SUSAN DYNARSKI is a professor of economics, education and public policy at the University of Michigan. She has advised the Obama administration on the findings of her student-aid policy research. She wrote this piece in the New York Times.
Finding Shock Absorbers for Student Debt – NYTimes.com.
My comment on what she missed, without which, all is naught.
“The author states that “College is a great investment”. That is based on flawed data. Before I try to state the correct version, here are two facts from “Academically Adrift”. First, in the 60’s, professors’ standards were such that students studied, on average, 25 hours a week – now it is 13. Second, and no surprise, in the 80’s critical thinking rose 1 sigma in four years, now it is .18 sigma.
Why the change? By treating uneducated “students” as naive “consumers”, schools learned that they could improve their brand. I have seen this first hand as a professor.
Now, for that more accurate replacement for “college is a great investment” on average.
If one takes the average value of an investment in college for students who graduated in the 60’s or 70’s (as most studies must do) one finds that investment in a college degree pays well. If one takes this to mean that the actual education that these students received was important in that payback, then one must conclude (from “Academically Adrift”) that today’s college education is, on average, of questionable value.
On a final note, everything I have seen since the 80’s confirms that the data in “Academically Adrift” is accurate. Also, it would not have surprised people like Clark Kerr and David Riesman who, in the 80’s, were warning us of what was happening as “students” morphed into “consumers”.”
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