Data Dive 3.7

Does a more expensive college pay off?

Two adults give you opposite advice. The data says something neither expected.

You will need paper and a pencil, and a browser for step 3

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Step 1 of 5 · Your guess

What do you think?

One adult tells you: pay more for college, and you will earn more later.

Another says: they are all the same, so go to the cheapest one. Both are talking about colleges you could drive to from Whittier.

Write it down before you lookWho do you think is right? Write it down, and why.
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Step 2 of 5 · Look

Colleges near Whittier, by cost and pay

Every college within 25 miles of Whittier, by what it costs and what its students earnUS Department of Education College Scorecard - one dot is one college, not one studentmedian earnings, ten years after startingin-state tuition, one yearthe other 46the 23 at or under $2,000 a year29,63356,89684,160111,424138,6871,14218,88136,62054,35872,097

US Department of Education College Scorecard. One dot is one college.

How to read it. Each dot is one college. How far right it sits is what one year costs. How high it sits is what its typical student earns ten years after starting. The colored dots cost $2,000 a year or less.

Find out
  1. Does the cloud slope up? Does paying more go with earning more?
  2. Look at the cheap colleges on the left. Do their students all end up the same?
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Step 3 of 5 · Try it

Now you try it, on the same data

This opens the pool, the site's chart tool. The words in bold below are buttons and menus you will see on the screen.

Do these five things

Open the pool on this file: data.sfhsbta.com/thepool?file=colleges_near_90605.csv&mark=point

  1. Under across, pick tuition_in_state. Under up, pick median_earnings_10yr. Find the column of dots at the far left: colleges that cost about the same.
  2. Hover the top and bottom of that column. Both cost about $1,200 a year. How far apart are their students' earnings?
  3. Find Rio Hondo, in Whittier. Where does it sit in that column?
  4. Under up, pick median_debt, how much students borrow. Look at the same column. Which colleges move? Which drop to the band at the bottom because their debt is not reported?
  5. Pick the college you would tell a friend about. Be ready to say what you changed on the chart to decide.
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Step 4 of 5 · Say it

Your answer, in one sentence

I think the best choice is <which college> because <what the chart shows> and I checked it by <what you did to the chart>.

The last part matters most. It shows you did not just look at the chart, you tested it.

Here is one exampleI think the best choice is a cheap college near the top of the column, because colleges that cost about the same end up $16,984 apart in earnings. I checked by switching up to debt, and Fullerton went from the middle of the column to the lowest debt of all.
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Step 5 of 5 · What you found

Check your numbers

$16,984
the earnings gap between colleges that cost about the same
5th of 23
where Rio Hondo ranks on earnings among the cheap colleges
1st of 19
Fullerton on lowest debt; it was 10th of 23 on earnings
4
cheap colleges with no debt number reported, which is not the same as zero
The big idea: compare inside the choice you really haveBoth adults argued about price. But the colleges you can afford cost about the same, and their students still end up far apart. The useful comparison is inside the choice you really have. And these colleges did not make their students. Students chose them, and that matters too.
One more thing to think aboutTwo colleges cost the same, but their students earn very different amounts. Name three reasons that could happen that have nothing to do with the teaching.
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After the dive

The charts you used today

the scatter

Each dot is one thing measured twice. A tight cloud along a line means the two move together.

What it leaves outTwo things moving together is not one causing the other, and a third thing neither axis shows may be moving both.

library · ladder · dives · the pool · this dive’s worksheet

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