¶ … Opportunities Faced by Leaders, Society and Organizations
Problems and opportunities facing leaders, communities and organization are always a cause of debate in the society. They can arise in many different ways and exist in many forms and society finds it's our way of meeting these challenges and responding to such opportunities. The articles chosen for this paper focus primarily on the issue of rising tuition costs and it's impact on college enrollment and this topic is chosen because it affects leaders, communities and organizations alike.
The first article in this connection is written by Donald Heller. The article explains how rising costs impact enrollment in colleges and universities. The author found that all things being equal, rising tuition costs will lead to lower enrollment. A decline in enrollment is however a subjective issue dependent on some other factors including type of institution. For example it has been found the community college enrollment tends to be more price responsive than university enrollment because percentage of lower income groups tends to be lower in institutions of higher education especially four-year universities.
Leaders and policy makers are constantly studying the possible changes of tuition fees and their subsequent effect on enrollment. Thus this issue is not only being faced by communities but also leaders and organizations. When studying this issue, it's important for policy makers to understand that price alone doesn't determine future enrollment trends. Other factors tend to play a more significant role in the decision to enroll. These factors include "the student's academic aptitude and achievement; course-taking patterns in high school and earlier grades; the role of parents, siblings, peers, and others in promoting college as a post-high...
It is very difficult to predict how enrollment would react to price changes because of so many other influences on the final decision to enroll. It is a challenge for policy makers to accurately predict the response because there have been instances when even the rise in tuition cost did not negatively affect enrollment instead they kept rising. However in the link between tuition costs and enrollment, we cannot ignore the role played by financial aid. It has been noticed that among lower income groups, financial aid plays the biggest role in their enrollment decision.
Another related though slightly different problem is addressed by Dickson and Pender in their article "Do In-State Tuition Benefits Affect the Enrollment of Non-Citizens?" This issue is connected with in-state tuition benefits offered to non-citizens and how their enrollment is affected by in-state tuition implementation. In 2001, Texas announced its decision to offer in state tuition benefits to non-citizens who had studied in Texas for last three years. Following this example, ten other states declared the same benefits for their non-citizen students. This move was however challenged by some quarters that felt that this was in violation of the rights of U.S. citizens who lived in other states and thus couldn't be extended the offer of in-state tuition benefits.
The article concluded that enrollment among non-citizens students had risen with this move that offered in-state tuition benefits. However among Hispanic students, it was noticed that they chose mostly the institutions that already had a…
