Long Island college presidents make case for value of undergraduate degrees, despite the cost

With a $1.7 trillion student debt crisis and the threat of job losses due to artificial intelligence looming, the presidents of four Long Island colleges on Tuesday acknowledged the increasingly "negative" reputation of college while making a case for the value of postsecondary education.

An undergraduate degree "is going to generate a million, a million and a half" dollars in increased lifetime earnings, "and a lot more opportunities," Robert Prezant, president of Farmingdale State College, said at a panel discussion at the college. He was joined at the talk by Andrea Goldsmith, president of Stony Brook University; Timothy Sams, president of SUNY Old Westbury; and Jerry Balentine, president of New York Institute of Technology.

All four college presidents said their educations changed their lives for the better, not just financially but by preparing them for meaningful careers.

"My grandparents, who raised me, their highest educational attainment was seventh grade and 10th grade, my grandfather was a mechanic, my grandmother was a teacher’s aide," said Sams, who grew up in a disadvantaged section of Syracuse. But, he said, "it was told to me every day that I was ‘Dr. Sams in the making,’ every day."

Goldsmith, a former dean of engineering and applied science at Princeton University who became Stony Brook’s seventh president in August, said she had turned down lucrative opportunities at tech companies in favor of academia. Students "inspire me so much, every single interaction I have with students makes me believe in the future," she said.

Even so, moderator Kara Cannon, executive director of the Tesla Science Center at Wardenclyffe, said, "There is a general negative perception that I don't think we've seen in a very long time."

Students taking on college costs, Balentine said, "invest probably more money than any other time in their life, except when they buy a house on Long Island."

He said 95% of NYIT graduates were either working or in graduate school within six months of earning their undergraduate degree. "That has to be our goal," he said.

The discussion came as college leaders face increasingly pointed questions about whether it makes financial sense for families to take on student debt as workforces undergo dramatic changes due to AI and other forces. Many professional jobs — particularly entry-level positions — are being transformed or even eliminated.

Goldsmith noted that SUNY four-year colleges charge about $7,000 a year in tuition, making it possible for students to graduate without high amounts of debt. "That is a story that public universities can and should tell, and we need to tell better," she said. 

Prezant’s comment about lifetime earnings echoed research by the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce, which found that bachelor’s degree holders earn a median $2.8 million over their careers, compared with $1.8 million for high school graduates.

 But the jump in earnings can’t be the only consideration, Prezant told the audience of students, staff and faculty: "Follow your passion. ... It's got to be important work."

Balentine said careers not requiring college degrees were "a valid alternative," He added: "I can get an English professor to my house faster than a plumber, right? And I can guarantee you the plumber makes more money." 

Colleges also are coping with threats of federal funding cuts and lower numbers of college-age students due to the drop in birth rates after the 2008 financial crisis.

"We're facing times of tremendous disruption in higher education" and in technology, Goldsmith said. "It's on us to figure out, how do we take this moment of disruption and use it for opportunity?"

By Maura McDermott

maura.mcdermott@newsday.commauramcdermott

Maura McDermott covers education. Since joining Newsday in 2012, she also has worked on the investigations team and covered real estate and the business of health care.