Tuition should be free for MA residents.

Tuition (currently about $5.5k/year before financial aid) is only a small part of the problem. The bigger issue is that you've got to pay rent and eat while you're going to school. Room and board and such for the year is more like $20 or 30k.

Let's not let perfect be the enemy of good. Education costs and housing costs are both problems that need to be solved. If community College becomes free, that's a big step in the right direction.

Reducing the cost of housing is more complicated, more controversial, and will take longer.

It’s free in Rhode Island.

Absolutely agree. But if the state makes tuition free, then students can use the federal Pell Grant to cover more of their living expenses. Still inadequate. I think we need to have free tuition and really increase financial aid to cover student living expenses and basic needs - like housing, food, and transportation

I support free access to education, but I no longer think academia is the way to go.

I did a BA at a state school and I loved it, it made me who I am, paying my loans wasn't the worst, but ten years later I'm making 30k.

I'm taking some classes at UMASS right now to upskill and they are trash compared to free programs I've attended in similar subjects. Course materials were last updated in 2010 and are full of spelling errors. Directions are missing in course activities. Professors are checked out. Why does this cost $1000+/class?

Plus an associates doesn't get you very far in a majority of majors.

I'd be way more excited about free programs that get people into trades and apprenticeships.

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I'm not sure what the practical value of community college is. Sending people to school for a year or two to earn credits that may or may not transfer well to a 4 year (aka tuition charging school) seems like a pointless endeavor. And the associates itself- very few jobs require an associates, most that would require one just require the HS diploma so the associates is kind of a pointless degree.

They need to reform the curriculum at the same time. Community College should be rediciculously targeted at the best bang for the buck trades skills and professions that are needed for the state economy.

Go learn basket weaving on your own time but if you want to be a teacher, you want to be a nurse or medical aid, or any of the skilled trades then absolutely we should be making the foundation of those tracks as cheap as possible. We need those skills and as a tax payer we should absolutely be funding it.

30k a year with a BA is pretty unusual, what field are you in? I hire pharmacy technician trainees for 41k a year with no experience or education requirements

Agreed, I was making that 12 years ago out of college at an office job that didn't require a degree.

30k is only 14.42 an hour.

Yeah something isn't adding up quite right there. Definitely an edge case.

Human services. Social work type stuff.

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Community colleges have credit transfer agreements with 4-years. If you know where you intend to transfer and into what program, you can look up exactly what you need to take and how those credits will transfer before you enroll. It's not the right choice for everyone but it's a great way for many people to get the first half of college for very cheap.