New York University

I’ve blogged before about the increasing concerns many people have regarding the quality of college education in America. Now, several new data points should make every parent of college-age kids – or children who will be ready for college soon – take additional notice.

The first interesting news tidbit is that total student debt, which surpassed the country’s credit card debt for the first time in August 2010, now tops $1 trillion. Compare that to student debt being only around $200 billion as late as 2000.

So we’re talking an increase of ~400% in a little over a decade, which is miles more than the inflation rate over this period. Average debt now stands at almost $23,000 per student, which is a spike of ~8% over the past year alone.

And just what are students getting for all the money they’re spending (or borrowing) for their higher education? If you want to know the ugly truth, check out the recently published book Academically Adrift by sociologists Josipa Roksa and Richard Arum [ISBN-13: 978-0226028569 … also available in a Kindle edition].

Based on the information presented in this book, some grads might wish to haul their colleges up on charges of educational malpractice. Full-time instructional faculty has declined from 78% of college teachers in 1970 to only around 50% today.

Roksa and Arum also report that college faculty members spend, on average, just 11 hours per week on instructional preparation and delivery … the rest of their time is spent on research and a slew of administrative activities.

And how about the “quality” of the education that’s being delivered? If we wish to view that in terms of the amount of time students are spending on their studies, the stats aren’t trending in the right direction. The book claims that whereas the typical college student in the early 1960s devoted an average of 40 hours each week to academic work, today’s students now spend only about 27 hours per week on studies. So in what way is the substantial extra money being extracted from students being used to delier a better quality product?

Here’s the next shocker: ~85% of college graduates are moving back home following graduation. This information comes from a 2011 field survey conducted by Philadelphia-based market research firm Twentysomething, Inc. Compared to the firm’s prior surveys, that represents a spike of nearly 20 percentage points in only five years.

Of course, we all know the economy has been a major problem over the past few years, with jobs hard to come by even for seasoned workers. But to learn that fewer than one in six college students are moving out on their own following college graduation means that precious few grads are coming out of school with the ability to land jobs that can sustain an independent lifestyle — however modest.

With stats as dismal as these, is it any wonder why some people are seeking an alternative paradigm for higher education other than the “four years away from home” model? Enrollment figures at America’s community colleges have been skyrocketing. Online education is also booming, despite lingering concerns about learning standards and accreditation.

Some economists such as Richard Vedder are suggesting making radical reforms in the way that financial aid is provided – and to whom – while other observers are pushing for more recognition of learning credentials that take us beyond a BS or BA degree.

Many of these ideas strike at the very heart of what we’ve always been conditioned to believe about a four-year college education as the gateway to a better life. But with today’s reality being so far removed from the theory (fantasy?) … some out-of-the-box ideas and approaches are exactly what are needed now.

Roy Neuberger: Financier and art patron extraordinaire.

When someone lives to the age of 107, that’s news in and of itself.

But when Roy R. Neuberger died at 107 on Christmas Eve Day, he was far more than just a person who had lived an extraordinarily long life. He was one of the most significant figures in 20th Century American finance, along with being an important patron of the arts.

Neuberger’s life story follows the arc of America’s modern history. Born into a family of wealth in Bridgeport, CT in 1903, he was orphaned at an early age. At first Neuberger was interested in a journalism career, but found college studies unfulfilling and dropped out of New York University before earning his degree.

Neuberger’s first job in business was with B. Altmans, a famous New York department store. He would later recall that this experience prepared him not just for a life in business, but also nurtured a lifelong appreciation for art.

Neuberger then took a sabbatical from business in his early 20s to travel to Europe, where he dabbled in painting and lived the life of a Bohemian in Paris along with other American expatriates.

After this wanderlust wore off and he was back in the United States, Neuberger stepped back into the business world by beginning his career on Wall Street – mere months before the stock market crash of 1929. Soldiering on during the years of the Depression, by 1939 he had co-founded Neuberger Berman, an investment firm that would later establish one of the first no-load mutual funds in America (the Guardian Fund – still in operation today).

But Neuberger’s love of art and painting was never far from his mind. In fact, by the early 1940s he was well on his way to becoming one of America’s most important art patrons. Neuberger was an early admirer of the paintings of Peter Hurd, promoting his works and helping to put this artist on the cultural map. It was a pattern that would be repeated over the years, as Neuberger championed the works of such luminaries as Edward Hopper, Milton Avery, Alexander Calder and Jackson Pollock.

Over the decades, not only did Neuberger amass a trove of modern art, he was to become a major benefactor of important works to institutions like the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum and the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), as well as numerous college and university museums. This culminated in the building of the Neuberger Museum of Art on the campus of the State University of New York in Purchase, to house his collection. The museum, designed by architect Philip Johnson, opened in 1974.

On the social scene, Roy Neuberger was a fixture in New York business, political and artistic circles. He was a close personal friend of Gov. and later Vice President Nelson Rockefeller. In later years, after the death of his wife, he was a regular escort of the glamorous singer, actress and fellow art patron Kitty Carlisle Hart – another member of the glitterati who lived a long and celebrated life (96 years).

Throughout his many decades of involvement in the arts scene, Neuberger never severed ties to his business or the world of finance. Indeed, he was a person who seemed genuinely comfortable operating in both realms – two worlds that sometimes do not get along so well.

Neuberger even found time to write his memoirs: So Far, So Good – the First 94 Years was published 13 years before his death … and he penned a second book on art collecting as late as 2003.

Clearly, Roy Neuberger was someone who had a real zest for life and who never stopped growing and learning … which surely makes him an inspiration to many. But if that’s not enough for you, just the fact that he lived to be 107 years old is noteworthy in itself!