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There's that payscale list of best ROI per college which mostly confirms this, but there are some colleges in the top 20 I wouldn't have thought of (Duke, Babso

by rdouble 13y ago

There's that payscale list of best ROI per college which mostly confirms this, but there are some colleges in the top 20 I wouldn't have thought of (Duke, Babson, Harvey Mudd). http://www.payscale.com/college-education-value http://www.payscale.com/college-education-value

mindcrime 13y ago
I don't know... their data either has to lag calendar time substantially, or be heavily based on inference or other statistical techniques that might not reflect reality. It may be accurate as a snapshot of a "point in time" but I'd be reluctant to judge any trends based on that, right now.
rdl 13y ago
Means or even medians are probably not terribly useful (Stanford and Harvard should be crushing the stats just based on Google/Facebook/etc.). A school which has a lot of people who go into public service or other low compensation positions would also be unfairly penalized. "Percentage of graduates who live the life they want after graduation" is probably the ideal metric, along with "net benefit to society". On a pure ROI basis, it's obviously going to go to the service academies and maybe Olin/Cooper Union, too. Good incomes on zero cost. But all of this also discounts the inputs; I'd consider a school which turns a bunch of otherwise-losers into median success citizens to be a success, while someplace which takes the children of Googlers and achieves the same result would be a horrible failure. It's complex.
- dfc 13y ago
  Its funny you mention Cooper Union, the grey lady had an article today about a change in tuition policy. The change being they will now charge: http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/04/24/nyregion/cooper-union-to-charge-undergraduates-tuition.xml http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/04/24/nyregion/cooper-union-t...
  - rdl 13y ago
    Yeah, I saw that :( And I think Olin may have changed their policy a few years ago (I'm not sure); seems to have tuition now, and a half scholarship for everyone. I think the proper tuition is something where a student can work during the year and summers to pay for it and emerge with little or no debt, or choose to do non-work activities and have debt which could be repaid with 10-20% of reasonable income in 10 years. I'm not sure if half of inflated tuition covers that.

by rdouble 13y ago

mindcrime 13y ago

I don't know... their data either has to lag calendar time substantially, or be heavily based on inference or other statistical techniques that might not reflect reality. It may be accurate as a snapshot of a "point in time" but I'd be reluctant to judge any trends based on that, right now.

rdl 13y ago

Means or even medians are probably not terribly useful (Stanford and Harvard should be crushing the stats just based on Google/Facebook/etc.). A school which has a lot of people who go into public service or other low compensation positions would also be unfairly penalized. "Percentage of graduates who live the life they want after graduation" is probably the ideal metric, along with "net benefit to society". On a pure ROI basis, it's obviously going to go to the service academies and maybe Olin/Cooper Union, too. Good incomes on zero cost. But all of this also discounts the inputs; I'd consider a school which turns a bunch of otherwise-losers into median success citizens to be a success, while someplace which takes the children of Googlers and achieves the same result would be a horrible failure. It's complex.

dfc 13y ago
Its funny you mention Cooper Union, the grey lady had an article today about a change in tuition policy. The change being they will now charge: http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/04/24/nyregion/cooper-union-to-charge-undergraduates-tuition.xml http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/04/24/nyregion/cooper-union-t...
- rdl 13y ago
  Yeah, I saw that :( And I think Olin may have changed their policy a few years ago (I'm not sure); seems to have tuition now, and a half scholarship for everyone. I think the proper tuition is something where a student can work during the year and summers to pay for it and emerge with little or no debt, or choose to do non-work activities and have debt which could be repaid with 10-20% of reasonable income in 10 years. I'm not sure if half of inflated tuition covers that.