SHOULD HIGHER
EDUCATION BE FREE FOR
ALL STUDENTS?
BY LUXAN SURESHAN
INTRODUCTION
• WHAT IS FREE HIGHER EDUCATION?
• The literal definition of free: “free” means “costing nothing,” which means the students will not have to
pay to experience higher education
• In Economics, we also look at what must be sacrificed for this scheme to occur (the cost of the next best
alternative forgone, which is known as opportunity cost) and, in this case, citizens may have to be taxed
more to fund free higher education or spending in certain areas of the economy must be reduced, which
shows that it is not free for the government
• In this presentation, I will explore the benefits of free education, as well as the costs of it. Through this, I
will be able to explain why this system would work in some countries and not in others, allowing me to
give an overall verdict about this issue, as well as hoping to provide an alternate solution to this.
RESEARCH REVIEW
• For my primary research, I created a survey with the following questions:
1) Should Higher Education be free for all students and please explain why you think it should or shouldn’t
be free?
2) If you stated that it should be free, please explain how the system would work ((eg. how would it be
financed, what areas should governments cut spending in, what parts of higher education (eg. graduation
rates, participation rates etc..) should the government focus on improving), etc….))?
3) If you stated that it should not be free, please explain how you would make higher education more
accessible for poorer/less advantaged students?
ADVANTAGES OF FREE
HIGHER EDUCATION
• The first reason why higher education
should be free is because the positive
externalities accrued
• The second reason is that it will
decrease inequality
• The third reason is that there will be
greater actual economic growth
DISADVANTAGES OF FREE HIGHER EDUCATION
• The first issue is that free college causes extra debt without addressing the universities’ costs
• The second issue is that it may mean universities suffer from a lack of funding
• The final issue is that more graduates will be earning greater incomes
THE IDEAL FREE HIGHER EDUCATION SCHEME
• 1. The first principle is to increase university access
• 2. The second principle to increase completion rates
• 3. The third principle is that governments should still fund public universities
CONCLUSION
• To conclude, I believe that higher education should be free, but not for all students
EVALUATION
• Overall, I believe my project went well.
• However, there were several factors which I could have improved upon. Firstly, when I was a carrying out my primary
research, I felt as though I should have included more people in my survey to find out what the prevailing view about
this issue and should have included specialist opinions from my Economics teachers to help formulate my main
discussion better, so I believe that my survey was limited. With the secondary research, while it was relatively
smooth for me, I found myself looking at websites which all had the same points as each other, which obviously
wasted some time and reduced my efficiency. Alongside this, I felt that I could have planned out each section before
writing it, which would have enabled me to express my ideas more clearly and would have also saved time for me.
• Despite this, I learnt a lot of skills by engaging in this Extended Project Qualification. With the research, I learnt how
to differentiate which sources of information are factual and which aren’t factual by cross referencing with numerous
sources, resulting in my judgement on this topic being mostly impartial. With the main discussion, I learnt how to
utilise my full research and turn it into a concise essay, which has meant that both my writing and analysis skills have
improved.
• In this whole project qualification, however, I discovered the importance of time-management, especially with the
strain of four A-Levels and extra-curricular activities that I am doing, so it highlighted the importance of sharing my
time and prioritising my time on different tasks to finish all my work efficiently and to an excellent standard. Lastly, it
amplified the importance of punctuality and handing work in on deadlines, as this is what I shall be encountering at
university and in the workplace, so this experience has helped understand what I will need to do to meet deadlines