OT - Columbia raises $6.1 billion

[jbdphi]

Current fees for new EMBA students: $168K

http://www8.gsb.columbia.edu/programs-admissions/executive-mba/tuition/overview

The EMBA program is one of the biggest money-makers out there for the high level business schools. As you correctly noted before, there is no way the fees paid in any way actually are tabbed for the cost of the professors and space used - it's mostly for profit and is used to subsidize other programs.

To answer your other question, the full-time MBA program (at least when I went) had 8 clusters of 60 students in each year plus another 3 clusters of 60 students who were Jan termers. So overall a bit shy of 700 per class. No idea what tuition is today but back when I went it seemed pretty insane. But for me it was quite obviously worth it as pre-business school I worked in advertising making very little money and struggling to live in Manhattan. After business school, in my first year at an investment bank, I made over 5x my previous salary and made back my tuition in around a year and a half.

 

[huskypantz]

Great insight in this thread. I thought my masters at Northeastern was expensive - but after seeing Columbia's EMBA, at about $35k it apparently was a bargain. And I am just noticing that Northeastern never calls asking for money - yet I probably average a communication every other week with UConn. I have no allegiance to NU and would always give to UConn first, but it is interesting. Maybe it's the idea that once you give they never forget you.

 

[upstater]

The EMBA program is one of the biggest money-makers out there for the high level business schools. As you correctly noted before, there is no way the fees paid in any way actually are tabbed for the cost of the professors and space used - it's mostly for profit and is used to subsidize other programs.

To answer your other question, the full-time MBA program (at least when I went) had 8 clusters of 60 students in each year plus another 3 clusters of 60 students who were Jan termers. So overall a bit shy of 700 per class. No idea what tuition is today but back when I went it seemed pretty insane. But for me it was quite obviously worth it as pre-business school I worked in advertising making very little money and struggling to live in Manhattan. After business school, in my first year at an investment bank, I made over 5x my previous salary and made back my tuition in around a year and a half.

I've never heard of any department subsidizing another, unless you mean Grad Business subsidizes Undergrad Business.

 

[Chuck]

...or you can just make some side money as a professor. Free Shoes University has gone Gordon Gekko wannabe:

"The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged a pair of [Florida State University] professors in Tallahassee, Fla., with perpetrating a complex naked short selling scheme for more than $400,000 in illicit profits.

Abusive naked short selling occurs when shares are sold without having the shares to deliver, and then intentionally failing to deliver the securities within the standard three-day settlement period. An SEC investigation found that Gonul Colak and Milen Kostov repeatedly engaged in a series of sham transactions designed to perpetuate a naked short position as part of an elaborate options trading strategy. Colak and Kostov were required to deliver the securities underlying their short positions within the standard three days. Instead, their sham reset transactions created the illusion that they had delivered the underlying securities when in fact they had taken no steps to do so. They maintained the uncovered naked short positions and profited.

Colak and Kostov agreed to settle the SEC’s charges by paying more than $670,000."

 

[DarthGrumpy]

I got hit for alumni donations from my B-School before I left, BU. Was only a part-time MBA student, so I did not have a strong connection; but, when they hand you a diploma in a plain envelope and advise it will cost $100 more to get the nice leather flip folder on top of $40K in tuition a year, I laughed. I just donate to UConn now.
It was also funny that they gave all graduates a nice brand new, metal, sharp edged luggage tag holder and that was the spring of 2002 with 9/11 still on everyone’s mind. I wonder how many of those ended-up in the TSA bins at Logan Airport.

 

[BlueDogs]

That's BS. Academia is a competitive atmosphere for top professors. You're competing against other top universities and the private sector. If they didn't have the top quality professors, then they wouldn't be Columbia and able to raise that much money. I hated when students whined about this while I was at UConn. If they wanted a cheaper school, where less money was going to the professors and to build up the university, they should have gone to one of the other less respected state universities.

The math is not BS. These institutions are commercial enterprises lining pockets.

 

[WhereistheDove?]

The math is not BS. These institutions are commercial enterprises lining pockets.

Well, I guess I can't argue with that well-presented argument.

 

[Adios]

..and tuition will increase... At 5% on the principal that's 300 Million. That's 30,000 a year for 10, 000 students. Yale is even worse with a 20 billion endowment. It's obscene and morally bankrupt what these schools get away with. The campaigns line the pockets of administrators and professors.

Someone's gotta play the pied piper. Yale athletics is fun. Steeped in history.

 

[BlueDogs]

Well, I guess I can't argue with that well-presented argument.

I would say the best litmus test is the comparative year over year increases versus basic inflation. It tells you that there are vast distortions at play that are not a function of normal, competitive expense controls. We should expect normal human behavior , which is to exploit cash rich environments and play the system. The more they spend, the more they get.

 

[WhereistheDove?]

I would say the best litmus test is the comparative year over year increases versus basic inflation. It tells you that there are vast distortions at play that are not a function of normal, competitive expense controls. We should expect normal human behavior , which is to exploit cash rich environments and play the system. The more they spend, the more they get.

Whose pocket are they lining? I mean what percentage of their cost increases is actually due to increases in staff salaries? Or is "lining pockets" just talking about building up an endowment?

 

[Carl Spackler]

It's not the size of the endowment, it's how you use it.

(at least that's what those with smaller endowments like to believe)

 

[upstater]

I would say the best litmus test is the comparative year over year increases versus basic inflation. It tells you that there are vast distortions at play that are not a function of normal, competitive expense controls. We should expect normal human behavior , which is to exploit cash rich environments and play the system. The more they spend, the more they get.

This is wrong. Expenses are not rising above inflation. Tuition does not equal expenses. Heck, it doesn't even equal cost of attendance.

 

[J187Money]

This is wrong. Expenses are not rising above inflation. Tuition does not equal expenses. Heck, it doesn't even equal cost of attendance.

They are when you consider the arms race re: physical buildings. The bonding / donations etc to get something built don't take any account into what all of these facilities cost to run. So great, UCONN / Columbia / whoever builds billions of new buildings, but now they need to be operated / maintained. And the cost of that has FAR outstripped inflation.

 

[upstater]

They are when you consider the arms race re: physical buildings. The bonding / donations etc to get something built don't take any account into what all of these facilities cost to run. So great, UCONN / Columbia / whoever builds billions of new buildings, but now they need to be operated / maintained. And the cost of that has FAR outstripped inflation.

So when they report that expenses have not outstripped inflation, they are lying?

 

[J187Money]

So when they report that expenses have not outstripped inflation, they are lying?

I don't know how they do the math so I can't say.

So what is the main reason that tuition etc has far outstripped the cost of inflation?

 

[upstater]

I don't know how they do the math so I can't say.

So what is the main reason that tuition etc has far outstripped the cost of inflation?

I already posted this in this very thread. Taxpayer support has dropped by 50%. In even the high subsidy states, like California, it's dropped from $16k+ to $9k+ in REAL MONEY over the last 20 years. Compare this to, say, kindergarten subsidy in the very same states. There is 2x as much subsidy for kindergarten as there is for college education. 20 years ago, it was the reverse of that.

 

[WhereistheDove?]

So when they report that expenses have not outstripped inflation, they are lying?

Are capital expenditures included in those expenses? I'd guess not.

 

[J187Money]

I already posted this in this very thread. Taxpayer support has dropped by 50%. In even the high subsidy states, like California, it's dropped from $16k+ to $9k+ in REAL MONEY over the last 20 years. Compare this to, say, kindergarten subsidy in the very same states. There is 2x as much subsidy for kindergarten as there is for college education. 20 years ago, it was the reverse of that.

I get that for publics. How about for privates?

 

[upstater]

Are capital expenditures included in those expenses? I'd guess not.

Yes.

 

[upstater]

I get that for publics. How about for privates?

At this point, only 16% of undergrads attend private schools. So we're talking about a subset of Higher Ed. There are reasons why they have jacked up tuition, but they are private entities, so they're not compelling anyone to attend. The important thing to consider with privates is this: they have jacked up tuition well above the actual cost of attendance (i.e. tuition is MORE than the cost per student). If I had to guess, it's because many of these schools maintain a need-blind admission policy.

This article is old but you'll see all the cost drivers examined: http://www.nyu.edu/classes/jepsen/costreport.html

This article puts the report into context: http://www.highereducation.org/crosstalk/ct0598/voices0598-ike.shtml

I can't find the article now but one of the commissioners called for examining whether private institutions should continue need-blind admissions policies since they were considered by him unfair to families paying the full rate.

 

[RegisteredUconn]

At this point, only 16% of undergrads attend private schools. So we're talking about a subset of Higher Ed. There are reasons why they have jacked up tuition, but they are private entities, so they're not compelling anyone to attend. The important thing to consider with privates is this: they have jacked up tuition well above the actual cost of attendance (i.e. tuition is MORE than the cost per student). If I had to guess, it's because many of these schools maintain a need-blind admission policy.

This article is old but you'll see all the cost drivers examined: http://www.nyu.edu/classes/jepsen/costreport.html

This article puts the report into context: http://www.highereducation.org/crosstalk/ct0598/voices0598-ike.shtml

I can't find the article now but one of the commissioners called for examining whether private institutions should continue need-blind admissions policies since they were considered by him unfair to families paying the full rate.

Isn't all higher ed voluntary?

 

[RegisteredUconn]

In the EMBA program, you need to get sponsored by your employer. In most cases, the employer pays (and you generally get forced into signing an agreement that you will stay at your company X years after graduation). You need the sponsorship because you will be out of the office every other Friday/Saturday to attend classes and there are 2-3 weeks that you need to attend as well. There might be some aid here and there but based on the people that are in that program the vast majority of that money is coughed up by employers or students. The regular full-time MBA program is also going at the same time and I have no idea how many students are in that program at any given time.

Do you remember who it was that held the gun to your head?

 

[RegisteredUconn]

Columbia pretty much owns except for the Dinosaur BBQ and Fairway Market from 125th Street to 135th St Broadway to the river.

That's not all they own either. In the early 1990s, GE donated its premier property in mid-town Manhattan, the 50-story General Electric building, to Columbia. In announcing the donation, their CFO quipped he didn't know if it was the largest gift Columbia had ever received but he was pretty sure it was the tallest.

 

[upstater]

Isn't all higher ed voluntary?

Not in this economy, where jobs are scarce. Most kids are compelled.

 

[J187Money]

Do you remember who it was that held the gun to your head?

Of course there was no gun to my head. But if I wanted X, I had to agree to Y. There is always a choice. Always.