education is the one thing nobody can ever take from you.
It is yours once you have it. But that said, I don't
always think that college is for everybody, but I do
think that it can give you a step up in the world.
College enrollment is falling according to the national
Student clearinghouse Research center. Undergraduate
enrollment dropped nearly 5% from 20 21-2022. Some
experts say the decline suggests students are
questioning whether college is worth the cost overall.
I think the most everyone will tell you in the economy
today, even in spite of where we are in the
labor-market today, that higher education is going to
be required for the future for success or young data
from the college board shows college costs jumped 25%
from 2009 to 2019. So how much does students expect t
pay Now experts are saying it depends. Private scho
are, you know in the 60 $70,000 range right now. Sta
schools um you know, I was looking today, U.N.C. Is
36,000 out of state, were $100 a credit hour. So if you
were taking a full load which is 12 credit hours, that
would be 1200 um plus $382 in fees. If you're going to
a public university in your state, they tend to be
around 10,000 $15,000 kind of year for tuition. But
it's not uncommon for a private university to be
$30,000 or $40,000. And some of the schools are even
more um more expensive, it can go anywhere from
2000-80,000. Those numbers, eve on the smaller end,
can be daunting to consider, especially for someon
who's only 17 or 18 years old. So back to the question
is college worth the cost, return on investment is
really, really important. A lot of our students earn
degrees in engineering, in computer science and in
business. You know, where the starting salaries are
quite high. Our average starting salary is 75 for
students who graduate $75,000 a year, that's the
average. And some majors are even significantly larger
than that. Universities are experiencing some
challenges, showing potential s the value of a
degree or certificate. When a high school student can
graduate today and walk out of high school and
potentially earn $20 an hour or more and then they
wonder why they have to pay us 10 thous dollars a year
to get an education. That's a reasonable question th
we ought to be, we ought to be ready to answer. And the
answer is yes, you might do that today. But when you
continue that job at some point, your employer is gonna
say, let's see your diploma. I think I'd like to move
you into management to get the jobs that will allow you
to really transform where you are now to the next level.
You need some type of education. Post high school, Th
good news, there are options to reduce the cost of
higher education. And it's not just scholarships.
There's so many schools that are so generous,
especially the more expensive they are, sometimes they
have more money and they give more money. The most
money you get comes from the college you go to. And so,
you know, there's web sites like Fastweb and apex and
you can go in there and look for scholarships. And
there are there stories where kids have like applied to
so many and gotten enough to go, but it's a very, very
small percentage and that's why, um, when you're
looking at colleges, especially you want to go out
of state not to a state school, you want to see, do
they have um, like a large endowment Do they have
enough money to help you pay for college We need
college to be less expensive, but we need more programs
that are not only gonna support kids, but also give
them the money that they need. So all in all is a
college degree still worth it. These collegiate experts
all agree that the short answer is yes. From networking
to advancing more quickly in your career goals. The
return on investment is there