Business Proposal Essay

Business Proposal

Amy Brown

ECO/561

October 30, 2014

John Bland

Business Proposal

The United States of America deserves a well-educated population to contribute to the American society. Unfortunately, the institution of higher education carries a heavy toll, a burden if you will, for many college students. For the traditional, fresh out of high school teenager, two to four years of the “college experience” lies ahead with plenty of debt to follow. Many traditional students attend colleges and universities with the assistance of financial aid through grants or loans, out-of-pocket, or a combination of both. Traditional students; however, make up only a portion of the nationwide college student population. Non-traditional students make up about 40% of that population. According to Johnson (2013), non-traditional students fall under at least one of seven characteristics; of which the student who supports a family and the student who is also a single parent are the main focus. These two non-traditional student parents require more attention; specifically childcare options, if colleges and universities continue to seek, recruit, and retain non-traditional students through graduation.

Student parents make up 25% of U.S. college students nationwide. Of all low-income students with children, 25% are less likely to earn a degree than non-parent, low-income students according to Nelson, Froehner, and Gault (2013). Additionally, student parents find themselves experiencing hard challenges while attending school such as working full-time hours and spending 30 plus hours in care-giving responsibilities; yet the student parents often earn higher grade point averages (GPA) than non-parent students. With that said, student parents go to college or return to school because they simply want to be there. Student parents overcome tough obstacles compared to the non-parent student and achieve higher grades in order to start or improve his or her career. Offering a simple program such as childcare has high potential for non-traditional students to enroll in and complete degree plans; which in turn, helps the schools in common statistics such as student make-up and degree completion.

Market Structure

Businesses are in the market to make profits, otherwise, there would be no point and the business would fail. In terms of economic profits, monopolies and oligopolies produce economic profits dependent on the average total cost. As McConnell, Brue, and Flynn (2009) explain, a monopoly is a “market structure in which one firm is the sole seller of a product or service” (p. 177) and an oligopoly “involves only a few sellers of a standardized or differentiated product, so each firm is affected by the decisions of its rivals” (p.177). Neither one of these market structures truly represents colleges and universities as a whole; although they fall under the monopolistic competition structure. While there are thousands of schools to choose from, it is the institution of higher learning that represents the single firm in a monopoly; however, the focus again is on non-traditional, student parents and helping these students complete his or her program to obtain a degree.