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Columbia has a pretty questionable record with other masters programs in creative fields. The school is exploiting the Ivy brand, the NYC location and talent, a

Columbia has a pretty questionable record with other masters programs in creative fields. The school is exploiting the Ivy brand, the NYC location and talent, and legions of students desperate to stand out in highly competitive creative fields. For instance, a 10-month MS in Journalism is $116k (including living expenses) while a 12-month M.S. in data journalism is $160k (https://journalism.columbia.edu/cost-attendance https://journalism.columbia.edu/cost-attendance). Yes, studying under true experts in NYC is a wonderful experience for people in film, theater, journalism, writing, the arts, etc. But there should be no expectation that a very expensive degree will lead to high-paying jobs in those fields. The fact that every year Columbia is setting up all of these new grads with hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt and little hope of repaying it in those professions is downright predatory. The WSJ article that prompted the original Twitter thread is worth reading. A few graduates have managed to find low-paying, entry-level jobs in the film industry that pay under $50k per year, and probably did not require a master's degree. One of the grads they talked with is working at the local TJ Maxx ... the same job he had as a teenager. Via one of the WSJ reporters who worked on the report: At least 43% of the people who recently took out loans for master’s degrees at elite private universities hadn’t paid down any of their original debt or were behind on payments roughly two years after graduation. It’s not just arts degrees. Other high debt, low-earning master’s programs: NYU publishing (debt: $116k, earnings: $42k), Northwestern speech-language pathology (debt: $148k, earnings: $60k), USC marriage and family counseling (debt: $124k, earnings: $50k). All this is made possible by Grad Plus, the no-limit federal student loan program. Created in 2005, it’s now the fastest growing program. Based on partial data from the 2021 school year, grad students were on track to borrow as much as undergrads for the first time. https://twitter.com/anfuller/status/1413160574205284352 https://twitter.com/anfuller/status/1413160574205284352

roland35 5y ago
Wow I had no idea a Masters could be that expensive! I paid $16k for a Masters in Computer Engineering at a local unglamorous state university (half paid for by my employer) and immediately got a promotion for $30k when I was done, so it was a pretty good rate of return!
- ghaff 5y ago
  Engineering Masters can be even less than that. I don't remember what my Engineering Masters cost all-in but it wasn't a lot including CoL at an Ivy.
- coldcode 5y ago
  I worked on my Chemistry Masters around 1980 and it cost me nothing, they paid me a pittance as a grad student to teach but I got free tuition at a public university. Strange how much things cost today.
  - samatman 5y ago
    Chemistry, at least c. mid 2000s when I was looking into it, is largely paid for by GAANN. There aren't many grad school slots available but those there are tend to be full-ride.
  - vxNsr 5y ago
    Sounds like they paid you a masters program tuition… granted back then that probably wasn’t a lot, but they were paying more than just your teaching salary.
- mabub24 5y ago
  The general advice I give to anyone considering grad school, and the same advice I was given by professors, is: unless you are absolutely certain it will be worth it, do not go to grad school unless you are paid to do so by the school or through some other form of compensation.
  - rejectedandsad 5y ago
    This is always interesting, because when I went to my crappy state school people always said "Oh, but you can always go to a top grad school!". It seems like if you're not cut out for success at 17 you'll never have it.
    - BeetleB 5y ago
whimsicalism 5y ago
... Most top tier universities exploit masters programs. It's pretty much what a masters is in the US.
spfzero 5y ago
They should at least let you know how long you'd need to work in an average, entry-level-plus job in that field, to realistically pay back the loan. That should be on the disclosure form for the loan.
busterarm 5y ago
YMMV. A friend/former coworker of mine left to get his Masters in CS at Columbia. He was always a driven, strongly self-directed kind of guy. The connections that he made in his Masters program led to him founding a security company with his professors and landed government contracts through their contacts in the federal government. That infosec company is one of the most competitive/exciting local employers.
- mrDmrTmrJ 5y ago
  Respectfully a Masters in CS is completely different from a masters in a 'creative field' because CS has an excess of demand for talent and tons of new opportunities. Writing, Journalism, Fashion, Fine-Arts, Film - all of these master programs are producing legions of high-debt students with bad prospects, which is the point of the original article that the start of the Twitter thread.
  - mabub24 5y ago
    I think another things is, these MFA programs aren't about scholarship or research. They're essentially exorbitantly expensive trade schools. Even weirder: in the past the idea of going to some ultra expensive trade school to learn how to make films would've been considered bizarre. Hollywood operated with an apprenticeship model (with, obviously a shitload of luck) that was kind of similar to the way a plumber-student would need to apprentice. Even journalism schools when they first started, weren't bathing in the cache of a MFA program, they were trade schools for making reporters. They taught you bare bones shit about writing a column to set lines, and had you interning at newspapers and shadowing reporters right away. MFA programs and the rise of "creative non-fiction" are now making journalists think they're artists. I don't have a problem with MFA programs existing (I mean, some CS programs are awful and churn out students who can barely code), but I think some applicants need to take a hard look at whether they even serve a purpose for their future employment beyond the letters "MFA" after your name; and, whether Columbia is actually the best MFA program to go to.
    - germinalphrase 5y ago
xapata 5y ago
They're estimating $45k for living expenses. I'm not sure we should be lumping that in.
dopeboy 5y ago
For reference, when I went to Columbia for a master's in computer engineering from 2008-2009, it was ~$33k in tuition and ~$14k in living costs. It's _insane_ that's it nearly 2.3x'ed since then.
- steveBK123 5y ago
  It's hard to discount how much the room&board aspect plays in as well. 2021 NYU has $20K room&board, you could go to UConn Stamford with in-state tuition for only $15k still! A lot of these prestige schools are in places with very expensive real estate. Additionally for marketing reasons the schools tend to have much too fancy housing. For many NYU grads for example, its quite a come down having to actually rent an apartment on their post-graduation budget. For reference I had friends who lived in NYU dorms the summer we all got bank internships in the the city. They were the nicest apartments any of us had for about the next 10 years.. working in finance!
  - dopeboy 5y ago
    Very true. I got lucky living in the International House which is a big dorm. 7.5x10ft rooms for $750/month with food included. I didn't mind it but I can't fathom folks who have families or want to live alone manage that.
Firebrand 5y ago
Columbia also has the School of General Studies bachelors program for non-traditional students that costs $85k (including living expenses) a year, and it’s notorious for offering little to no financial aid for it. You end up paying $340,000 to take the same classes as regular Columbia students while being almost cut off completely from the college social experience.
- xibalba 5y ago
  This seems like a very clear case of the need for personal responsibility. In light of these facts, why in God’s name would anyone opt into this?
  - subpixel 5y ago
    I went to Columbia. Many reasons folks wind up in General Studies. Two common ones are you didn’t get into good schools but your dad is both loaded and encouraging that a Columbia degree is worth it. Another is you’re between 40 and 60 and trying to reinvent yourself and/or your love life. It’s a cash cow, akin to the Learning Annex.
    - andi999 5y ago
      What does your love life have to do with a Columbia degree?
      - simtel20 5y ago
        The implication is that you meet the students grads and professors of the university and they are now part of your social circle and your dating pool. A while back a friend in her thirties went to Columbia's teachers college and ended up marrying one of her professors so I guess it's more common than I realized.
      - subpixel 5y ago
        What I was remarking on was that there was a certain subset of the 'back to school' cohort, in my day, who were basically reinventing their life, and often post-divorce.
dfadsadsf 5y ago
The one about SLP making only 60k I truly do not understand. My daughter has speech problems and is doing 5 hours/wk of speech therapy with SLP for $180/hour (average rate for area) - just from us she is making almost 40k/year. All good SLPs are booked solid 2-3 months into the future and most do not even take new clients.
- thedevelopnik 5y ago
  A lot probably go to work for school districts rather than into private practice.
- criticas 5y ago
  Two Possibilities: they work for a non-profit or government entity (school district, social services organization, etc), or they work less than full time. About 85% of speech pathologists are women, who tend to prioritize other factors (work-life balance, family care, etc) over raw earnings (https://www.zippia.com/speech-language-pathologist-jobs/demographics/ https://www.zippia.com/speech-language-pathologist-jobs/demo...). According to ZipRecruiter, the national average is about $98K. The NY state average is $101,491 (https://www.ziprecruiter.com/Salaries/What-Is-the-Average-Speech-Pathologist-Salary-by-State https://www.ziprecruiter.com/Salaries/What-Is-the-Average-Sp...).
vmception 5y ago
I have a question Universities still think that there is a large enough population that is only interested in the pursuit of higher knowledge, but the private sector formed around attending these universities prompting the underclass (sorry, no other word in this context) to clamor to attend them and simply become debt serfs So we can complain about the universities, refrain from calling the debt laden alumni dumb simply because they are so numerous now (degree-positive movement?), or complain about the federal government but the question is: What organization does exist just for the upper class to pursue knowledge and maintain their connections? Universities and fraternities were doing that loooooong before the private sector noticed and its only controversial (it being: college admissions practices, debt, purpose, degree choice, admission corruption etc) because people that were never intended to be there feel they need to be there So what is the replacement? Private clubs with professors? Summits and exclusive apprenticeships? Just admitting the same family’s children to universities anyway and they just pretend to be struggling students indistinguishable from the proletariat?
- seibelj 5y ago
  Universities will enter a period of consolidation. Many will shut down entirely but some will merge with larger fish. Highly motivated individuals will eventually be able to get their foot in the door to corporations via YouTube learning, IQ tests or replacements (SATs), provable signals like acceptance to the (remaining) good schools, and whatever else pops up that can distinguish people. The private sector is the first to realize what bullshit is happening because of their profit requirement, so as the university system falters they will be actively promoting its replacement. I agree that separating the rich from the poor will continue to be an important function. Frats and other social clubs are proxies for wealth. I think simply that getting access to certain schools will be limited by wealth via the restriction on loans to certain schools and majors, and the academic world will revert to an earlier time of privilege.
hiyer 5y ago
Not just creative fields. A relative of mine did an MPA from Columbia-SIPA. He spent around $200k all told (including indirect costs like housing), and on graduation the best offer he got was for around $60k. Eventually he took up a job (outside USA, as his visa expired) based on his previous experience, so the entire expense on the degree was just sunk cost.
gumby 5y ago
> The school is exploiting the Ivy brand, the NYC location and talent, and legions of students desperate to stand out… Sharp analysis. For film, an NYU degree is less bad (I hesitate to say “better”) bc at least you’re in the village, where some of the art scene still remains, rather than stuck in the boonies uptown. But the real issue is that a masters in the humanities is only for the independently wealthy. In particular the MFA gets you a pan unpaid internship at a gallery where they home you’ll bring in your parents’ wealthy friends. In that regard not that different from the private banking business.
- simtel20 5y ago
  NYU seems to create a better network for the grad film students. It doesn't guarantee success any more than Columbia, but basednon the tiny sample size of one friend and his classmates, most of his film masters degree class ended up working in the industry in one way or the other.

roland35 5y ago

Wow I had no idea a Masters could be that expensive! I paid $16k for a Masters in Computer Engineering at a local unglamorous state university (half paid for by my employer) and immediately got a promotion for $30k when I was done, so it was a pretty good rate of return!

ghaff 5y ago
Engineering Masters can be even less than that. I don't remember what my Engineering Masters cost all-in but it wasn't a lot including CoL at an Ivy.
coldcode 5y ago
I worked on my Chemistry Masters around 1980 and it cost me nothing, they paid me a pittance as a grad student to teach but I got free tuition at a public university. Strange how much things cost today.
- samatman 5y ago
  Chemistry, at least c. mid 2000s when I was looking into it, is largely paid for by GAANN. There aren't many grad school slots available but those there are tend to be full-ride.
- vxNsr 5y ago
  Sounds like they paid you a masters program tuition… granted back then that probably wasn’t a lot, but they were paying more than just your teaching salary.
mabub24 5y ago
The general advice I give to anyone considering grad school, and the same advice I was given by professors, is: unless you are absolutely certain it will be worth it, do not go to grad school unless you are paid to do so by the school or through some other form of compensation.
- rejectedandsad 5y ago
  This is always interesting, because when I went to my crappy state school people always said "Oh, but you can always go to a top grad school!". It seems like if you're not cut out for success at 17 you'll never have it.
  - BeetleB 5y ago

whimsicalism 5y ago

... Most top tier universities exploit masters programs. It's pretty much what a masters is in the US.

spfzero 5y ago

They should at least let you know how long you'd need to work in an average, entry-level-plus job in that field, to realistically pay back the loan. That should be on the disclosure form for the loan.

busterarm 5y ago

YMMV. A friend/former coworker of mine left to get his Masters in CS at Columbia. He was always a driven, strongly self-directed kind of guy. The connections that he made in his Masters program led to him founding a security company with his professors and landed government contracts through their contacts in the federal government. That infosec company is one of the most competitive/exciting local employers.

mrDmrTmrJ 5y ago
Respectfully a Masters in CS is completely different from a masters in a 'creative field' because CS has an excess of demand for talent and tons of new opportunities. Writing, Journalism, Fashion, Fine-Arts, Film - all of these master programs are producing legions of high-debt students with bad prospects, which is the point of the original article that the start of the Twitter thread.
- mabub24 5y ago
  I think another things is, these MFA programs aren't about scholarship or research. They're essentially exorbitantly expensive trade schools. Even weirder: in the past the idea of going to some ultra expensive trade school to learn how to make films would've been considered bizarre. Hollywood operated with an apprenticeship model (with, obviously a shitload of luck) that was kind of similar to the way a plumber-student would need to apprentice. Even journalism schools when they first started, weren't bathing in the cache of a MFA program, they were trade schools for making reporters. They taught you bare bones shit about writing a column to set lines, and had you interning at newspapers and shadowing reporters right away. MFA programs and the rise of "creative non-fiction" are now making journalists think they're artists. I don't have a problem with MFA programs existing (I mean, some CS programs are awful and churn out students who can barely code), but I think some applicants need to take a hard look at whether they even serve a purpose for their future employment beyond the letters "MFA" after your name; and, whether Columbia is actually the best MFA program to go to.
  - germinalphrase 5y ago

xapata 5y ago

They're estimating $45k for living expenses. I'm not sure we should be lumping that in.

dopeboy 5y ago

For reference, when I went to Columbia for a master's in computer engineering from 2008-2009, it was ~$33k in tuition and ~$14k in living costs. It's _insane_ that's it nearly 2.3x'ed since then.

steveBK123 5y ago
It's hard to discount how much the room&board aspect plays in as well. 2021 NYU has $20K room&board, you could go to UConn Stamford with in-state tuition for only $15k still! A lot of these prestige schools are in places with very expensive real estate. Additionally for marketing reasons the schools tend to have much too fancy housing. For many NYU grads for example, its quite a come down having to actually rent an apartment on their post-graduation budget. For reference I had friends who lived in NYU dorms the summer we all got bank internships in the the city. They were the nicest apartments any of us had for about the next 10 years.. working in finance!
- dopeboy 5y ago
  Very true. I got lucky living in the International House which is a big dorm. 7.5x10ft rooms for $750/month with food included. I didn't mind it but I can't fathom folks who have families or want to live alone manage that.

Firebrand 5y ago

Columbia also has the School of General Studies bachelors program for non-traditional students that costs $85k (including living expenses) a year, and it’s notorious for offering little to no financial aid for it. You end up paying $340,000 to take the same classes as regular Columbia students while being almost cut off completely from the college social experience.

xibalba 5y ago
This seems like a very clear case of the need for personal responsibility. In light of these facts, why in God’s name would anyone opt into this?
- subpixel 5y ago
  I went to Columbia. Many reasons folks wind up in General Studies. Two common ones are you didn’t get into good schools but your dad is both loaded and encouraging that a Columbia degree is worth it. Another is you’re between 40 and 60 and trying to reinvent yourself and/or your love life. It’s a cash cow, akin to the Learning Annex.
  - andi999 5y ago
    What does your love life have to do with a Columbia degree?
    - simtel20 5y ago
      The implication is that you meet the students grads and professors of the university and they are now part of your social circle and your dating pool. A while back a friend in her thirties went to Columbia's teachers college and ended up marrying one of her professors so I guess it's more common than I realized.
    - subpixel 5y ago
      What I was remarking on was that there was a certain subset of the 'back to school' cohort, in my day, who were basically reinventing their life, and often post-divorce.

dfadsadsf 5y ago

The one about SLP making only 60k I truly do not understand. My daughter has speech problems and is doing 5 hours/wk of speech therapy with SLP for $180/hour (average rate for area) - just from us she is making almost 40k/year. All good SLPs are booked solid 2-3 months into the future and most do not even take new clients.

thedevelopnik 5y ago
A lot probably go to work for school districts rather than into private practice.
criticas 5y ago
Two Possibilities: they work for a non-profit or government entity (school district, social services organization, etc), or they work less than full time. About 85% of speech pathologists are women, who tend to prioritize other factors (work-life balance, family care, etc) over raw earnings (https://www.zippia.com/speech-language-pathologist-jobs/demographics/ https://www.zippia.com/speech-language-pathologist-jobs/demo...). According to ZipRecruiter, the national average is about $98K. The NY state average is $101,491 (https://www.ziprecruiter.com/Salaries/What-Is-the-Average-Speech-Pathologist-Salary-by-State https://www.ziprecruiter.com/Salaries/What-Is-the-Average-Sp...).

vmception 5y ago

I have a question Universities still think that there is a large enough population that is only interested in the pursuit of higher knowledge, but the private sector formed around attending these universities prompting the underclass (sorry, no other word in this context) to clamor to attend them and simply become debt serfs So we can complain about the universities, refrain from calling the debt laden alumni dumb simply because they are so numerous now (degree-positive movement?), or complain about the federal government but the question is: What organization does exist just for the upper class to pursue knowledge and maintain their connections? Universities and fraternities were doing that loooooong before the private sector noticed and its only controversial (it being: college admissions practices, debt, purpose, degree choice, admission corruption etc) because people that were never intended to be there feel they need to be there So what is the replacement? Private clubs with professors? Summits and exclusive apprenticeships? Just admitting the same family’s children to universities anyway and they just pretend to be struggling students indistinguishable from the proletariat?

seibelj 5y ago
Universities will enter a period of consolidation. Many will shut down entirely but some will merge with larger fish. Highly motivated individuals will eventually be able to get their foot in the door to corporations via YouTube learning, IQ tests or replacements (SATs), provable signals like acceptance to the (remaining) good schools, and whatever else pops up that can distinguish people. The private sector is the first to realize what bullshit is happening because of their profit requirement, so as the university system falters they will be actively promoting its replacement. I agree that separating the rich from the poor will continue to be an important function. Frats and other social clubs are proxies for wealth. I think simply that getting access to certain schools will be limited by wealth via the restriction on loans to certain schools and majors, and the academic world will revert to an earlier time of privilege.

hiyer 5y ago

Not just creative fields. A relative of mine did an MPA from Columbia-SIPA. He spent around $200k all told (including indirect costs like housing), and on graduation the best offer he got was for around $60k. Eventually he took up a job (outside USA, as his visa expired) based on his previous experience, so the entire expense on the degree was just sunk cost.

gumby 5y ago

> The school is exploiting the Ivy brand, the NYC location and talent, and legions of students desperate to stand out… Sharp analysis. For film, an NYU degree is less bad (I hesitate to say “better”) bc at least you’re in the village, where some of the art scene still remains, rather than stuck in the boonies uptown. But the real issue is that a masters in the humanities is only for the independently wealthy. In particular the MFA gets you a pan unpaid internship at a gallery where they home you’ll bring in your parents’ wealthy friends. In that regard not that different from the private banking business.

simtel20 5y ago
NYU seems to create a better network for the grad film students. It doesn't guarantee success any more than Columbia, but basednon the tiny sample size of one friend and his classmates, most of his film masters degree class ended up working in the industry in one way or the other.