The Author Is Dead!

Either somebody’s cribbing from somebody — or some thing, as in a press release — or this Newsday article is part of an inescapable Foucault-like discourse about class war that is so ingrained in our psyche we can’t help but crib from one another:

Tuition at some of New York City’s elite high schools has surpassed $30,000, marking a new, but not-that-shocking milestone in the ever-rising cost of private education in the city.

The milestone is part of a trend that has seen tuition skyrocket to the point that it is now cheaper for students to get an Ivy League education than it is to attend many of New York’s top schools.

This fall, Riverdale Country School in the Bronx will charge $31,200 for grades six through 12. Manhattan’s Trinity School will soon charge $30,170 for seniors, private school observers say.

And plenty of other schools are just a hair under the $30,000 threshold. The Horace Mann School in the Bronx, for instance, will charge about $29,000 for the 2006-07 school year.

By comparison, tuition at Harvard for 2005-2006 cost $28,752; at Yale University it was $31,460.

If that sounds familiar, it should be — we noticed the same thing in the Sun a few weeks back:

Tuition and fees at some New York City private high schools will cost more than $30,000 for the school year beginning in September 2006, breaking a new barrier in sticker shock for parents.

New York already boasts the highest private school tuitions in the country, but prices at some schools will now surpass even the cost of sending a child to Harvard. Many parents have been notified about the tuition increases over the past few weeks.

Riverdale Country School, located on a leafy oasis in the Bronx, will charge $31,200 for tuition, lunch, and books for grades six through 12. Bus service from Manhattan costs an additional couple of thousand dollars. At the Trinity School on the Upper West Side, tuition for seniors will reach $30,170, which includes a $400 “graduation fee.”

. . .

At $30,000 a year for kindergarten through 12th grade, parents are looking to spend about $400,000 before their children even get to college.

Undergraduate tuition at Harvard this year is $28,752, plus room and board.

I don’t ever name drop except when I do.