[Culturechat] Higher education costs in CH

[Vance Roy]

As I have mentioned before, Herr Britschgi entrusts me with some of his 
personal details that most Swiss would not. When we had a recent 
discussion about what a higher education in CH costs, he brought me his 
two daughters' most recent tuition bills from the Federal Institute Of 
Technology in Zurich. This school is the equivalent of MIT in the USA 
and is one of two such institutions in CH, the other being in Lausanne. 
Graduates from these schools are in demand over the entire world. 
Although there are other choices, these are the top two places of 
higher learning in CH. One Britschgi daughter has just finished a 
degree in mathematics (with an exam score of 5.6 out of a 6.0 perfect 
possible) and the other daughter is in molecular chemistry.

The bill for each is detailed, but the total for their semiannual cost 
is 627.00 CHF or 1254.00 CHF per daughter per year. This is about 
915.00 US$ in today's exchange. The actual tuition is 1100.00 CHF per 
year per daughter. The remainder is for other incidentals, such as 
obligatory fees, etc. Naturally, the chemistry student has more costs 
for labs, equipment, etc. than a mathematics student has, but the total 
for each remains the same. These figures will come as a shock to anyone 
who has researched college or university costs in the USA. 915.00 US$ 
won't get you much but a smile at any school in the USA.

OK, so how does this come to be? Of course, the answer is subsidies. 
The kanton that is the home of a student is assessed for university 
costs, so in reality, all taxpayers foot some of the bill. For instance 
in Kanton Obwalden, the average cost per student is 23,000.00 CHF per 
year. In addition, the kanton in which the university is located 
(Zurich in this case) is assessed some money. This seems fair since 
that kanton receives economic and prestige benefits for having the 
school located within it.

The Britschgi daughters live at home. If a student lives too far away 
to commute, then there are other costs. We have friends whose son just 
began at the Federal Institute and lives in Zurich. It costs about 
800.00 CHF rent per month for him to live in an apartment with two 
other students. If one considers the cost of a student in regards to 
books, spending money, insurance, transport, food, etc. The costs to a 
parent reaches about 1000.00 CHF per month exclusive of the subsidy but 
including the year's tuition owed by the parents. Add to that the fact 
that a student is required to pay social security unless he or she 
makes 15,000.00 CHF per year (402.00 CHF per daughter in this case), 
and the figure rises. Stipends, or what would be called scholarships in 
the USA, are available to some with varying degrees of pay back. 
12,000.00 CHF (8760.00 US$) per year isn't chicken feed, but compared 
to what it cost me 12 years ago to put a student through four years of 
Cornell's Hotel Administration School, it looks pretty darn good. I 
don't want to even think about what that costs today for the same 
education.


Vance Roy
gigli.saw@dplanet.ch
http://homepage.mac.com/fredch

“Never under estimate the ingenuity of the stupid.”
Anon.