With the defeat of Initiated Measure 25 and the election of a Republican Governor and Legislature who have no plans to invest in education, South Dakota’s vo-tech tuition will likely remain the third-highest in the nation.
But guess what else in South Dakota is third-highest in the nation? The net price of university education:
After grants and scholarships, this New America analysis finds that low-income families still end up paying an average of over $14,000 to send their kids to a South Dakota public university for a year. College education costs more only in Pennsylvania and Vermont. Students can save around $3,000 a year by studying in Nebraska or Montana, over $4,000 in Minnesota or Iowa, close to $5,000 in Wyoming, and close to $6,000 in North Dakota.
The average net price to students is $8,500 in New York and $7,500 in California.
Stephen Burd explains the New America methodology behind this map:
Like the three previous Undermining Pell reports, this report judges four-year colleges based on two criteria: the proportion of Pell Grant recipients they enroll and the average net price they charge the lowest-income students.
Colleges report both the Pell and net-price-by-income data to the U.S. Department of Education’s Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), which displays the school-by-school data on the College Navigator website.
The Pell data represent the percentage of all undergraduates on a campus that have received Pell Grants. The average net price data represent the average amount of money that students and their families have to pay after all grant and scholarship aid is deducted from the listed price. Colleges report the net price data broken down by income for only first-time, full-time students who receive federal financial aid. Public colleges and universities report on in-state students only. This report specifically looks at the data for students with family income of $30,000 or less. Both the Pell and net price data are for the 2015–16 academic year.
This year’s report examines 584 public four-year colleges in the 50 states. Colleges that did not report average net price data to IPEDs were excluded, as were military academies, and state colleges that primarily award associate degrees [Burd, 2018.10.31].
South Dakota did give higher education the second-largest per-FTE funding increase in the nation in 2017, 15.7%, but we’re still investing only 85% of the national average per FTE in higher ed. Plus, we’re one of fourteen states putting over 60% of the higher ed funding burden on students:
But hey, who wants a bunch of kids who want a cheap education hanging around South Dakota anyway? Let ’em go to Minnesota or Iowa or New York to read all those books and get all those idears. Paying higher tuition and incurring more student debt builds character… as well as more docile workforce that needs its paycheck more than real political liberty.
What are the salaries compared to ND, MT, and NE?
What is the funding by each State?
What is the breakdown of cost per student?
This is public knowledge that Cory could have given us.
Does any of that matter to the students trying to get an affordable public university education?
It matters to Parents who are paying for it and to legislators who are in control of the money.
In South Dakota education is viewed as an expense, not an investment. For every kid we ship out of state for college we save thousands $$. Maybe they’ll come back after college for the low wages and high cost of living.
A better question instead of just how much someone thinks other people should pay for other kids education would be whether a degree from a South Dakota college is even worth it?
I can’t speak for the liberal arts colleges but SDSM&T may make the additional cost is worth it. The average starting salary of a Mines graduate is $65,000, USD is $46K, SDSU is $49K and so forth: https://www.payscale.com/college-salary-report/best-schools-by-state/bachelors/south-dakota
Based upon $14K/year in cost ($56K in total cost if you finish in four years) means SDSM&T is the only South Dakota college providing an education that can actually repay the student for their investment in just one year. University of Minnesota is only $56K but the cost per year is $14,670 ($24K for out of state) which is even costlier than you average South Dakota college.
In my opinion “you get what you pay for” so you should all look at sending your kids to a quality college such as SDSM&T and not waste your money on the lesser schools that clearly don’t provide the students the skill set needed to earn higher wages.
O.S.
For once I agree with the point that you are making, sort-of. I read a few articles in the past (I’ll try to find them if you want) that basically indicated that STEM degrees, like Engineering, are just as valuable from high-reputation than lesser schools, and generally produce a good salary no matter where you go to school. This is because those degrees generally have a standardized curriculum, high standards, and professional organizations.
If you are trying to work for NASA, you might want to consider M.I.T., but if you want to be a city engineer, SDSU or SDSM&T will do just fine.
I’ll give you props for recognizing that, but I’m not sure how any of that supports or refutes the point Cory is making.
TAG, don’t agree with him. It only makes him moar obnoxious and disagreable. Please don’t feed this Troll any sweets.
My point is cost is secondary to the return on cost. It’s like gasoline for the car: If pure gasoline gets you 30mpg and 10% ethanol gets you 20mpg which is the better deal? Then it depends upon the cost per gallon. Same with college. Complaining that we don’t subsidize college as much as other states doesn’t reflect the value of the college.
Why not be a state that provides the best return for the dollar when it comes to college costs. Maybe, as a state, it would be a better idea to change all majors to STEM majors and let the liberal arts go to other states. South Dakota kids who attend South Dakota colleges would find better jobs and make more money and after all isn’t that why we invest in their futures? Nobody has the goal of educating their child so they are in more debt and poorer. . .
STEM degrees from SD are not more of a bargain for low-income people then STEM degrees from other states. That’s the point. They likely are LESS of a bargain. The fact that STEM degrees have a high return in general is not the point at all. Its just a point of distraction.
“STEM degrees from SD are not more of a bargain for low-income people” but they are for South Dakota. Other states do not matter as to attend a school like Minnesota out of state tuition is over $24K/yr so low income people from South Dakota are not likely to even go there. I’m not really worried about kids form other states. If they want to come here and pay out of state tuition fine.
I think our state funded and supported schools should provide South Dakota kids the best opportunity for finding valuable work and income that they can. If it means STEM education then that is what we, as a state, need to focus on. If the liberal arts doesn’t have the same return then our tax dollars should not be wasted on that area. It’s about providing “our kids” the best opportunity we can with the limited resources we have.
Okay, speaking as a SDSMT student here-
Yeah, we have the better return for our degree. However, we constantly lose funding, our professors are overworked so it’s hard for them to do research, and if we continue on this path no matter what we do students will end up paying more. I easily pay $3,000 a semester “out of pocket”. If nothing changes it’ll continue to go down the dumps. I know of 4 or 5 departments trying to hold it together through all the funding cuts.
$65k salary for a SDSMT grad is if they leave the state to take a job. Not many STEM jobs in SD.
Debbie: “However, we constantly lose funding, our professors are overworked” provide us some evidence of this. When has the SDSM&T lost any funding for running the institution or for wages? I’ve never heard of such a thing. The same with professors being overworked. There isn’t a professor I know that is overworked by the institution. Maybe they can be overworked when it is self-induced but certainly not by the institution.
Mike J: There are engineering jobs in our local area that pay that or even more. Yes, some kids will take jobs elsewhere but that is their choice.
Old Sarge:
My department is a great example. We had a tenured professor leave, and have been unable to replace her for two years now. This means another tenured professor has to do the work of two professors. He teaches double the classes that he was hired on to teach in his contract, which eats into his research time. We were able to go all the way through the hiring process & have three on site interviews- then the administration pulled the funding from the department for another department to have because we aren’t getting increases in budgets.
Not to be rude but just because you don’t see something personally it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.
Good point, Debbie, about OS’s myopia. His argument about the value of a four-year degree does not refute the point about cost, because it does not apply specifically to degrees from any one state’s degree programs. The point here is that if families and students do decide that a four-year degree has value, they will still find it more expensive to pursue that degree in South Dakota than elsewhere.
And even if they agree with OS and say four-year degrees are not worth their effort, they will find that two-year technical degrees also cost more in South Dakota than in most other states.
And even if they apply OS’s argument to all higher education and go straight to work after high school, they will find wages lower in South Dakota than most other places and the cost-of-living not commensurately lower, meaning they will find life more expensive in South Dakota than in most other places.
Debbie provides a punishing empirical counterpoint to Jason’s attempted distraction. Students apparently aren’t seeing their money poured into paying good professors enough to keep them here and provide them with the good teaching and research opportunities that they can get elsewhere. South Dakota students get a double-whammy, apparently: the state lazily shifts more of the cost of university education onto their shoulders, than slacks off even further on funding, leaving students paying higher tuition for underpaid and overworked profs, resulting in less value for more money.
Our cheapskate state apparently squeezes students and professors for all it can, and offers neither the profs or their graduates high enough wages to make them stick around.
65K is earned within the first few years on the job, not starting pay, according to the RC article OldSferbrains is using.
Always look for missing context with OldSockittoyouSlim.
“If” a South Dakota student chooses the right major, regardless of the state college, they are going to get their monies worth.
And this is my point: I’m all for GREAT wages for teachers as I think my wife is one of the best in the whole state and limiting her income to $70K/yr for all the work she does is not a fair wage when compared to the performance of the schools in our surrounding states. I also think if we would redirect our state money towards degrees that provide good jobs at a fair wage instead of wasting money on professors, admin and facilities for majors and courses that only cost our kids and don’t help them land good jobs we could pay those “good” professors wages that would attract the finest professors in the whole world.
A teaching degree is a “Liberal Arts” degree. Just Sayin’. Just because a profession doesn’t pay well doesn’t make it any less valuable or necessary to a functioning society. How could we treat all of those “mental health issues” that Republicans talk so much about without mental health professionals? (also liberal arts) I guess if we remove all the entitlements we won’t need any social workers or psychologists either, right? SMH
I’m guessing it isn’t the degree that determines the wage, more likely he marketplace and demand.
For a good paying job go to school to be a congressman. No experience necessary. No set limit on how many days you need to show up for work or votes and the benefits are enormous.