Targeted Assistance School Program Effectiveness Guidance: Fill & Download for Free

There are four factors driving the cost of college higher and leading to more and more student loan debt:• A society obsessed with the idea of the four-year college degree with almost no regard for cost or outcomes. (This is what I call “College-Mania.”)• Wildly escalating college costs.• The easy availability of government backed loans.• Rampant over borrowing fueled by financial illiteracy.Where In The Hell Are These Kids’ Parents?I have a friend who is a Gen Xer. She claims most of the parents of the current crop of Gen Z’s, her peers, are driven by two maxims:1) I must see to my children’s happiness, and2) My children must go to college.Navigating from that stage where high school grads received their high school diplomas, through post-secondary education, and into that first decent paying job is really tricky today. An eighteen year old shouldn’t be expected to have to figure their way through that maze on their own. This responsibility must fall to the parents. Unfortunately, despite the fact that for many families post-secondary education for their children is their second biggest expense, they are blind to the complexities of the issue:Post-secondary Education ChoicesFor decades in our country the youth and their parents have been the target of societal, familial, educational, and political propaganda stressing the point that: To be a success in life you MUST graduate from a four year college.This pressure has led a lot of young people to make some really naïve post-secondary education choices, the result of which is an investment of time and money with little or no return. Often this poor investment choice has had the corollary effect of running up debilitating debt.Today forty percent of high school graduates rush off to college like lemmings. However only one in four will graduate and get a good job. Roughly fifty percent of those who enroll end up “left holding the bag,” and that bag is empty except for their obligation to repay loans for an education that has no value in the marketplace.In the good old days—fifty years ago--college was the traditional path to financial success. If you graduated with any kind of a degree with any GPA, you could waltz out of the college gates straight into a well-paying, entry level corporate job.College in America doesn’t work that way anymore. What happened?Two decades ago in his book, Another Way To Win, Dr. Kenneth Gray coined the term “one way to win.” He described the OWTW strategy widely followed in the US as:• Graduate from high school.• Matriculate at a four-year college.• Graduate with a degree in anything.• Become employed in a professional job.Dr. Gray’s message to the then “academic middle” was that this was unlikely to be a successful strategy in the future. The succeeding twenty years have proven him inordinately prescient and not just for the “academic middle.”The simple explanation is that it comes down to “supply” (graduates) and “demand” (suitable jobs).What is Supply & Demand?A half century ago only seven percent of high school graduates went on to college. In post-WW II America our economy was booming while the economies of many European and Asian countries were--only slowly--being rebuilt. The “Law of Supply and Demand” strongly favored the freshly minted college graduate.Today, when forty percent go on to college, grads are “a dime a dozen.” In the post-Great Recession of 2008 we are slogging through the longest and slowest recovery since the Great Depression. In the last nine years we haven’t seen one year of 3% GDP growth. (Recent college grads have no concept what it is like to work in a strong economy.)There just aren’t anywhere near enough suitable jobs for the army of high school graduates choosing to go to four-year colleges. College is a competition for a few good jobs, and many are going to lose. Those with less rigorous majors are the likely candidates.There is another path to middleclass prosperity—hidden in plain sight. Dr. Kevin Fleming in his book, (RE)Defining the Goal: The True Path to Career Readiness in the 21st Century, explains where many well-paying jobs are lurking:“The true ratio of jobs in our economy is 1:2:7. For every occupation that requires a master’s degree or more, two professional jobs require a university degree, and there are over a half a dozen jobs requiring a 1-year certificate or a 2-year degree, and each of these technicians is in very high-skilled areas in high demand.”However in our society this path is stigmatized. A parent will only rarely suggest community college, and you’ll never hear a high school guidance counselor share this job information.Goodbye, Mr. ChipsCollege tuition is up 200% in the last twenty years. E. Gordon Gee, former president of The Ohio State University, is the poster-child for uncontrolled spending. “I didn’t think a lot about costs. I do not think we have given significant thought to the impact of college costs on families.” (Encouraged to move on from OSU Mr. Gee is now president of West Virginia University.)Roughly seventy-five percent of costs at a college are labor. Well that’s a good thing, right? We want the best and the brightest teaching “little Johnny” about Humbert Humbert’s idee fixe with Mrs. Haze’s daughter. However that’s not what is happening. Old, lovable, Mr. Chips is being cast out on the sidewalk to be replaced by lower cost, contingent faculty. Any cost savings are more than offset by the addition of shiny, new administrators with titles like, “Associate Provost for Investor Partnerships.” These administrators, who never see the inside of a classroom, pull down comfortable six, even seven, figure salaries.It is bad enough that Chipping has been cast aside. The college “arms war” has gone nuclear. In order to attract increasingly, sybaritic students colleges and universities add expensive amenities that make them appear more like resorts than institutions of higher learning. These free perks include: water parks, steak restaurants, movie theaters with complimentary popcorn, arcades, upscale dorms with flat screen TV’s, ice rinks, heated pools, spas, climbing walls, fitness centers, etc. The more the schools spend. i.e. the higher the climbing walls, the more they are rewarded with new enrollees bearing tuition checks.Other People’s MoneyThe “bottomless cookie jar” nature of the student financial aid programs exacerbates the high cost of college.From 2008 to 2016, during a period of artificially low interest rates, the total student loan debt doubled from $640B to $1.3T, and the average student loan balance increased 80% from $20K to $36K. There doesn’t appear to be any limit to the amount of money that students, sanctioned by their parents, are willing to borrow. With interest rates on the rise the student loan debt crisis can be expected to mutate into a financial catastrophe.William Bennett, President Reagan’s education secretary, wrote an op-ed thirty years ago in which he hypothesized that tuition was rising partly because of the explosive growth of federal financial assistance. He observed that demand for higher education grew as it became easier for students to borrow money, and that that demand allowed schools to raise their prices.There has been plenty of pushback—particularly by academics—on Bennett’s theory, but recent studies have lent more credibility to his view. Researchers at the New York Federal Reserve suggested in 2015 that a common result is a tuition increase of about sixty cents for every increased dollar of student aid. A paper last year by Grey Gordon and Aaron Hedlund for the National Bureau of Economic Research also strongly supports Mr. Bennett’s theory.It is bad enough that government policy is driving up costs, but the system of student aid is incredibly complex, with over a dozen federal loan, grant, work-study and tuition-tax-credit programs, and these programs have no educational performance standards.SummaryThe college administrators and the politicians aren’t going to “change their spots” any time soon. That leaves it up to the parents to guide their kids through this post-secondary education labyrinth—helping them minimize crippling student loan debt. The single biggest step that parents could take is to stop sending their academically marginal kids to expensive four-year colleges. Probably half of the students going to college today would be better off going to community college.Notes:I saw a survey of 1000 parents recently.Question 1 Should every high school student go to college?Response (80%) No, absolutely not.Question 2 Should your kid go to college?Response (80%) Of course without a doubt.

Yes, too many kids—many of them marginal academically—are going to four-year colleges. There aren’t anywhere near enough suitable jobs for the army of high school graduates (40%) matriculating. (Half of all grads end up under employed or unemployed. A record 25% minimum wage jobs are held by college grads.)Wadhwa is wrong. While college may not be dead, it is seriously wounded. The data shows that most of those attending college today are not being well served. In the documentary, Ivory Tower, Theil describes college as being vastly "oversold." That's an accurate description of the situation. (In my opinion half the young people matriculating at four-year colleges would be better off choosing some other post-secondary education option.)However college administrators make Bernie Madoff look like Robin Hood. Fueled by "College-Mania," government student loans, and the financial illiteracy of the consumer nothing is going to change significantly for decades.Theil is exaggerating a bit to make a point. The problem with his premise is that the customized, self-directed education option isn’t ready for prime time—particularly when it comes to scale. However he is making a point that needs to be made. Consumers of post-secondary education options need to take off their blinders.It has just gotten way too difficult to make a four-year college education pay off. The average American family just isn’t financially literate enough to comprehend that, except for a few, four-year college as an investment is problematical at best. Families don’t understand the risks involved and give planning for college about the same level of attention as planning a family picnic at a local state park.In many ways it is hard to blame them. In the good old days—fifty years ago--college was the traditional path to financial success. If you graduated with any kind of a degree with any GPA, you could waltz out of the college gates straight into a well-paying, entry level corporate job.This paradigm has collapsed. College in America doesn’t work that way anymore.There are six factors that have made “college as an investment” problematical:A society obsessed with the idea of the four-year college degree with almost no regard for cost or outcomes. (This is what I call “College-Mania.”)Wildly escalating college costs.The stagnation of wages.A vast imbalance of supply (graduates) and demand (suitable jobs).The easy availability of government backed loans.Rampant over borrowing fueled by the financial illiteracy of parents and students.AffordabilityTuition is up 200% in twenty years. Fifty years ago a student could earn enough money in three weeks to pay their tuition. Today that takes six months.Wages for the majority of the population have actually been slowing when you eliminate the supervisory personnel. The average family is losing ground financially.These trends are destroying the return on investment for a four-year college degree.Where In The Hell Are These Kids’ Parents?I have a friend who is a Gen Xer. She claims most of the parents of the current crop of Gen Z’s, her peers, are driven by two maxims:1) I must see to my children’s happiness, and2) My children must go to college.Navigating from that stage where high school grads received their high school diplomas, through post-secondary education, and into that first decent paying job is really tricky today. An eighteen year old shouldn’t be expected to have to figure their way through that maze on their own. This responsibility must fall to the parents. Unfortunately, despite the fact that for many families post-secondary education for their children is their second biggest expense, they are blind to the complexities of the issue:Post-secondary Education ChoicesFor decades in our country the youth and their parents have been the target of societal, familial, educational, and political propaganda stressing the point that: To be a success in life you MUST graduate from a four year college.This pressure has led a lot of young people to make some really naïve post-secondary education choices, the result of which is an investment of time and money with little or no return. Often this poor investment choice has had the corollary effect of running up debilitating debt.Today forty percent of high school graduates rush off to college like lemmings. However only one in four will graduate and get a good job. Roughly fifty percent of those who enroll end up “left holding the bag,” and that bag is empty except for their obligation to repay loans for an education that has no value in the marketplace.Two decades ago in his book, Another Way To Win, Dr. Kenneth Gray coined the term “one way to win.” He described the OWTW strategy widely followed in the US as:• Graduate from high school.• Matriculate at a four-year college.• Graduate with a degree in anything.• Become employed in a professional job.Dr. Gray’s message to the then “academic middle” was that this was unlikely to be a successful strategy in the future. The succeeding twenty years have proven him inordinately prescient and not just for the “academic middle.”The simple explanation is that it comes down to “supply” (graduates) and “demand” (suitable jobs).What is Supply & Demand?A half century ago only seven percent of high school graduates went on to college. In post-WW II America our economy was booming while the economies of many European and Asian countries were--only slowly--being rebuilt. The “Law of Supply and Demand” strongly favored the freshly minted college graduate.Today, when forty percent go on to college, grads are “a dime a dozen.” In the post-Great Recession of 2008 we are slogging through the longest and slowest recovery since the Great Depression. In the last nine years we haven’t seen one year of 3% GDP growth. (Recent college grads have no concept what it is like to work in a strong economy.)There just aren’t anywhere near enough suitable jobs for the army of high school graduates choosing to go to four-year colleges. College is a competition for a few good jobs, and many are going to lose. Those with less rigorous majors are the likely candidates.There is another path to middleclass prosperity—hidden in plain sight. Dr. Kevin Fleming in his book, (RE)Defining the Goal: The True Path to Career Readiness in the 21st Century, explains where many well-paying jobs are lurking:“The true ratio of jobs in our economy is 1:2:7. For every occupation that requires a master’s degree or more, two professional jobs require a university degree, and there are over a half a dozen jobs requiring a 1-year certificate or a 2-year degree, and each of these technicians is in very high-skilled areas in high demand.”However in our society this path is stigmatized. A parent will only rarely suggest community college, and you’ll never hear a high school guidance counselor share this job information.Goodbye, Mr. ChipsCollege tuition is up 200% in the last twenty years. E. Gordon Gee, former president of The Ohio State University, is the poster-child for uncontrolled spending. “I didn’t think a lot about costs. I do not think we have given significant thought to the impact of college costs on families.” (Encouraged to move on from OSU Mr. Gee is now president of West Virginia University.)Roughly seventy-five percent of costs at a college are labor. Well that’s a good thing, right? We want the best and the brightest teaching “little Johnny” about Humbert Humbert’s idee fixe with Mrs. Haze’s daughter. However that’s not what is happening. Old, lovable, Mr. Chips is being cast out on the sidewalk to be replaced by lower cost, contingent faculty. Any cost savings are more than offset by the addition of shiny, new administrators with titles like, “Associate Provost for Investor Partnerships.” These administrators, who never see the inside of a classroom, pull down comfortable six, even seven, figure salaries.It is bad enough that Chipping has been cast aside. The college “arms war” has gone nuclear. In order to attract increasingly, sybaritic students colleges and universities add expensive amenities that make them appear more like resorts than institutions of higher learning. These free perks include: water parks, steak restaurants, movie theaters with complimentary popcorn, arcades, upscale dorms with flat screen TV’s, ice rinks, heated pools, spas, climbing walls, fitness centers, etc. The more the schools spend. i.e. the higher the climbing walls, the more they are rewarded with new enrollees bearing tuition checks.Other People’s MoneyThe “bottomless cookie jar” nature of the student financial aid programs exacerbates the high cost of college.From 2008 to 2016, during a period of artificially low interest rates, the total student loan debt doubled from $640B to $1.3T, and the average student loan balance increased 80% from $20K to $36K. There doesn’t appear to be any limit to the amount of money that students, sanctioned by their parents, are willing to borrow. With interest rates on the rise the student loan debt crisis can be expected to mutate into a financial catastrophe.William Bennett, President Reagan’s education secretary, wrote an op-ed thirty years ago in which he hypothesized that tuition was rising partly because of the explosive growth of federal financial assistance. He observed that demand for higher education grew as it became easier for students to borrow money, and that that demand allowed schools to raise their prices.There has been plenty of pushback—particularly by academics—on Bennett’s theory, but recent studies have lent more credibility to his view. Researchers at the New York Federal Reserve suggested in 2015 that a common result is a tuition increase of about sixty cents for every increased dollar of student aid. A paper last year by Grey Gordon and Aaron Hedlund for the National Bureau of Economic Research also strongly supports Mr. Bennett’s theory.It is bad enough that government policy is driving up costs, but the system of student aid is incredibly complex, with over a dozen federal loan, grant, work-study and tuition-tax-credit programs, and these programs have no educational performance standards.SummaryThe college administrators and the politicians aren’t going to “change their spots” any time soon. That leaves it up to the parents to guide their kids through this post-secondary education labyrinth.A four-year college degree will be right for a select few—the academically gifted, highly motivated students with financially savvy parents. The “customized, self-directed” education option is in its infancy. (I do thing the coding bootcamp is real.) The big opportunity is being stigmatized and overlooked—community college.Notes:I’m finding the other answers to this question interesting. Predictably many on Quora are “gung ho” college without regard to career outcomes. They just ASSUME everything will turn out OK. Nothing is further from the truth today. There just aren’t enough good jobs.I used to blame the high schools. Guidance counselors reflexively funnel as many naïve teenagers as possible into 4-year colleges without much regard for their students’ future job prospects. However I have had an “awakening.”Recently I did some volunteer work in a local suburban high school that sends sixty-five percent of their graduates on to college. During the lunch period in the cafeteria I was introduced to the superintendent. I couldn’t resist “getting on my soapbox” and explaining the “math”—that, funnel as he may, only a small percentage of his students were likely to graduate from college and get a well-paying job.He took it well. He smiled and explained high school superintendent’s “math” to me:“If the football team has a winning season, the band can play a recognizable version of ‘The Star Spangled Banner,’ and the students go to college, we will be just fine.”I gave a lot of thought to his response.High schools are public institutions. As such, they are highly susceptible to being influenced by parents and other key members of the community. Most parents want their kids to go to college. In our society there is not much that, immediately, stands in their way of making that happen. I have come to the conclusion that expecting our teachers, counselors, and principals to take up the “college is not for everyone” banner is asking too much. In our society there is just too high a probability of the “messenger getting shot.”The waterpark photo is from Texas Tech. The price tag was $8.4M.

The problem in the US isn’t “affordability” per se. If the average American family thought they couldn’t afford to send their kids to college, then they wouldn’t. Since they do send their students to college despite the negative outcomes, I conclude the issue lies elsewhere.The average American family isn’t financially literate enough to realize that, except for a few, four-year college as an investment is problematical at best.In many ways it is hard to blame them. In the good old days—fifty years ago--college was the traditional path to financial success. If you graduated with any kind of a degree with any GPA, you could waltz out of the college gates straight into a well-paying, entry level corporate job.This paradigm has collapsed. College in America doesn’t work that way anymore.There are six factors that have made “college as an investment” problematical:A society obsessed with the idea of the four-year college degree with almost no regard for cost or outcomes. (This is what I call “College-Mania.”)Wildly escalating college costs.The stagnation of wages.A vast imbalance of supply (graduates) and demand (suitable jobs).The easy availability of government backed loans.Rampant over borrowing fueled by financial illiteracy.AffordabilityTuition is up 200% in twenty years. Fifty years ago a student could earn enough money in three weeks to pay their tuition. Today that takes six months.Wages for the majority of the population have actually been slowing when you eliminate the supervisory personnel. The average family is losing ground financially.These trends are destroying the return on investment for a four-year college degree.Where In The Hell Are These Kids’ Parents?I have a friend who is a Gen Xer. She claims most of the parents of the current crop of Gen Z’s, her peers, are driven by two maxims:1) I must see to my children’s happiness, and2) My children must go to college.Navigating from that stage where high school grads received their high school diplomas, through post-secondary education, and into that first decent paying job is really tricky today. An eighteen year old shouldn’t be expected to have to figure their way through that maze on their own. This responsibility must fall to the parents. Unfortunately, despite the fact that for many families post-secondary education for their children is their second biggest expense, they are blind to the complexities of the issue:Post-secondary Education ChoicesFor decades in our country the youth and their parents have been the target of societal, familial, educational, and political propaganda stressing the point that: To be a success in life you MUST graduate from a four year college.This pressure has led a lot of young people to make some really naïve post-secondary education choices, the result of which is an investment of time and money with little or no return. Often this poor investment choice has had the corollary effect of running up debilitating debt.Today forty percent of high school graduates rush off to college like lemmings. However only one in four will graduate and get a good job. Roughly fifty percent of those who enroll end up “left holding the bag,” and that bag is empty except for their obligation to repay loans for an education that has no value in the marketplace.Two decades ago in his book, Another Way To Win, Dr. Kenneth Gray coined the term “one way to win.” He described the OWTW strategy widely followed in the US as:• Graduate from high school.• Matriculate at a four-year college.• Graduate with a degree in anything.• Become employed in a professional job.Dr. Gray’s message to the then “academic middle” was that this was unlikely to be a successful strategy in the future. The succeeding twenty years have proven him inordinately prescient and not just for the “academic middle.”The simple explanation is that it comes down to “supply” (graduates) and “demand” (suitable jobs).What is Supply & Demand?A half century ago only seven percent of high school graduates went on to college. In post-WW II America our economy was booming while the economies of many European and Asian countries were--only slowly--being rebuilt. The “Law of Supply and Demand” strongly favored the freshly minted college graduate.Today, when forty percent go on to college, grads are “a dime a dozen.” In the post-Great Recession of 2008 we are slogging through the longest and slowest recovery since the Great Depression. In the last nine years we haven’t seen one year of 3% GDP growth. (Recent college grads have no concept what it is like to work in a strong economy.)There just aren’t anywhere near enough suitable jobs for the army of high school graduates choosing to go to four-year colleges. College is a competition for a few good jobs, and many are going to lose. Those with less rigorous majors are the likely candidates.There is another path to middleclass prosperity—hidden in plain sight. Dr. Kevin Fleming in his book, (RE)Defining the Goal: The True Path to Career Readiness in the 21st Century, explains where many well-paying jobs are lurking:“The true ratio of jobs in our economy is 1:2:7. For every occupation that requires a master’s degree or more, two professional jobs require a university degree, and there are over a half a dozen jobs requiring a 1-year certificate or a 2-year degree, and each of these technicians is in very high-skilled areas in high demand.”However in our society this path is stigmatized. A parent will only rarely suggest community college, and you’ll never hear a high school guidance counselor share this job information.Goodbye, Mr. ChipsCollege tuition is up 200% in the last twenty years. E. Gordon Gee, former president of The Ohio State University, is the poster-child for uncontrolled spending. “I didn’t think a lot about costs. I do not think we have given significant thought to the impact of college costs on families.” (Encouraged to move on from OSU Mr. Gee is now president of West Virginia University.)Roughly seventy-five percent of costs at a college are labor. Well that’s a good thing, right? We want the best and the brightest teaching “little Johnny” about Humbert Humbert’s idee fixe with Mrs. Haze’s daughter. However that’s not what is happening. Old, lovable, Mr. Chips is being cast out on the sidewalk to be replaced by lower cost, contingent faculty. Any cost savings are more than offset by the addition of shiny, new administrators with titles like, “Associate Provost for Investor Partnerships.” These administrators, who never see the inside of a classroom, pull down comfortable six, even seven, figure salaries.It is bad enough that Chipping has been cast aside. The college “arms war” has gone nuclear. In order to attract increasingly, sybaritic students colleges and universities add expensive amenities that make them appear more like resorts than institutions of higher learning. These free perks include: water parks, steak restaurants, movie theaters with complimentary popcorn, arcades, upscale dorms with flat screen TV’s, ice rinks, heated pools, spas, climbing walls, fitness centers, etc. The more the schools spend. i.e. the higher the climbing walls, the more they are rewarded with new enrollees bearing tuition checks.Other People’s MoneyThe “bottomless cookie jar” nature of the student financial aid programs exacerbates the high cost of college.From 2008 to 2016, during a period of artificially low interest rates, the total student loan debt doubled from $640B to $1.3T, and the average student loan balance increased 80% from $20K to $36K. There doesn’t appear to be any limit to the amount of money that students, sanctioned by their parents, are willing to borrow. With interest rates on the rise the student loan debt crisis can be expected to mutate into a financial catastrophe.William Bennett, President Reagan’s education secretary, wrote an op-ed thirty years ago in which he hypothesized that tuition was rising partly because of the explosive growth of federal financial assistance. He observed that demand for higher education grew as it became easier for students to borrow money, and that that demand allowed schools to raise their prices.There has been plenty of pushback—particularly by academics—on Bennett’s theory, but recent studies have lent more credibility to his view. Researchers at the New York Federal Reserve suggested in 2015 that a common result is a tuition increase of about sixty cents for every increased dollar of student aid. A paper last year by Grey Gordon and Aaron Hedlund for the National Bureau of Economic Research also strongly supports Mr. Bennett’s theory.It is bad enough that government policy is driving up costs, but the system of student aid is incredibly complex, with over a dozen federal loan, grant, work-study and tuition-tax-credit programs, and these programs have no educational performance standards.SummaryThe college administrators and the politicians aren’t going to “change their spots” any time soon. That leaves it up to the parents to guide their kids through this post-secondary education labyrinth—helping them minimize crippling student loan debt.Note:The waterpark photo is from Texas Tech. The price tag was $8.4M.