Dive Brief:
- A second poll has asked college graduates how they rate the value of their education, finding more promising results.
- While Gallup and Purdue found that only half of the 30,000 graduates polled consider their educations to be worth the cost, Clark University found 72% of 21- to 29-year-olds it surveyed thought their education experience was “worthwhile.”
- The study (which included 1,000 respondents) found nearly 1 in 10 respondents have student loans exceeding $50,000, and 70% expect to go back to school to continue their education in their 30s and 40s.
Dive Insight:
The Clark University poll had a different target population, focusing on Millennials, and its question about student satisfaction differed from the Purdue University poll in that it asked about overall satisfaction rather than a response specifically in light of the cost of education. The Purdue poll, however, found that the more debt a student had, the less likely they were to think their education was worth the cost.
If recent graduates have more debt, it is perhaps surprising their satisfaction numbers were so much higher. When graduates are asked to think about the whole college experience, it seems, higher education institutions fare better.