WASHINGTON — Amid widespread debate about the economic value of a college degree, an education reform leader said Monday that the case for increasing postsecondary attainment should not be framed as an economic or political issue.
Too often, said Dr. John H. Jackson, president and CEO of the Schott Foundation for Public Education, discussions about whether and where to invest in higher education are held in terms of the “return on investment.”
“But when the numbers come out, we have to answer the question as: What is the return on investment from guaranteeing opportunity for all?” Jackson said. “And that’s a question we can’t answer to a person because you never know what the return on investment might be.”
Jackson made his remarks as keynote speaker Monday at the National Press Club during an event billed as the “National Summit on the Investment Payoff: Supporting Efforts to Increase the Benefits of Higher Education for Underserved Populations.”
The Institute for Higher Education Policy, or IHEP, and the Pathways to College Network organized the event, which featured a dozen or so speakers from various realms of higher education.
One of the primary aims of the conference was to sort through some of the conflicting messages about whether a college degree makes economic sense — both from an individual standpoint as well as from the standpoint of societal investment.
