[fblike]
One of the biggest anxieties in American culture is the fear that the country is lacking a qualified workforce that will be economically competitive in the twenty-first century. While politicians have primarily focused their efforts on fixing America’s elementary and secondary institutions, college might be the next frontier of state-driven education reform. Less than thirty percent of Americans have a Bachelor’s degree and reformers note that part of the reason is the growing cost of college attendance. Over the last fifty years, tuition costs have exploded at public and private institutions, as have housing and textbook charges. While the number of Americans attending college is rising, graduation rates remain poor and student debt to service the cost of college is also increasing. Fears about the growing cost of college and its impact on American social mobility and the nation’s economy have made college-oriented education reform a part of the 2016 presidential elections. Candidates such as former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Florida Senator Marco Rubio, and New Jersey Governor Chris Christie have detailed plans to either slow tuition increases, reduce student debt, and/or make college education more of a national entitlement. Political analysts argue that a candidate with a suitable program to make college more affordable could galvanize the youth vote in 2016, something that politicians have learned can sway elections in the Obama years.
This topic brief will explain some of the anxieties about the rising cost of college, provide some reasons that college costs are growing, before finally exploring some of the reform proposals that have been submitted to resolve the problem.
Readers are also encouraged to use the links below and in the related R&D to bolster their files about this topic.
Here is today’s premium R&D to accompany 
Last Thursday, Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras announced that he was resigning. Tsipras’s Syriza Party, which won the Greek parliamentary elections in January, was coming apart at the seams after Tsipras agreed with Greece’s creditors to enact more austerity reforms. When the Greek Parliament had to approve of this deal last week, Tsipras was forced to rely on opposition parties as forty-three of Syriza’s 149 members either voted against the deal or abstained. Following the vote, twenty-five Syriza members of Parliament (MPs) bolted from the party and this left it without a governing majority. Unable to survive a censure motion and likely fearing that anti-bailout leftists would soon rally against his government, Tsipras resigned and paved the way for new elections next month. The news of new elections was hesitantly received in some European capitals, with Paris and Berlin reminding Athens that it would be held to the terms of the new bailout deal regardless of who won power. Nevertheless, financial markets have been roiled by another Greek election – the nation’s fifth in six years – out of fears that Syriza could lose or that the elections will slow down much needed economic reforms.
Here is today’s premium R&D to accompany