My husband and I met at the University of Notre Dame, and a couple years ago, we detoured there on our way to visit my parents in the Detroit area. \u00a0Lots had changed \u2014 the university, which quite readily attracts donors happy to have their names on buildings (though less willing to endow their upkeep costs), has been on a building spree lately, and has also bought up a lot of land just south of campus, which had been a fairly poor and declining area of small homes, to create a \u201ccollege town\u201d-type shopping\/restaurant district that the university lacked, along with some additional housing. <\/p>\n
But this weekend, for the first time since before the kids were born, we went back to Michigan State, where I was an undergrad.<\/p>\n
To be sure, there weren\u2019t the same changes as at Notre Dame. \u00a0Most of the buildings were still the way they always were, though the stadium had grown, they\u2019d gotten rid of the traffic circle, the football practice building had a shiny new atrium, and the like. \u00a0But here are some of the changes, each of which points to a reason for the relentless tuition increases:<\/p>\n
We stepped into my old dorm, and saw that the utilitarian cafeteria (a salad bar, three hot entrees and a couple side dishes, some desserts, soft-serve ice cream and cold cereal all day long, plus basic tables and chairs) was radically different, with a massively-widened variety of food choices, upscale tables and chairs, some in a coffeehouse-style, and an addition to accommodate it all \u2014 and that\u2019s just what we could see from looking in through the glass walls. <\/p>\n
Then we went up to my old dorm floor, 3 North Case. \u00a0The first thing we saw was that all individual wings were now accessible only by keycard. \u00a0(I don\u2019t quite know the logistics of this \u2014 can you no longer visit friends without scheduling it and being met by them at the entrance to the wing? \u00a0Or does a student ID provide access to any door at any dorm floor?) \u00a0But the door to my old dorm wing was open \u2014 because the dorm was also the home to \u201cJames Madison College\u201d and contained professors\u2019 and administrators\u2019 offices, as, in line with the general increase in staff, even though the student body hasn\u2019t grown, this wing had been turned into professors\u2019 offices.<\/p>\n
And in the elevator lobby was a stack of yearbooks! \u00a0There-for-the-taking yearbooks, and at the library was a shelf, marked \u201cYearbook \u2013 FREE\u201d in the same way as the student paper is given away free. \u00a0Now, maybe your college experience was different, but back in my day, yearbooks were available for purchase, but no one I knew bought one, and I had a general impression that it mostly featured the fraternities and sororities (though the Greek system was comparatively modest at MSU). \u00a0It appears that a \u201cfree\u201d yearbook is now yet another item that has been bundled into the tuition.<\/p>\n
After looking around at the dorm, we did a quick circle through the center of campus. \u00a0No major changes, just little things, like the fact that the intramural playing fields now included an astroturf football field. <\/p>\n