|
 |
Education Dive
Report: Liberal arts colleges deliver one of the highest returns on investment
Natalie Schwartz
Jan. 14, 2020
Dive Brief:
Liberal arts colleges tend to have higher returns than most other types
of institutions, though graduates don't see their investment pay off
immediately, according to a new report from Georgetown University's
Center on Education and the Workforce (Georgetown CEW).
A decade after enrolling, students at liberal arts colleges see a
median return on investment of $62,000, which is roughly 40% lower than
that of all institutions. But at the 40-year mark, they have a median
return on investment of $918,000, compared to the $723,000 median for
all schools.
The findings come as more Americans question the value of higher
education and some liberal arts colleges struggle with enrollment
declines.
Dive Insight:
Liberal arts colleges offer the third-highest long-term returns of all
14 institution types outlined by the Carnegie Classification system.
Only doctoral universities with the two highest research activity
levels ranked higher, the report found.
"As with many four-year institutions, financial returns from liberal
arts colleges start low, but enrolling at one of these colleges is a
good investment in the long term," Anthony Carnevale, director of the
Georgetown CEW, said in a statement.
That's not true for all liberal arts colleges. Some have long-term
returns of less than $550,000, well under the median, the report points
out.
And institutions with similar student demographics can yield vastly
different returns. Oberlin College, where nearly 9% of students are
Pell Grant recipients, has a 40-year return on investment of $763,000.
Meanwhile, Washington and Lee University, which has about the same
share of Pell students, delivers a return of $1.58 million, the report
found.
Colleges with higher shares of students majoring in STEM disciplines
also tend to have higher returns. "[T]he old rules still apply," Martin
Van Der Werf, co-author of the report and associate director of
editorial and postsecondary policy at Georgetown CEW, said in a
statement. "Where students go to school, and what they major in,
matters more than just about anything else."
A growing number of students are opting for majors with a clear link to
the job market — such as business and computer science — as polling
shows Americans increasingly doubt the value of higher education.
About half of U.S. adults said they view a college education as "very
important" according to a Gallup survey earlier this year, down from
70% of respondents who said the same in 2013. And a separate recent
Gallup survey found that just a quarter of U.S. adults (27%) believe
postsecondary education is affordable to anyone who needs it.
Amid this shift in public sentiment, some liberal arts colleges have
been struggling to fill their seats, forcing several to close. Higher
ed experts attribute the enrollment declines to a drop-off in the
number of high school graduates and a strong economy pulling students
directly into the workforce.
In response to these challenges, some liberal arts colleges are forming
partnerships with companies or nontraditional education providers to
teach their students in-demand job skills. Dominican University of
California, for example, is partnering with the Make School, a coding
academy, to offer computer science curriculum. Several community
colleges are working with Amazon Web Services to incorporate courses
and credentials in cloud computing.
Others are doubling down on the liberal arts. Massachusetts' Hampshire
College, which appeared on the brink of closure last year, has rolled
out a new curriculum in which students will focus on addressing
modern-day issues, such as climate change and social inequity.
|
|
|
|
