LANCE LAMBERT: Today we are talking with Senator Ron Wyden, a Democrat from Oregon. Thanks for taking the time to chat with us.
SEN. RON WYDEN: Thanks for having me.
LANCE LAMBERT: And I’m aware that you’re running on very little sleep.
SEN. RON WYDEN: Well, this is good to get together with you.
LANCE LAMBERT: So recently The Chronicle ran a story highlighting some of the flaws with states’ data systems — systems that measure recent graduates’ earning outcomes. The federal government in banned from having a system like that. However, a bill you’re planning to reintroduce, the Student Right to Know Before You Go Act, would scratch that ban and address some of those flaws. What are you trying to achieve?
SEN. RON WYDEN: What’s important to understand is I think we have an opportunity for what literally is a revolution in terms of federal higher-education policy. Historically, federal higher-ed policy has been about access. It’s been about getting students into the door. And I don’t take a backseat to anybody in terms of that. And we saw it again last night with the Franken Amendment with respect to Pell Grants and making sure that there is that network of programs and grants and assistance so that students can get in the door. Federal education policy has historically been about that, and, in effect, it’s an effort to ensure access.
In the days ahead, I think we’re going to have to go further than that. I think we’re going to have to combine a fresh strategy, which ensures that not only do we zero in on access, as the Senate did last night, but we are going to have to come up with new measures to make sure that students can wring more value out of these enormous sums that they spend on their education.
I have a program in the high schools called “Listening to Oregon’s Future.” And I always give the students a chance to ask questions early on. And they’ve already picked up on what the bottom line is here. The fact is, for a student, the second biggest expenditure — essentially, after their house — in their lifetime is going to be their education. And they’re going to want to get more value out of it. And the point of our bipartisan bill is to ensure that they have the tools to do it.
LANCE LAMBERT: And so what information do you want to make available for students?
SEN. RON WYDEN: The information that we make available — and by the way, Senators Alexander and Murray, the chair and the ranking minority member on the education committee, have apparently been looking at ideas that are fairly similar to the bill that Senator Rubio and I have — is to make sure that students can get information about matters like graduation rates and debt levels and remedial education. And, most importantly, what they would be likely to earn if they got a degree from a particular school.
And all of this does, in effect, two things. No. 1, it empowers the student and the students’ parents in order to be able to make the soundest possible choices. In other words, right now they’re sort of in the dark. There’s no Carfax for education. I mean, they’re sort of in the dark with respect to some of this information.
And second, I personally believe that higher ed, to a great extent, has been impervious to efforts to hold down costs because there really haven’t been any realistic kind of mechanisms to hold down cost and ensure students get value. This begins, in effect, to lay out a strategy to do that. If you have School A over here, with a great record of graduation rates, low debt levels, students doing very well financially when they get their degrees, and then School B over here, in effect being exactly the opposite — low graduation rates, high debt levels, lot of remedial education — School B either cleans up its act or it goes out of business.
And School A is in a position to, in effect, get the students who would otherwise go to School B, and School A, in effect, is king of the hill in that particular market until somebody comes along and says, Hey, I saw what School A is up to. I’m going to beat them. So I’m not going to say this is some sort of elixir for holding down costs, a magical kind of strategy. But it is a realistic way to start introducing value into the equation for students and holding down cost.
LANCE LAMBERT: The federal government’s already spent more than $700 million on state systems. Would that have been to waste if the federal government were to build its own?
SEN. RON WYDEN: Well, first of all, nothing that Senator Rubio and I envision is going to harm these state efforts. The reality is that the state systems don’t pick up a lot of people — military, self-employed, federal employees would just be some examples — but also in a mobile society, you’ve got students going to a variety of different kinds of programs. And the federal government is ideally the one positioned to be able to herd on something that involves moving from state to state to state.
And to a great extent, you see that in a whole host of issues that are important for students. One of the key components of the Affordable Care Act — it was part of my bipartisan health-reform bill, seven Democrats and seven Republicans — is it’s clear students want more portable services. They want reflecting their mobility and the fact they may be working and going to school. They want to be able to quickly and conveniently move from place to place to place. And the state systems, to a great extent, are confined, A, to the data within that state, and then, of course, there are some notable exceptions, as I mentioned.
LANCE LAMBERT: Your undergraduate degree is in political science. At Ohio State, the typical political-science grad earns a little over $29,000 their first year out of college. If you would have known that information when you were going to college, would you have maybe changed your degree?
SEN. RON WYDEN: Well, I’m probably not the best exception because what I wanted to do when I started college and I was a senior was I wanted to play in the NBA. And that was really all that I cared about it. It was really a ridiculous theory because I was too small and I made up for it by being slow. So I got a college scholarship. And when it was clear I wasn’t going to play in the NBA, I transferred.
And what I would tell you is that what you’re likely to earn is not going to once again be the determinative factor in your education or anything else at that point. It is one measure that I think students want. And I’ve had a lot of community meetings with students, and that’s what they say. And it is particularly relevant in terms of them being able to make decisions — the best decisions for themselves at various times in their career.
For example, if they see, for example, that they can get a degree in engineering or nanoscience or something — for example, in my state where students do very well financially — they may decide they want to take on more debt at that time because their initial earnings can be greater.
But what we are still in the process of doing — and we’ve done this in consultation with universities, with student groups, and the like — is we’re going to probably look on the earnings side at several different measures. In other words, you might see a couple of years, then you might see five years, then you might see a longer term. Because I don’t want people to walk away and say that a couple of United States senators, one Democrat and one Republican, are saying the only thing that is relevant for purposes of education are these judgments about what you earn.
LANCE LAMBERT: In Florida they’re using this data to cut degree programs. Do you agree with those merits?
SEN. RON WYDEN: No, but I’m also very much aware of kind of federalism — that there’s a role for states and there’s a role for the federal government. And I’m going to make sure that Oregon doesn’t do anything like that.
LANCE LAMBERT: What’s the appetite on Capitol Hill for this bill, and do you see it moving this year?
SEN. RON WYDEN: Well, I’m very hopeful. I think in Chairman Alexander and in Senator Murray we’ve got two proven talents — people who don’t just give speeches and wave their arms around, but people who are veteran legislators. And I think they’re very serious about higher ed. And as I indicated earlier on the the program here, what they’re talking about is really quite similar to what Senator Rubio and I are talking about.
LANCE LAMBERT: And thank you for taking the time to chat with us.
SEN. RON WYDEN: Great. Let’s do it again.
Video produced by Carmen Mendoza and Julia Schmalz.