Germany Provides Higher Education Without the Frills

By Aisha Labi

The sight of college students hunched over books on a dark winter's evening hardly seems noteworthy. But until recently, students who wanted to use the library at Munich's Ludwig Maximilian University after dinner were out of luck. It shut its doors after normal business hours, in part because budgets were tight.

Now, thanks to a relatively new development in German higher education — tuition — the lights are burning longer in the library here at night.

How the