Why our kollege keedz aren't larning.....

[Aviation Pro]

Suggestion, why don't we offer these spoiled brats a choice, learn in austere conditions (with the money going toward erudition not lifestyle) or pick up a rifle and stand a watch. That should get their deficit attention:

Posh dorms, amenities becoming the norm at college

CHICAGO, Illinois (AP) -- Somewhere along the way, college life has gotten a whole lot more posh.

On a number of campuses, students are able to hire personal maids to clean and do their laundry. They pay moving crews to pack and transport their stuff -- plasma TVs and other high-end electronics included. And they're living large in housing that looks like anything but a dorm.

"You know it's good when your parents walk in the room and say 'Can I live here?"' says Niki Pochopien, a 21-year-old senior who just moved into swanky new living quarters for students at DePaul University in Chicago.

Known as Loft-Right, the mod-looking structure has all the amenities: expansive city views, granite countertops in the kitchen and bathrooms, modern designer furniture and satellite TV hookups. The lobby lounge -- like something out of a hip hotel -- has a pool table and fireplace, and soon will have a Starbucks and tanning and hair salons next door.

Living at a place like this isn't cheap.

Students at Loft-Right each pay more than $1,000 a month for a private bedroom in a two- or four-bedroom unit, with bathrooms shared by no more than two people.

Rest here: http://www.cnn.com/2006/EDUCATION/09/14/college.posh.life.ap/index.html

And a bonus Doonesbury cartoon to put it into perspective:

[Deja Q]

1. Even I can't use the offshoring problem as a justified reason anymore.

youtube video of teacher taking a kid's cell phone and slamming it on the floor (RIGHT ON TEACHER!!!!!!!!!!!)

Reports of kids using cell phones to send messages with the sound muted

ipods in class

Portable game systems (gameboys)

pagers

It's a school. Not a restaurant, damn it.

Our educational system does have problems, but when our schools openly allow kids to listen to music and piddle with cell phones, we have only ourselves to blame. That shit has got to stop and if it means more teachers breaking the stuff, it's fine by me.

There is nothing wrong with leisure equipment or leisure time. But this is a school. Not a playground.


Well, offshoring only shows Americans we have no future, so it is a genuine part of the problem... but it sure as hell isn't the only one.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

2. I recently did some work on 'Dorms' at George Fox Univ.... they were cool.

Not high end, at all, but unlike any dorms I've seen.

Basically they were 3 bedroom apartments, kitchen, 1 bath, 2 beds in each room, 23 units in the building, lounge on each of the 3 floors. The furniture was well made, but not fancy. Cement floors (coated with varnish. very cool and trendy) Downstairs they were getting a coffee shop or deli (still in construction so I couldn't tell).

George Fox was founded by Quakers, so it was nice to see that it wasn't following the trend in your OP. :)

[bluestateguy]

3. At UT-Austin they put in a leisure pool

Not for doing laps, mind you, but a pool for just lounging around. The pool area is surrounded be several academic buildings. In those buildings, if you go up to the higher floors you can look out of the classroom windows at all of the people sitting by the pool. I feel bad for the professors who have to teach in those classes. Here you have a class going on in one of those buildings, and all of the young men are leering out of the windows at the bikini-clad sorority girls sitting by the pool (not that I blame them).

[Mind_your_head]

4. My kid goes to a private college in the Midwest.....

and they don't have these types of amenities (and I'm glad they don't)! I want my kid to realize that those are luxuries (not necessities) and that you can work towards earning them, if you want to.

I think the colleges that provide such luxurious appointments and the parents that expect their kids to live ALWAYS in the "lap of luxury" are doing them a huge disservice.

Just my 2 cents...

M_Y_H

[Selatius]

5. It's so materialistic and bourgeois

Moving crews to move your junk around. Plasma screen TVs, the whole nine yards.

The reason people stopped caring anymore is because they have enclosed themselves in a world of materialism that diverts their attention and destroys their curiosity.

What La_Revolution said about George Fox University is nice. Apartment style dorms make dorm living feel a little more like home, but you don't need cleaning mades and huge flatpanel television screens and so much junk that you have to hire a moving crew to haul your stuff. At the very least, I don't.

[omega minimo]

6. A better idea: end all superfluous perks for local/state/fed legislators

That will get their deficit attention.

[seabeyond]

7. so what? if they can afford it, so what? and how is the indicative

of lacking in education. where and how they live has nothing to do with the academics of the university.

this is no ones business and up to individual and family to make these decision.

all the ills of the world, this doesn't even make it on the list

[rockymountaindem]

8. Whether or not you're learning anything has little to do with your dorm

I've been in college for three years now, and I've seen hard-working students in definate crapholes, and in nice pads. Likewise, I've seen some real losers living in what I would call self-induced squalor, as well as one who lives in a condo that I'm sure cost his rich dad at least 200 grand.

Here's an example: in my first dorm I had a simple rectangular room with a cement floor and concrete cinderblock walls painted white. It was about as big as my bedroom at home, but I shared this room with a roomate and there were two bathrooms for over 40 guys. The common room was frequently strewn with trash and empty bottles. Not really a posh place to say the least. Two of my floormates had a lot in common. They were both from very wealthy Pakistani families. They lived in rooms just like mine, with a roommate and exactly the same environment as the rest of us. One was a stuck-up jerk who drank like a fish and didn't give a damn about his grades as long as he got above a 50% so he wouldn't fail out of school and have to go home and face his dad. His room was a total mess and smelled pretty bad most of the time. The other was a clean-living guy who liked to drink tea and studied probably more than anyone else on our floor. He had the same background as the other guy, same living conditions at school and everything. Yet, they were totally different as individuals and as students.

Another guy who lived with me that year moved out into that fancy condo and I'd say his habits are exactly the same as before, which is to say I don't think schoolwork is his first priority, but he's no slouch either. Just because someone lives in a nice dorm isn't indicative of how much effort they're willing to put into anything.