8/5/10

The value of education

I've grown increasingly jaded about the cost of higher education in this country vs. the economic value. As I start to blog and post, I'm collecting articles and responses under the tag "education ROI"


Original Article:
http://blogs.hbr.org/schrage/2010/07/higher-education-is-highly-ove.html


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Bill_Patton [Moderator] 5 days ago
Fantastic article. I have for some time been comparing the "higher education bubble" with the housing bubble. Both were fueled by similar expectations for continuous growth and aggressive lending policies. As going to college came to be viewed a an inalienable right, lenders (with governmental blessings) stepped in to offer loans to all, with no regards or consideration for the underlying value of the degree being sought. Increased demand combined with cheap money led to spiraling college costs.

At some point, buying a $500,000 condo in California is as nonsensical as graduating $160,000 in debt for a liberal arts degree. In working with a few clients in the college lending space, I'm seeing a real backlash on the part of parents who no longer are willing (or even able) to underwrite $20,$30 or $40k/year tuition bills. Instead they are pushing quality community college classes for their children. I truly believe that many of our ivy crusted institutions are heading for a housing bubble type crash if they continue to decouple their tuition costs with the actual value of their degree.

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Bjpower2 [Moderator] 19 hours ago in reply to Bill_Patton
Well said. I am in full agreement. For those who have real world skills, watching their portfolios for the "bubble-burst" of student debt and likely taxpayer bailout would be wise.
On the whole, the overall topic is almost too enormous for blog discussions. There is real value to gaining the ability for critical thought and systems thinking. With a good curriculum, a student learns to generalize the skills they learn from writing to applied statistics. While I have profound doubts about our current global higher educational institutions, a good programme will elevate a student's skills and abilities. The ROI on this is now in doubt -- for good reasons stated above. This is unlikely to be fixed by a myopic view on higher ed. It starts long before university.