American University of Iraq-Sulaimani is a private university, which means that there is nothing such as a free lunch at AUI-S.
Students who come to AUI-S, even those on scholarship, know that there is a monetary price on the education they get. So it is normal to see things given in exchange for an amount of money.
However, this doesn't mean that there are no different classes at AUI-S. Oppositely, the classes at AUI-S are visible to a large extent. First, because it is a small university. Second, because some of the top rich people 'children are at AUI-S.
On the other hand, there are poor students. Poor in this context means those people who can't provide extra money for their education. They may have some money to sustain daily needs, but they can't pay for their education, residence and transportation.
Between these two classes, there is a large middle class body of students at AUI-S.
These students are not extremely rich neither extremely poor. They can live comfortably if there was not a sudden change in their income.
We want to argue that the policies applied at AUI-S are not in favor of the poor and middle class students who constitute the majority of the AUI-S student body.
Most of these problems are connected with financial aid students, which we will speak about in another piece. However, we want to give specific examples of the pro-rich behavior of the AUI-S administration.
AUI-S's decision to get $100 for books and another $100 for the dorms hurt a lot of students financially. This might seem funny for some people who only speak in terms of millions and billions, but that is the truth. There are students whose families have had a hard time to get $200. Students coming from low income families don't get $400 easily a year, taking into account that an average Iraqi's GDP per capita is only $2,500.
A student from a poor family normally gets between $100-$120 from her family monthly. This means that the family gives between $1200-$1400 to the student. When another $400 is added to the $1200, the family clearly experiences hard times.
The situation gets worse when the poor student is coming from a big family. Students with more than 3 siblings, who are students too for most of the time, suffer more than anyone else. We have more than one example of families who can't provide $100 to their child monthly. The student, finding no appropriate job fitting his schedule, works for very low wages.
There are students at AUI-S who have more than 3 jobs in order to make ends meet. However, AUI-S seems to continue these policies of raising money at the expense of the poor and middle class students.
The garage, which is filled with all kinds of expensive cars almost all the time, is a gift offered from the university to the rich students. Since parking is free, anyone who can get a car comes with a car. The crowded garage is getting more and more crowded every day, but the university has no solution. AUI-S can get a lot of money out of putting a price on parking. This will hurt no one, since the majority of the students coming with their own cars to the university are rich students. The price that they will pay, say $10 for one day, doesn't affect the rich students very much, while the profit made by AUI-S, say $15000 a month, helps AUI-S a lot.
The American University of Iraq-Sulaimani claims to be working out solutions to find more resources and get more money, but it seems that this attempt is going to cost poor and middle class students only. Students who belong to this category have a stable income for most of the time, so they can't give the university more than what they do now. There are students who have a really hard time finding $400-$800, but they do their best to find that money and give it to AUI-S. However, they are not ready to pay more and more money. There are families who will choose not to send their children to AUI-S if the price of the education kept increasing.
AUI-S should find ways, one which we have proposed above, to get more money but not hurt the majority of the students.
11 Comments: on "Money Talks (3) : Rich and Poor"
well done
some economical faults
1- Monetary Cost not Monetary price
2- Daily income per capital not GDP per capita.
Plus, do not use the term (There is no such thing as free lunch) in a wrong place. This term means you have to sacrifice something in order to get something else. For example, if tomorrow you are invited by me you are still bearing the cost of that time that you are spending with me during the lunch.
this really hurts! Guys, you need to talk to your political leaders who ONLY sponsor their henchmen,and those who are politically and economically connected to them. And more interesting, they only pay for Arabs and students! This Uni is almost failed!
$10 is too much for a parking in a day, isn't it?
What makes me angry is that most of the RICH students don't pay money. They got scholarships.
What the hell the previous anonymous is talking about [some economical faults]? This must be an exceedingly rich person because s/he does utter garbage when correcting the grammatical mistakes instead of discussing the real subject!!
Well done Dana. It is true and I want to say everything in AUI-S costs an arm and a leg, tuition fees, the food, dorms fee and books fee and so on.
Dana, believe it or not, last semester, I had difficulty to get less than $100 to pay my second tuition invoice and I had to write letters to ask Financial Department to wait for me until I get the amount.
The anonymous’ words give me the creeps because s/he does not care what happens to poor students at AUI-S; instead, [it] talks about grammatical mistakes.
More, working as a work-study student at AUI-S is a dead-end job because one gets a very few bucks per hour which is inexcusable and it drives students crazy.
My deep thanks go to the writer of this article.
I don't agree with the parking fees.If you come to school with your own car , doesn't mean that you are super rich. However, I agree on the issue that says some really rich students are on scholarships. These people are taking away the chances of a poor student to come to Aui-s.
The article is weak since it is not based on facts but only assumptions. $400 a year?? You should say $200 a year since each semester students have to buy books worth $100 and a year has two semesters which means $200 a year. Even if it was $400 a year, families wont have hard time getting that amount. The GDP per capita you have mentioned is not an accurate measure since there are no precise data available on Iraq. You seem to oppose your own arguments. You say that those families have a hard time getting $400 a year but at the same time you say that students coming from those families have $100-$120 monthly. Do you see any consistency in what you saying? I dont. Moreover, your argument regarding parking fee is more than ridiculous. It is a university and not the bazar. Nowhere in the world does parking cost $10 a day. Looking at the weakness and irrationality of the arguments of the article, I can see why the name of the author is not written.
The article is weak since it is not based on facts but only assumptions. $400 a year?? You should say $200 a year since each semester students have to buy books worth $100 and a year has two semesters which means $200 a year. Even if it was $400 a year, families wont have hard time getting that amount. The GDP per capita you have mentioned is not an accurate measure since there are no precise data available on Iraq. You seem to oppose your own arguments. You say that those families have a hard time getting $400 a year but at the same time you say that students coming from those families have $100-$120 monthly. Do you see any consistency in what you saying? I dont. Moreover, your argument regarding parking fee is more than ridiculous. It is a university and not the bazar. Nowhere in the world does parking cost $10 a day. Looking at the weakness and irrationality of the arguments of the article, I can see why the name of the author is not written.
The article is weak since it is not based on facts but only assumptions. $400 a year?? You should say $200 a year since each semester students have to buy books worth $100 and a year has two semesters which means $200 a year. Even if it was $400 a year, families wont have hard time getting that amount. The GDP per capita you have mentioned is not an accurate measure since there are no precise data available on Iraq. You seem to oppose your own arguments. You say that those families have a hard time getting $400 a year but at the same time you say that students coming from those families have $100-$120 monthly. Do you see any consistency in what you saying? I dont. Moreover, your argument regarding parking fee is more than ridiculous. It is a university and not the bazar. Nowhere in the world does parking cost $10 a day. Looking at the weakness and irrationality of the arguments of the article, I can see why the name of the author is not written.
The article is weak since it is not based on facts but only assumptions. $400 a year?? You should say $200 a year since each semester students have to buy books worth $100 and a year has two semesters which means $200 a year. Even if it was $400 a year, families wont have hard time getting that amount. The GDP per capita you have mentioned is not an accurate measure since there are no precise data available on Iraq. You seem to oppose your own arguments. You say that those families have a hard time getting $400 a year but at the same time you say that students coming from those families have $100-$120 monthly. Do you see any consistency in what you saying? I dont. Moreover, your argument regarding parking fee is more than ridiculous. It is a university and not the bazar. Nowhere in the world does parking cost $10 a day. Looking at the weakness and irrationality of the arguments of the article, I can see why the name of the author is not written.
To be Poor is not an end of stopping doing something.
The way i think...!!!!
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