Higher Education

I recently saw an article ranking each U.S. state on the percentage of residents with BAs. It’s interesting. I grew up in the state ranked 7th, went to college in the state ranked 1st (48.3% of MA residents have a BA!), and currently live in the state ranked 14th. I have a BA, as do many of my friends and family members. To me, college is a rite of passage and I expect that both of my children will go. But it is clear that people in some states (notably West Virginia, which ranked 50th) either have less access to higher education and/or value it differently. And news reports suggest that attitudes toward higher education have begun to sour, even in states such as MA, partly due to the exorbitant cost of a four-year degree and the ensuing student debt, partly due to politics. Each year’s batch of high-school graduates will be smaller now (the so-called “demographic cliff”). And then there’s AI stealing away so many of the jobs to which college grads once aspired. All of this will likely lead to fewer college students, more colleges going out of business, and a less educated populace. I wonder how each state’s BA percentages will change in the coming years.