First, Universities Serve Themselves

Regarding "Students pushing back on intern tuition" (Monday Business), compliments on a revealing article regarding the current state of our system of higher education.  It was revealing to learn that universities across the country are charging students tuition for the unpaid internships they do at private businesses: this was certainly not the practice when I was going to college in the 70's.

Our university system has an increasingly unsavory reputation for exploiting student labor, including thousands of teaching interns in our colleges who work for course credit and a pittance in pay, not to mention the thousands of student athletes who risk injury to earn the NCAA billions, but receive not a penny in return.

It's refreshing to learn of students challenging their university for unfair labor practices.  May their efforts shine a bright spotlight on all the ways universities exploit students, including their monopolistic pricing policies for tuition.

Pete Smith

Cypress, TX