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Friday, June 09, 2017

Is college worth it? Increasing numbers say no

"Too many people are going to college," writes my American Enterprise Institute colleague Charles Murray. That's not a response to the mob of students that attacked him and the liberal professor who had invited him to speak back in March at Middlebury College. It's the title of the third chapter in his 2008 book Real Education: Four Simple Truths for Bringing America's Schools Back to Reality.

Since Murray wrote those words, higher-education enrollment has in fact declined, from 20.6 million in 2011 to 19 million in 2006, according to Ohio University economists Richard Vedder and Justin Stehle writing in the Wall Street Journal. That 8 percent drop is concentrated in community colleges and for-profit schools.

But enrollment has been no better than flat at large four-year universities, and law school enrollment plunged 31 percent from 2010 to 2015. And freshman enrollment at the University of Missouri fell 35 percent since the riots in which a faculty member called for "muscle" against a student journalist and administrators caved in to rioters' demands.

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8 comments:

Anonymous said...

The ROI for a college education is dropping every year.
It's unbelievable what colleges and universities have done to screw our younger population - and the parents who pay for it.
If you think health care inflation is bad, college tuition inflation is DOUBLE that!!
Why....?
Just like easy money for mortgages, the university system convince our federal and state governments that EVERY student has the right to affordable education. So instead of the Bernie Sander's method of 'free' education, they did the second best thing: make it nearly impossible NOT to get a student loan.
So, now, universities can constantly raise their rates because there is now a plentiful flow of funds.
And the worst part is, these institutions take our open-minded young adults and force feed them liberal Kool-Aid and it makes them non-thinking zombies.

Anonymous said...

In my opinion college today is not worth the cost. Simply because almost all colleges are doing is brain washing students to be liberal leftist. They are not educating them anymore. Just look at Watter's World and the other interviews of college kids on the street. They haven't got a clue about anything. They seem to be dumber than a box of rocks. So just because they got a piece of paper saying they graduated college means nothing but they went to college for four years and attended classes and learned nothing. So yes they would have been better off learning how to do something. Like be an electrician or plumber or carpenter, st least then they could get a job and make money working. But instead they are flipping hamburgers at McDonald's
because they don't know anything and especially don't know how to work because they are 23 years old and never worked a day in their life. Mom and Dad gave them everything and paid for their college and the results are very disappointing. Now there may be a few conservative colleges out there. But the only ones I can think of would be private Christian colleges. A place that educates and teaches values. However these are few and far between.

Anonymous said...

I think 2011 and 2006 are switched around. That sentence in the opening makes no sense about declining enrollment if you read it.

Anonymous said...


So much of college curriculum has become a sideshow, and so many college professors are doing little more than taking up valuable space.

Anonymous said...

You can't go to medical school without going to college. If students take STEM majors they will have good jobs.

Anonymous said...

There are fewer people attending in 2006 than there were in 2011?
I feel like I am reading a foreign language.
Everything is so confusing any more.

Did I drop acid this morning?
Hmmmmm

Anonymous said...

the easy answer is NO, unless you are determined to go into the Medical Field, Engineering and so forth. That's about it. Save your money and start your own business...

Anonymous said...

343
Were you responding to 1110?

Or, are you the same person . . . expounding upon your comment?

So many questions. . . .