I know that is not totally true, but unfortunately it is the picture people have.
HI, I am a student, entering my third year. This is a bit about my experience with VLS. VLS does have positives. It focuses on areas of interest to me, it has an SIP program, the ENRLC clinic is wonderful, and they have some excellent professors with incredible expertise. But, it has more problems than positives.
Tuition is so high because the administration and faculty made a conscious decision to climb rankings (I've been told by reputable faculty members, not just one, but three). A few years ago VLS hired a consultant to advise the school on it's future. The consultant came back with two options. VLS could climb rankings through increased bar courses and other measure to play the "rankings game". Or, they could focus on what makes them special, programs like SIP that allow experiential learning to spread the VLS name. The school obviously chose to seek rankings.
VLS's solution seems to be hiring expensive deans. The Dean makes 300K (a fortune in Vermont), has a personal chef, uses his secretaries to do his taxes (stealing school resources for his personal gain), lives in the Dean's house, but is not a man of action. For example, rather than taking leadership in organizing VLS into action, he asked student leaders to organize a march on Washington to protest the lack of climate change legislation. He did this immediately after the same student leaders organized the school's biggest environmental law conference. Rather than taking a leadership role in an idea, likely motivated by spreading VLS's name, he asked overworked and exhausted students to take care of it. On a side note.. I have friend who was working in an office that was being painted. The Dean entered the office and tripped on a carpet. Rather than tack the carpet down himself, a solution requiring about three minutes of his time, he make a stink about it, calling Buildings and Grounds (who of course, were busy working) time and tima again. He also checked back multiple times throughout the day to see if had been done. A man of action, the type of leader VLS needs, would have gotten a couple tacks and taken care of the problem and gone back to doing more important things. Our Dean is a dean of mid-afternoon walks, a Dean who hires others to do his work for him (cooking and farming), and is symbolic of the VLS switch from common sense to top-heavy administrative inefficiency and inaction.
Rather than focus on what VLS does well, the school is trying to remake itself into a rankings climbing machine. Coincidentally, focusing on the programs that give VLS students unique experiences, thereby making us more marketable, might be a better solution to raising our rank than by copying other schools ranked higher. It is starting by limiting SIP students (cheap credits). It pushes the joint degree program, which is essntially five two week courses for 22K (the internship portion of degree in all likelihood requires about an hour work per person for filing). This is highway robbery. And one of the main reasons I cannot in good conscious advise prospective to attend VLS.
The school makes moral decisions for the students, disallowing military recruiters for "the don't ask don't tell" policy, rather than allowing students to decide for themselves. A better solution is to accept the money, allow the recruiters on campus, and then use a portion of the recruiting money to fund student lobbying groups (cheap credit production). The school could accept the money, lower tuition, protest the policy, and create cheap credits. Realistically, the recruiters would not spend much time at VLS anyway, cause let's face it, it's not a fertile recruiting ground for JAG lawyers. So, rather than explore other, better options, VLS makes the moral decision for students at a serious cost to students, experientially, and monetarily.
The school also retains terrible, over the hill, faculty. Unafraid to cut them loose, the school keeps them around, allowing them to teach bar courses, putting VLS students at a major disadvantage immediately. These professors teach Civil Procedure, Evidence, and other core courses. Property courses are taught by brand new professors with absolutely no experience in the topic. So, property for most 1st years is a joke, and some sections are widely unattended because the class is at best a recap of the textbook with no professor insight offered. Students often find that internet sources are better than professors. And I know professors who've taught the course that admit this. For 4K a course, VLS students deserve better professors.
Administration employees have increased about 500% in the last 20 years while student enrollment is only up 50% (info from VLS graduates, faculty, and employees, all reputable). And, enter any VLS office, and most administrators are not busy. This increased administration seems to be motivated by upper-level administrators desire to delegate, effectively removing themselves of the burden of doing actual work.
Yes, VLS has lots of problems. Yet, the administration does not listen to students. "That's something we'll have to look at" is not a promising or genuine answer the upper level deans give student leaders when they verbalize their concerns to the deans. The Board of Trustees ought to take a day or two to hear students for ten minutes each so that they can get a real gauge on what's actually happening.
There is a serious disconnect problem, and I believe it's caused by admionstrators insulating themselves from the concerns of students. Students who want to work at NGOs and low paying gvt jobs cannot, because they are too in debt. This problem is foreign to administrators. The fact is that the VLS education is far inferior to the education promised to me, and until the Board of Trustees opens their ears to student concerns, the school will continue to have poor quality applicant and will remain broke. After all, it's how students are treated today that determines how generously students will give back in the future. I for one will give nothing back to VLS. I give generously to my high school and college, but VLS will not get any money from me.
The tuition is so high for one simple reason: financial aid has been extremely easy for students to get. The more access to free or low interest loans, the more debt institutions feel they can place on their graduates. While I also feel the pains of my VLS loans, look around and try to find an affordable education in VT. All tuitions in this state are high.
Certainly the administration is responsible for some of the increase, and the schools lack of an endowment also affect tutition, but it is the market at play.
Tuition has risen steadily since I graduated, yet so has enrollment. If the tuition is too high or out of proportion with the market, applications should decline. However, that's just not the case.
What VLS needs to focus on is helping their graduates who do choose to take public interest careers manage their debt load. LRAP is far too small and far too restrictive.
3rd year,
Bravo! Well said. I myself saw similar instances. As well as being the pampered Dean, he has also done a great job of alienating the locals in the area.
I just wonder why the board or the Alumni office can't reel him in and cut the wasteful spending and the lack of leadership. One of his goals when he became Dean was to move the school in the direction of corporate law. NOT what VLS was about.
I just want to know what the 25% to other is in the school's budget. Anyone know?
Holy shit! 3rd year was not kidding about the chef!
Peggy, The Chef!
Hmmm, that article was written by Dorothy Heinrichs' husband. She works in the Alumni Office.
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