Missing the Point… Professional or Not, We Need to Talk About the Cost of Higher Education
We are spending far too much time arguing about labels and not nearly enough time confronting the real problem.
The debate around what qualifies as a professional degree has quickly become the headline. Which programs count. Which ones do not. Who gets access to certain funding mechanisms and who does not. That conversation may feel important, but it is distracting us from the core issue that should unite everyone involved.
The cost of education is simply too high.
An in-state student at a public institution should not graduate with one hundred thousand dollars of debt. Full stop. That reality should be unacceptable regardless of major, profession, or eventual career path. When we reach a point where that level of debt is normalized, we have lost sight of the purpose of public higher education.
There are many opinions about why costs have risen so dramatically. Some point to administrative growth. Others focus on facilities, compliance, technology, or reduced state support. All of those arguments matter, and reasonable people can disagree on which factors carry the most weight. But the debate over cause cannot become an excuse for inaction on outcomes.
Debt at that level changes lives. It delays home ownership. It alters career decisions. It limits geographic mobility. It narrows opportunity for students who already face economic barriers. When access to a public education comes with a six-figure price tag, access is no longer truly public.
This is where choice matters.
If a family decides to send their child to a private institution, that is a choice. If a student chooses to attend an out of state university with significantly higher tuition, that is also a choice. Those decisions may be thoughtful, values driven, and entirely valid. But they are fundamentally different from the expectation that a public in state option should be financially attainable.
As a father of two children currently in later elementary school, this issue is no longer abstract to me. Like most parents, I want to help my children pursue education without starting adulthood buried under debt. I understand that college costs money. I understand that there are trade offs.
But I also believe that public systems exist to serve the broader good, not to pass unsustainable costs onto the next generation.
We cannot allow the conversation about what is or is not professional to get in the way of addressing affordability. Labels do not pay tuition bills. Definitions do not reduce debt. Structural cost reform does.
If we are serious about strengthening the workforce, expanding opportunity, and honoring the promise of public higher education, then we need to refocus the conversation. Fixing the cost of in state public education is not a partisan issue or a semantic one. It is a responsibility.
And it is overdue.
