The Declining Value of a College Education: Should Zoe Go to Oberlin?

57% of Americans say U.S. higher education fails to provide good value for the money. 75% say college is too expensive to afford.

My lovely daughter Zoe will be applying for college admission next year. Until recently, I had no doubt but that she should set her sights on more-or-less the same sort of expensive-but-worth it education that I enjoyed. And that was at Oberlin College. Current annual cost: $50,000.

Yet there has been more and more coverage of late concerning the declining value of higher education. See The Wall Street Journal: “The Declining Value Of Your College Degree.”

We can trace some of that to declining efforts on the part of students: If you don’t study as much, then you don’t learn as much, and your big deal college education turns out to be not worth as much. See The Economist: “The Value of College.”

New survey research from The Pew Research Center illustrates the situation with some beautiful charts: “The Value of College.”  For a summary of the data, see The Pew Research Center article “Is College Worth It?”

A fascinating aspect of this data is that it compares the opinions of the general public to that of college presidents. Turns out some college presidents do live in ivory towers.

So what about Zoe? Should she invest in a education that is becoming less valuable and less relevant to her future? She wants to go to college, but has no understanding of what $30K or $40K of debt will do to her post-college life. Should I point her to the affordable-yet-mediocre community college? Or to the prestigious-but-expensive liberal arts college? Jeepers. If you figure it out, please let me know.

Recent Update: From the NYTimes: “Even for Cashiers, College Pays Off:” “The evidence is overwhelming that college is a better investment for most graduates than in the past. A new study even shows that a bachelor’s degree pays off for jobs that don’t require one...”

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--Bill Paarlberg drives his daughter to school every morning, but she no longer lets him help with her homework. Bill is editor of Katie Paine's new book Measure What Matters and The Measurement Standard blog and newsletter. The Measurement Standard is a publication of KDPaine & Partners, a company that delivers custom research to measure brand image, public relationships, and engagement.

Comments

[CommAMMO]

Bill -- if she's in the arts, then Oberlin is a great school, lots of history, tons of great profs and small, artsy town ambiance that's just 35 minutes from the city. Whether she'll make $200,000 soon after is anyone's guess -- I'm a public school guy, myself, so my University of Washington and (currently) Kent State seem fine with me, and at MUCH lower cost.

Also, if she's in the performing arts, Baldwin-Wallace College is great... Cleveland's in your future!
Cheers,
Sean

[Dweingrod]

Just made a very similar decision last year sending my son to Kenyon. We had options for other private colleges with lower costs and scholarships, but it was his first choice AND he loves English which is one of Kenyon's strong suits. So it was nearly impossible to say no, but this blog just gives more rise to a nagging feeling I keep having about higher education, (and debt), in general.

What I will say is that he and his peers are much more mindful of the sacrifice being made on their behalf than I was when I went to, a private, college. He regularly asks about finances and thanks us for the opportunities. And driving him home last week, (the 10 or 11 hour drive may be more painful than the tuition), I was very happy to hear him review his year and state more than once, "I really learned a lot this year". That helped assuage the pain slightly.

[Bill Paarlberg]

Thanks for the comments, Sean and Dweingrod. My own Oberlin education now seems a priceless treasure (I second your comments on the school, Sean), despite the debt it left me with and that weighted heavily on me in my 20s.

Part of me wants my daughter to have a comparable education. But one of the things my education experience taught me was a fear of debt. If in two years she gets the chance to borrow $10 or $20 a year to finance her own Oberlin degree, I'll be caught between pride and wanting to warn her against it.

I have good friends who have prospered without a college education. Perhaps the future holds alternative opportunities for education and advancement that will force traditional higher education to modify its model.

[Nuno Andrade]

The Student Loan Corporation had a recent infographic on the ROI of particular majors. At the end of the day, it's the major that will determine the career, although the school you go to has a lot to do with the type of job you have as well. Take a look at the SLC infographic here: https://www.studentloan.com/pay_for_college/roicollegemajors.htm

[Bill Paarlberg]

Thank you, Nuno. That’s a great infographic and a great point. I notice they use Years to Break Even. Which obscures the potential problem of college loans that may take many, many years to pay back. --Bill