The college commencement addresses have all been delivered, and new graduates are faced with the realities of a slower economy and no diminution in the accumulation of student debt. Ron Leiber of The New York Times recently profiled Cortney Munna, a 2005 NYU graduate who is carrying almost $100,000 in student loan debt. Today National Public Radio ran a story about Heather Lefebvre, a 2010 summa cum laude graduate of Brandeis University who is burdened with $85,000 in student loan debt.
This graphic, which accompanied the web version of the NPR story, shows that student debt is a growth industry. So grads are getting hit with more debt than ever and the worst economy any graduating class has faced in several years. To make matters worse, student loan debt cannot be discharged by bankruptcy.
Leiber’s article for the Times asks the question, who is to blame? After interviewing Munna’s mother, herself a student loan borrower, the lending agencies, and the NYU financial aid office, he finds no one willing to take responsibility for Munna’s predicament. As usual, blame falls back on the borrower, but is that entirely fair? Education is supposed to be an investment that will bring future benefits, both economic and non-economic, but does the return on investment justify the expense? The question is not whether college is a good investment or not. In general, college is a very good investment. The real question is whether the marginally better education obtained at expensive schools like NYU and Brandeis is worth the added debt for students who can must borrow. State schools are the workhorses of our educational system, and they are much less costly. Are pricy private schools worth it? Of course, few of the schools will answer this question realistically, so it is foolish to look for the pricier colleges and universities to provide wise counsel to students like Munna and Lefebvre. Meanwhile, we are constantly encouraging young people to reach for the stars and not settle for less than the best.
One point that comes from these examples, is choice of major. Many of my liberal arts students come from wealthy families, and I know that they will be fine no matter what happens. But students like Munna and Lefebvre are not wealthy. Munna had an interdisciplinary major of religious and women’s studies, and Lefebvre was a double major in English and creative writing. I know many parents urge their children to diversify their majors, making certain that at least one major has the potential to lead to a job. If you are going to double major, choosing two quite different majors (English and biology, or religious studies and psychology) might improve chances of post-graduate employment. I was an English major, and I still believe that a basic liberal arts education is good preparation for both civic life and a wide variety of employment paths. But I went to state schools, emerged from college without debt, and benefited from good economic times. These things are not true for today’s graduates.
