Does College Still Offer a Good Return On Investment?

The answer to this question has more to do with the current economy than anything else. While reading the numerous recent articles and books on this question I stumbled upon a gem from the September 1933 (Volume 90) of Forum and Century, A periodical published between 1930 and 1940. Both the Editorial Foreword entitled A Challenge To The Colleges and a lengthy article entitled Is College Worth While? Question the value of a college degree.

The authors of the foreword and article bring up exactly the same questions that many writers, politicians, college and university presidents, students, and parents are asking now. The most striking aspect about these articles is that, aside from the outdated words and the elegant typesetting of the publication, these articles could have been published yesterday. Much like our current economic and political climate, these articles were written immediately after the Great Depression when citizens lacked confidence in our nation’s ability to recover and were cautious about the possible risks of funding a college education.

The same people who now claim that college isn’t worth the financial investment due to low graduation rates are also some of the same people who claim that unless you attend an engineering school or an elite university in the Northeast, you might as well not attend college at all due to a low return on investment. I have to disagree with these folks. I work with college students and recent college graduates everyday, and I can tell you that most of them are graduating on time with no to low student loan debt, and are getting good, if not great, jobs upon graduation.

The cynics claim that college simply doesn’t offer a good return on investment, but once again, I think their data is incomplete because they’re only looking at one’s financial investment. Since it is hard or impossible to measure a student’s own personal investments of time, industry, motivation, and emotional and intellectual energy, those investments go unnoticed and unmeasured. But, they are the most important investments that can be made in higher education and they have a greater impact on one’s college and future success than how much tuition costs.

There’s been a lot of talk over the past few years about what many researchers call “grit” and how having grit is a key factor in student success at all levels.  This is something that parents, college faculty, and administrators have known about for a long time, we just never put a name to it.

Simply put, grit is determination, focus, and to some degree, resiliency. People of our generation may call it gumption, or tenacity, but usually it’s something we can spot in a student after talking with him for about 30 minutes. It has little to do with IQ or intellectual ability and a whole lot to do with attitude, perseverance, and work ethic. Students with grit tend to perform well in class, but not necessarily great, and they are also campus leaders and involved in organizations and service. They have clear goals and find ways to achieve them on just about any campus. But, the big question is, can a student learn grit, or is it an inherent personality trait? The general consensus is that yes, students can learn to be more focused and deliberate in their actions giving credence to the earliest assertions of Aristotle “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”