Farm economists call out land-grant schools and states for not keeping higher education accessible to rural students

Many rural students were once able to affordably graduate from college because of the low tuition and high acceptance rate of land-grant universities. But higher tuition and lagging wages, along with lower acceptance rates, make it more difficult for them to work their way through school or even get in, University of Tennessee agricultural economists Harwood D. Schaffer and Daryll E. Ray write in their latest "Policy Pennings" column. (UT is a land-grant university.)

It shouldn't be that way, they write, capitalizing the key term: "From our perspective. Land Grants are not like other institutions of higher education; they are held to a higher standard of responsibility. They are as essential as public elementary, middle, and high schools. Other state institutions of higher education have a role to play, but Land Grants have a singular set of responsibilities."

Such schools' primary responsibility ought to be educating youth and interested adults of the state, which can't happen with low acceptance rates, Schaffer and Ray write. Another problem: it's much harder for students to work their way through college and graduate with little to no debt since tuition has far outpaced minimum and prevailing wages for entry-level work. 

"State governments must step up and fully fund the educational and basic research functions of their respective Land Grant institutions," Schaffer and Ray write. "One of the reasons we have seen tuition hikes is the failure of federal and state governments to provide their share of educational costs for students attending Land Grants and other state institutions of higher education." Read more here.