ROI on a college degree depends what you study, not where • Hacker News Board

Re: ROI on a college degree depends what you study, not where

#111

Post by CPLX » Wed, May 04, 2016, 2:55 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #53

CPLX wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For an opposing viewpoint, today might actually be an excellent day to ponder the effect of a lack of understanding of basic math, science, and history has on the general electorate.

I assume you're talking about Trump. We've had universal basic education in those subjects for decades, so that cannot be the explanation. I suspect the problem is not a lack of education, but a lack of indoctrinating the right values. Consider climate change. I believe climate change is happening and needs to be addressed. But I don't really understand the mechanics. Neither do the people who think it doesn't exist.…

Perhaps. Though I wouldn't bet everything on the idea that a rising streak of overt anti-intellectualism has no relationship to education whatsoever.

Re: ROI on a college degree depends what you study, not where

#112

Post by caseysoftware » Wed, May 04, 2016, 2:55 PM UTC

jackcosgrove wrote: post #91

bisRepetita wrote: post #67

This study, like pretty much all the ones I have read on such topic, seems to compare income people going to college vs people not going to college. And they attribute all the benefits and ROI to college. While often it just measures that people that are smarter and motivated (because they can and want to go to college) do better financially than the one less smart and less motivated. I wish I could find a study of s…

I predict that in the future college will become so expensive that students of all abilities will rely more on online certificates to measure their ability and training. Employers will more slowly accept these credentials. If enough smart people don't go to college, the signaling ability of college will be broken and then the higher education market will collapse or radically reform itself.

I think we're already seeing that in tech. Not just the coding schools which are still pretty young but online training such as Lynda and Pluralsight.

It will take much longer - if ever - for something like that to happen in law, medicine, and engineering but it's feasible. Remember, licensing and accreditation are still relatively new concepts..

Re: ROI on a college degree depends what you study, not where

#113

Post by caseysoftware » Wed, May 04, 2016, 2:58 PM UTC

bisRepetita wrote: post #67

This study, like pretty much all the ones I have read on such topic, seems to compare income people going to college vs people not going to college. And they attribute all the benefits and ROI to college. While often it just measures that people that are smarter and motivated (because they can and want to go to college) do better financially than the one less smart and less motivated. I wish I could find a study of s…

Have you read Bell Curve?

It talks about completing college as potentially being an indicator or side effect of the things you cite, not the result. The author uses earlier versions of this study and its predecessors to analyze relationships: https://www.nlsinfo.org/content/cohorts/nlsy97

Re: ROI on a college degree depends what you study, not where

#114

Post by bisRepetita » Wed, May 04, 2016, 3:03 PM UTC

jessriedel wrote: post #104

bisRepetita wrote: post #67

This study, like pretty much all the ones I have read on such topic, seems to compare income people going to college vs people not going to college. And they attribute all the benefits and ROI to college. While often it just measures that people that are smarter and motivated (because they can and want to go to college) do better financially than the one less smart and less motivated. I wish I could find a study of s…

> I wish I could find a study of similarly smart and motivated people who decided themselves to go or not to college. As a choice. I don't think that's actually the ideal study design you want. Any measure of intelligence/motivation is going to be imperfect, so any time you try to control for it but still allow a "free choice", that free choice will be correlated with variables that plausibly impact future success (e…

Thank you! This is very helpful. If /jackcosgrove in this thread is right about "the signaling ability of college will be broken", or at least challenged, maybe we'll be able to continue this with a study at scale between college vs non-college.

Re: ROI on a college degree depends what you study, not where

#115

Post by criddell » Wed, May 04, 2016, 3:08 PM UTC

cableshaft wrote: post #64

criddell wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My oldest daughter is just entering high school and we are indeed thinking about maximizing the return on education investment. I went to school for computer science and while I have a very good and easy life, I regret not spending more time studying the humanities. I've told her about this hoping to provide another perspective than what she gets at school where they push STEM relentlessly. An investment in education…

Isn't that what general education is for? I majored in Computer Science, but I took classes on Japanese, Theater, Poly Sci, Criminal Justice, Communications, Literature, and probably a couple others I can't remember right now. In several of those subjects I took two or three classes.

I didn't take full advantage of what the university had to offer me. I was very focused on learning as much as I could about computer science, software development, and systems and I mostly neglected the humanities (although I did take economics and loved it).

Re: ROI on a college degree depends what you study, not where

#116

Post by ececconi » Wed, May 04, 2016, 3:09 PM UTC

morgante wrote: post #97

jerf wrote: post #4

In addition to the obvious 0 line, it's worth taking the article's observation that S&P has returned 7.8% and mentally drawing a line there too. Also, for anyone in the position of deciding which to do, I'd add the observation that it is way easier to go to college and get a formal education in science, math, or engineering, and pursue an ongoing adhoc self-directed education in the arts and humanities in your remain…

> it's worth taking the article's observation that S&P has returned 7.8% and mentally drawing a line there too. Unfortunately people aren't generally in the habit of handing out low-interest loans to recent high school graduates with no assets so they can invest in the S&P. I mean this seriously. One of the bigger advantages of college as an investment is that you can get favorable interest rates on purchasing it. Th…

That might be slightly offset by being able to reduce your tax liability due to the interest payments of college loans.

Re: ROI on a college degree depends what you study, not where

#117

Post by criddell » Wed, May 04, 2016, 3:10 PM UTC

morgante wrote: post #108

School-Cotton wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In countries with a functioning education system (take your pick), this is what high school is for. Edit for downvoters: In France, this was the high-school leaving exam (literary track) in history for 2015. Four hours to write an essay on each of the following two topics: 1. "South and East Asia: The challenges of population and growth." 2. "The paths of power: The United States and the world at the end of the 1960s…

I went to a very elite high school in the US and my final exams included questions similar to that (the IB). Some of my teachers literally wrote the textbooks on their subjects. That doesn't mean my high school classes were anywhere near the depth or intensity of my college classes. While high school provided me with a solid foundation in all the disciplines, it's not set up to go in depth on specific areas. As a com…

What do you think about the IB program? My daughter is on a track that leads to IB in 11th grade and I'm not sure how I feel about that.

Re: ROI on a college degree depends what you study, not where

#118

Post by cableshaft » Wed, May 04, 2016, 3:12 PM UTC

School-Cotton wrote: post #87

cableshaft wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't that what general education is for? I majored in Computer Science, but I took classes on Japanese, Theater, Poly Sci, Criminal Justice, Communications, Literature, and probably a couple others I can't remember right now. In several of those subjects I took two or three classes.

In countries with a functioning education system (take your pick), this is what high school is for. Edit for downvoters: In France, this was the high-school leaving exam (literary track) in history for 2015. Four hours to write an essay on each of the following two topics: 1. "South and East Asia: The challenges of population and growth." 2. "The paths of power: The United States and the world at the end of the 1960s…

Yeah, I took a class on programming, classes in French, classes on Graphic Design (super smart decision, came in handy ever since), Philosophy and Debate, and probably could have taken more if I didn't have one period taken up by Band for four years, in high school.

And I took a few AP classes that you dismiss as being simple multiple choice tests, which wasn't the case.

The parent was talking about intense focus on stem in college being something he's worried about for his kid, not high school.

Re: ROI on a college degree depends what you study, not where

#119

Post by Nav_Panel » Wed, May 04, 2016, 3:12 PM UTC

soundwave106 wrote: post #107

jerf wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a null argument. It cuts both ways equally, and therefore can not distinguish between the two.

In these days when STEM is so promoted, I think sometimes there is too much tendency to dismiss the arts and humanities as complete lightweight fluff compared to STEM. Perhaps there are some subjects which fall in this category. But I know, for instance, with music theory and composition, the heavy stuff can get fairly complicated and technical very fast. Certainly few people would be dismissive of the technical trai…

I'm not disagreeing with your general point -- from my observations at a tech-focused school, many STEM folks write off the arts pretty hard -- but I think your examples are poorly chosen. Most folks are aware or have at least heard that, at a deep level, music has a lot of mathematics. Additionally, linguistics emerged specifically as a scientific study of language: much closer to STEM than other humanities.

A better example might be that philosophy/law require broad and deep contextual knowledge of prior thinkers and extremely strong logical skills. Even having trained in formal logic as a software developer, I sometimes struggle to parse philosophical arguments, even when laid out plainly. Yet, even that is still a comparison on the same plane as STEM when ultimately these fields come with different sorts of complexities. Apples and oranges.

Re: ROI on a college degree depends what you study, not where

#120

Post by neap24 » Wed, May 04, 2016, 3:16 PM UTC

keiferski wrote: post #49

jerf wrote: post #4

In addition to the obvious 0 line, it's worth taking the article's observation that S&P has returned 7.8% and mentally drawing a line there too. Also, for anyone in the position of deciding which to do, I'd add the observation that it is way easier to go to college and get a formal education in science, math, or engineering, and pursue an ongoing adhoc self-directed education in the arts and humanities in your remain…

I'd add the observation that it is way easier to go to college and get a formal education in science, math, or engineering, and pursue an ongoing adhoc self-directed education in the arts and humanities in your remaining decades of life, than the other way around. Yeah, not really. There is a huge difference between reading a book by yourself, and reading a book then discussing it with a room full of other intelligen…

I disagree slightly. Mostly because you can find dozens of commentaries and critical analyses of great works of fiction to complement your reading. These are essentially transmitting the same info a knowledgeable teacher/group of classmates would. The resources for math and science are also vast, but often require access to specialized laborites/equipment at the upper levels.