By Amy DiPierro<\/p>\n
When Harmony Simpson graduated from high school in 2019, she knew she didn\u2019t have the money to attend a four-year university and that she wanted to avoid debt \u201clike the plague.\u201d She vividly remembers discussing post-high school options with her peers.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were talking about how college was essential, but we believed that it was still a scam,\u201d said Simpson, now a student at Santa Monica College.<\/p>\n
Simpson decided to enroll anyway. She recalled that consequential decision as one of five panelists discussing the value of higher education \u2014 and why so many Americans have lost faith in it \u2014 at an EdSource online roundtable Thursday. While acknowledging that long-standing concerns about college debt and newer fears about artificial intelligence deter some prospective college students, the panelists defended the benefits of college, financial and otherwise.<\/p>\n
But they said colleges and universities must do more to help students continue post-secondary education throughout their lives, communicate clear expectations about how much college costs after financial aid and teach skills like critical thinking for graduates to remain adaptable in a changing economy. Panelists suggested\u00a0work-based learning,\u00a0credit for prior learning, California\u2019s new\u00a0Career Passport\u00a0and dual enrollment in high school as some of the efforts aimed at meeting students where they\u2019re at.<\/p>\n
Here are some more takeaways from the conversation moderated by EdSource Executive Editor Michelle Quinn. The hour-long session entitled \u201cDegrees of value: How changing attitudes toward college challenge higher education in California,\u201d showed panelists confronting public ambivalence about college that might have been less evident a decade ago.<\/p>\n
Despite doubts, college usually pays off in the long run<\/p>\n
Panelists were quick to cite research suggesting that most college degrees\u00a0have a positive impact\u00a0on student earnings in the long term.<\/p>\n
Ted Mitchell, the president of the American Council on Education, the group that represents most colleges and universities, said about 40% of students start college but never finish, sometimes taking on debt without reaping the higher earnings that would come with a degree. Those who do graduate, however, earn roughly $1.5 million more during their lifetime than people without a degree, he said.<\/p>\n
That makes college \u201ca great investment\u201d for most students, said Su Jin Jez, the CEO of California Competes. \u201cIt\u2019s better than stocks or bonds. It\u2019s better than gold. It\u2019s a smart place to put money.\u201d<\/p>\n
But students also want a fast payoff<\/p>\n
However, students \u2014 especially those living in poverty and needing an immediate way to improve their family\u2019s economic circumstances \u2014 may not be able to wait years or decades for their college education to pay dividends, panelists said.<\/p>\n
Jez challenged her colleagues to consider how higher education could improve students\u2019 lives right away and get them certificates or degrees faster. She ticked off several strategies \u2014 asynchronous online courses, competency-based education or even campus housing for adult students with partners and children \u2014 that colleges might use to adapt to students\u2019 needs.<\/p>\n
The challenge is for colleges to open doors to economic opportunities for prospective students from the moment they set foot on campus. For Simpson, a visit to Santa Monica College\u2019s career services office before she had even enrolled helped her to secure a graphic design internship. That work experience allowed her to learn about the kind of work she hopes to pursue \u2014 and set her up to enroll in Santa Monica College classes later on.<\/p>\n
Fears of debt remain a pain point<\/p>\n
Uncertainty about how much a college education will cost \u2014 and whether students will be left paying off loans decades after graduation \u2014 continues to fuel the conversation about whether college is a good investment, the roundtable discussion showed.<\/p>\n
For some families, a parent\u2019s experience paying off student loans from a degree that isn\u2019t relevant to their work has created doubt that college will benefit their children, said Morgan Nugent, the superintendent of Fall River Joint Unified School District.<\/p>\n
Nugent suggested more opportunities for career exploration and dual enrollment in high school so that students \u201cat least explore some of those things that they may be interested in, versus going ahead and going to college, and then taking a look at having that debt starting to compound on itself.\u201d One too-frequent scenario is when students take a year or two off to work between high school and college, he said, and never go back to school. \u201cWe really need to help and communicate the bridge between what that high school experience looks like and then that transition into higher education.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mitchell said colleges must do more to communicate to families that the true cost of college tuition is often discounted far below \u2014 often half on average \u2014 the advertised sticker price thanks to financial aid programs. \u201cWe haven\u2019t figured out a way yet to really tell people how much college is going to cost,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s one of the things that we\u2019ve done wrong. It\u2019s one of the things we need to do better at.\u201d<\/p>\n
One way colleges should add value, he said, would be to \u201cdouble down on something like a universal transcript that allows students to take their learning, assign credit to it and move it from institution to institution until they find the right moment and the right place to complete.\u201d<\/p>\n
California has made progress in that direction with the idea of a Career Passport, Jez said, a kind of hybrid between a transcript and a resume aimed at bridging the link between colleges and employers.<\/p>\n
AI compounds anxiety about the value of college<\/p>\n
Amy Tong, a senior counselor in the Office of Gov. Gavin Newsom, said that as a parent, she can see how the multitude of higher education and training options can create confusion and uncertainty for students. She hopes for a way to \u201csimplify a lot of this,\u201d so that students know how to shift from their initial choice and don\u2019t feel like \u201cI have to have one bite at the apple. I have to make the right decision.\u201d She said she was not sure whether the education system is helping students and families make those decisions \u2014 and possibly different ones later on \u2014 about what major and career goals are right for them.<\/p>\n
Adding to uncertainty, Tong noted, students are now weighing how their career paths may be impacted by the rise of artificial intelligence. She said students have \u201ca lot of anxiety\u201d about finding entry-level and internship opportunities that may be displaced by the technology.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s among the reasons why the college experience should be an opportunity for students to develop interpersonal skills, research capabilities and critical thinking, she added. AI can do analysis, but \u201cit still requires that human intelligence to be in the driver\u2019s seat when it comes to, how do you use this analysis that is being\u00a0driven by AI?\u201d Tong said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Amy DiPierro When Harmony Simpson graduated from high school in 2019, she knew she didn\u2019t have the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":93344,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[179,15,181,23,100,180,143,145,144],"class_list":{"0":"post-93343","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-oakland","8":"tag-community","9":"tag-education","10":"tag-latest-headlines","11":"tag-local-news","12":"tag-news","13":"tag-newsletter","14":"tag-oakland","15":"tag-oakland-headlines","16":"tag-oakland-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93343","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=93343"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93343\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/93344"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}