Graduation And The True ROI – Transforming Lives And Communities
Across the country, many students have recently graduated. Parents and extended family gathered on campuses large and small to hear inspiring speeches about how students are 'just beginning' their lives – hence the word 'commencement.' These graduates are entering a workforce undergoing drastic change at a time when the value of a university education is increasingly questioned. In measuring this value, researchers often cite the 'ROI,' or return on investment, which states the benefit purely in economic terms. On those measures, a college education returns multiples of the costs for tuition and fees in the form of increased earnings throughout a career. The Georgetown Center for Education and the Workforce has calculated the ROI for college degrees by looking at median earnings after graduation and subtracting the average net price of attaining a bachelor's degree. From a financial perspective, the ROI at a public institution in 2021 was $174,000 after 10 years and $714,000 after 20 years. Over longer horizons, the return on investment exceeded $1,000,000 in all degree categories.
Higher Education as a Hedge to Financial Uncertainty
Such economic considerations are top of mind for today's graduates, who face a nearly unprecedented level of uncertainty in their future careers. The unemployment rate for recent college graduates is 5.8%, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York's 2025 data. And yet unemployment rates for all young workers are significantly higher than for college graduates, ranging from 6.9% to 10% since 2021. The median salary for high school graduates is only $40,000, according to 2025 data from the National Association of Colleges and Employers, but average salaries for STEM graduates exceed $70,000, and exceed $60,000 for finance and accounting majors.
Graduation Speeches and the Struggle between Ideals and Reality
This year's graduation speeches from a mix of celebrities, politicians, and intellectuals have looked beyond economics to provide inspiration and hope for new graduates. Celebrities included Sara Bareilles at UCLA, and even Kermit the Frog at the University of Maryland. Politicians such as New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern spoke at Yale, while Jerome Powell, Chair of the Federal Reserve, spoke at Princeton.
At Soka University of America (SUA), where I work, 127 students and their families celebrated their graduation at a commencement ceremony featuring actor and humanitarian Orlando Bloom as the keynote speaker. The power of SUA commencement was enhanced by the small and tight-knit community. SUA President Edward Feasel reminded students that they are part of 'the underlying current of history' as they engage in the 'constant struggle between ideals and reality.' Orlando Bloom reflected on his time in Japan when he met SUA's founder Daisaku Ikeda, who told him, 'The playwright August Strindberg wrote: 'The actor must control the role and not let the role control him.'' Ikeda continued, telling Bloom, 'The important thing is to remain true to yourself ... You don't define yourself solely in terms of your profession as an actor, or your work — that world is not enough for you, for you are dedicating your life to others.' This advice, to look beyond professional roles and employment, speaks to the larger value of higher education in a person's life.
ASU and the Starbucks SCAP Partnership
At the nation's largest R1 institution, Arizona State University, with over 180,000 students, 21,000 graduates and their families celebrated the occasion. ASU President Michael Crow noted in his opening that 'we have to take responsibility for the communities that we serve,' emphasizing the roles that universities play in society. The ASU graduation also included smaller ceremonies for the various schools and degree programs, such as the Starbucks graduation ceremony, which arises from a long-term collaboration between Starbucks and ASU for workers seeking college degrees. The Starbucks partnership, known as the Starbucks College Achievement Plan (SCAP), has provided 100% coverage for eligible employees pursuing their first bachelor's degree. Starbucks has found that the SCAP students are retained for 50% longer than non-participants, and are promoted at nearly three times more. Since 2014, SCAP has enabled over 16,000 Starbucks workers to earn ASU diplomas. Over 26,000 employees are currently enrolled, bringing benefits to Starbucks as well as the surrounding communities. At the SCAP ceremony celebrating 1100 new graduates, Crow reminded the audience that 'as a human being, when you have a capacity to learn anything, you will not be left behind' and urged the graduates to 'take your learning and do something with it other than being selfish.' Many SCAP students overcome significant obstacles during their educational journey. Graduates such as Samant Karkar, left college for financial reasons and took a job at Starbucks. She subsequently enrolled in a Health Science program at ASU and plans to work on reducing food insecurity to 'bring food banks and food distribution agencies to communities in need.'
Higher Education and Responsibility to Communities
Another new ASU graduate, Cecilia Alcantar-Chavez, has degrees in mechanical engineering and an international MBA. One of 11 siblings and one of the first in her family to attend college, she grew up on a raisin farm in the central valley of California. She served as student body president of the ASU Polytechnic campus, founded two student clubs, wrote scientific grants for carbon removal technologies, and worked in Washington, D.C. through the Department of Education. She also worked as a teaching assistant for Michael Crow and Professor Derrick Anderson in their innovative co-taught class, 'Science, Technology and Public Affairs.' Students in this course designed and presented ideas for lunar bases, smart cities, ocular implants, coral reef restoration and other projects. Cecilia's life speaks to the power of higher education, and she says that 'it is no coincidence that the U.S. has done so well and has some of the best universities in the world.' She notes that universities are 'profoundly interconnected in so many aspects of our life: health, education, economics, everything.' Alcantar-Chavez's experience enabled her to 'learn and grow' as she explored 'all these different possibilities that you would never have thought of before,' including learning 'responsibility to communities you're part of and also those you don't think you're really a part of, but you are."
Education for Empathy at Soka University of America
At Soka University of America, a liberal arts college in California rooted in the Buddhist values of courage, compassion and community, the emphasis on being part of a global community is central to its mission of fostering global citizens. Class of 2025 graduate Muchindu Mwananyanda, who was born in Lusaka, Zambia, and has lived in Botswana and South Africa, reflected on how being part of SUA's global student community changed his life through deep connections with faculty and staff. After taking an international studies course titled 'Plagues and Peoples' in his second year, Mwananyanda's studies opened him up to a future in health professions. The course introduced him to the ethical dimensions involved in studying and treating diseases around the world. He realized that to prevent an epidemic, it's not only necessary to perform research, but to 'care about the dignity of everyone's life' in order to 'provide aid as soon as possible and save as many lives as you can.' The small seminar format not only taught him about the complexity of the issues, but also where he stood morally and how to empathize with the people who disagreed with him. Mwananyanda is taking his education further with graduate studies in health and international development at the London School of Economics.
These inspirational students demonstrate how, for millions of college graduates, universities provide abundant ROI in multiples of value to the communities that graduates serve. For colleges as large as ASU, with its 180,000 students, and for Soka University of America, with its 476 students, the positive impacts of higher education during this graduation season are being felt around the world. While these can be measured in dollars or numbers, the most significant and deepest impacts on individual lives and entire communities go beyond financial returns and are impossible to quantify.
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