As Debt Rises and Job Prospects Dim, Some Say It's Time to Put a Warning Label on Graduate School
By Stacey Patton
Washington
This isn't just the year of the massive open online course; it's also the year of two other hot topics in higher education—student debt and a barren job market for graduating students.
While people in higher education are struggling to adjust realistically to the supply-and-demand changes in the labor market, students need more-transparent information about the pathways into and out of graduate school now. That was the consensus among attendees at the Council of Graduate Schools' annual meeting held here last week.
In various sessions, deans and administrators discussed everything from faculty perceptions of the job prospects for graduate students and the ways some institutions are trying systematically to track outcomes (or not), to how to increase financial literacy on campuses at a time when undergraduate student debt and recent changes in federal loan policies are making it more difficult for students to attend and finish graduate school.
"The situation we face today is one of good news and bad news," said the council's president, Debra W. Stewart. "The good news is that there is broad bipartisan agreement here in Washington and among elite stakeholders that educating people up to the highest level possible is necessary for America to be competitive and prosperous. There are very few people who say they don't want their kids to go beyond college."
The issue going forward, Ms. Stewart said, is, "How are we going to find the money to do it?"
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