Which southwest Missouri college produces the highest-earning graduates?
The U.S. Department of Education College Scorecard puts Cox College on the top, with an average salary of $41,400.
Of the 10 higher education institutions reviewed by Springfield Business Journal within 50 miles of the Queen City, median salary came in at $31,800 for students 10 years after enrolling in school. That’s roughly $19,000 less than the national average.
The area’s largest school, Missouri State University, takes the No. 2 spot on the list with an average of $36,800 and Bryan University bottoms out the local scorecard with an average of $24,900. Missouri University of Science and Technology students take the Show-Me State’s overall top spot with an above national average of $64,100.
Launched in September 2015, the College Scorecard is a holdover from the Obama administration and an effort to level the playing field for students and families wading through a sea of websites and catalogs while researching colleges. Using easy-to-read charts and colorful graphics, the online searchable database lists schools based on three major criteria: salary after attending, average annual cost and graduation rate. But a host of other information also is available including typical total student debt to the size of the student body and average SAT scores.
While the aim was to create an unbiased and accurate index, local school leaders say the scorecard is anything but that. While not adverse to a government-provided one-stop shop, colleges believe the scorecard is oversimplified, misleading and uses inaccurate statistics.
“There are apples and oranges mixed in the data set,” said Mike Brothers, Drury University’s director of media relations. “It’s not a very quality tool for reflecting what they say it reflects.”
Fatal flaws?
Local educators believe the problem is in the data itself, which they say relies on incomplete and mismatched numbers. Examples abound.
Cox College is leading the local pack, but even the nursing school questions the data. Vice President of College Services and Institutional Research Jim Moore said its salary data is relatively accurate, but incomplete numbers give a skewed view of such things as graduation rates.
“Graduation rate is calculated based on first-time incoming freshman,” he said. “Most of our students are nontraditional and have multiple degrees already, so they don’t count. Last year, our federal graduation rate was based on three students.
“We have a total enrollment of about 900. That’s not an accurate picture.”
Moore said in spring 2016, the school posted a 96 percent graduation rate based on its internal calculations, but Cox College reported a rate of just 33 percent to the federal government.
Mismatched numbers also can be a problem. At Drury for example, Brothers said the listed average cost to attend of $21,824 is the sticker price for day school students, while other metrics such as enrollment factor in night school numbers.
“There is a cost difference when attending night school, but that’s not reflected here,” he said. “It’s two different data sets presented as one picture.”
The data – the most recent available – last was collected during the 2012-13 school year, representing students starting school during the 2002-03 school year. With new data released each fall, the scorecard is a combination of three main sources: a Department of Education survey, the national student loan database and earnings data from tax records.
“It’s only tracking students who took out federal loans,” Brothers said, noting that leaves out about one-third of Drury’s student population. “That makes sense, because it’s the information the government would have access to, but it’s not a complete picture by any means.”
That also means not every higher education institution is listed on the scorecard as originally intended by the Department of Education.
“This was an attempt to provide transparency,” said Lee Skinkle, Southwest Baptist University provost. “There isn’t one metric you can rank colleges on that everyone will love. There is no perfect instrument, but this one seems to have a lot of holes.”
Skinkle said the skew is particularly bad at SBU, where an abundance of students going into ministry throws off numbers.
“This is surveying people 10 years after starting college,” he said. “If you go into the ministry, you’re probably still in school then, so your salary is a lot lower.”
Next step
With dozens of college comparison websites already online, the future of the College Scorecard is uncertain under President Donald Trump and new Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos.
“This is going to be debated, and there will be pressure to have something similar for families,” Skinkle said. “I would like to see a public comment period to make some changes, but it shouldn’t be scrapped. It could be a valuable resource for families.”
But can the data be reconciled?
“They’ve tried to create a tool to make all colleges equal, [to] make the choice easy,” said Moore. “But the reality is all colleges are not equal and the scorecard should reflect that going forward. They have to find a way to show the similarities while highlighting the differences.”
One thing local educators agree on is college return on investment can’t be broken down into a few simple charts – intangibles play a large factor.
“The data is all mixed up, but they are presenting it all neat and tidy,” Brothers said. “The best advice is to use this scorecard as just one point of data in your search. College is about finding the right fit, and you’re not going to find a cut and dried answer to that on a website.”
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