A quick essay: Students, not the state, should pay university tuition fees. We tend to compare our education system against other countries’ systems. It is believed that countries such as Norway or Germany have a better educational system than us, and even so free. There are other countries, like the USA, where students have to pay their fees and they reach a high education level too. Here in Spain, we are just in the middle, so the big question is, should the students, not the state, pay their university tuition fees? Currently, the budget is very limited in Spain, and the money raised from taxes is not enough if we want to maintain a good level of education. If students paid for their tuition fees, this problem would be solved. In addition to this, having a university free for everyone may lower its value. If people don’t have to pay for something, they may end up forgetting its value. Moreover, in Spain people just go to the university because “they are told to do it” and then they realize they don’t want to study, or they want to study something completely different because they haven’t thought it thoroughly. On the other hand, we need a society with a high level of education, and some people will be kept out of the university if they have to pay for it. Bright students with not enough money won’t be able to study. However, a fair grant system could be a solution in case that everyone had to pay for their tuition fees. One example to support this would be the USA, where bright students could apply and usually get a grant. To summarize, both ways are going to work if they are implemented carefully and take all the points described above into account. My personal opinion is that students should pay tuition fees as long as we have a good grant system to give the same opportunities to everyone.