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The Center for American Progress reports
Prospective students in the United States who can't afford to pay for college or don't want to rack up tens of thousands in student debt should try their luck in Germany. Higher education is now free throughout the country, even for international students. Yesterday, Lower Saxony became the last of seven German states to abolish tuition fees, which were already extremely low compared to those paid in the United States.
German universities only began charging for tuition in 2006, when the German Constitutional Court ruled that limited fees, combined with loans, were not in conflict the country's commitment to universal education. The measure proved unpopular, however, and German states that had instituted fees began dropping them one by one.
"We got rid of tuition fees because we do not want higher education which depends on the wealth of the parents," Gabrielle Heinen-Kjajic, the minister for science and culture in Lower Saxony, said in a statement. Her words were echoed by many in the German government. "Tuition fees are unjust," said Hamburg's senator for science Dorothee Stapelfeldt. "They discourage young people who do not have a traditional academic family background from taking up study. It is a core task of politics to ensure that young women and men can study with a high quality standard free of charge in Germany."
[...]Free education is a concept that is embraced in most of Europe with notable exceptions like the U.K., where the government voted to lift the cap on university fees in 2010. The measure has reportedly cost more money than it brought in. The Guardian reported in March that students are failing to pay back student loans at such a rate that "the government will lose more money than it would have saved from keeping the old £3,000 ($4,865) tuition fee system."
[...]learning German might be the best financial choice an American high school student can make.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Geotti on Thursday October 16 2014, @03:14AM
Anyone considering doing a CS masters, I can highly recommend TU-Berlin [tu-berlin.de].
I don't know about other degrees, but for CS you (currently) have absolutely free choice of (a shitload of) courses, with most of them having been appealing to me. They can (probably) recognize your general education from a US institution (they have a 3-year bachelor here with "peripheral" classes mostly in the masters program). And if that's not enough, you are also entitled to take (transferable, of course) classes (they call 'em modules here) from any other higher ed institution in Berlin or Brandenburg (like the University of Applied Sciences [htw-berlin.de], Hasso Plattner Institute [wikipedia.org], FU-Berlin [wikipedia.org], etc.)
It's TEH SIHT, and TOTALLY enjoyable, since you specialize in exactly what you want to specialize in. I loved it and can't imagine anything better. Really.
If you have discipline and want to learn the stuff you're interested in, there's a very good chance that a (set of) corresponding classes is offered.
*Many* courses are available in English [tu-berlin.de].
Even though I speak fluent German, I obviously preferred English courses (Duh, it's CS. What is German?) and there were only 2 modules out of all the others taught in DE only (those were systems analysis and InfoSec management).
Admissions [tu-berlin.de]. There's also an "international students place" (i.e. the place, where they hold your hand and patiently explain everything to you in English), which I didn't use and can't be bothered to find right now.
Also, some people seem to really like this city. (I admit, the nightlife is nothing short of amazing! This includes high-quality drugs.) The climate is kinda grey-ish, though.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Geotti on Thursday October 16 2014, @03:17AM
I loved it and can't imagine anything better.
Just to put that in perspective, I'm usually extremely grumpy and critical.