Debt Profile of a Typical Pace University Student

As in everything in life the typical profile of a hypothetical person can be misleading since it might not describe any one in particular. It is possible that all members of a population are situated either above or below the resulting profile although it is not possible for everyone to be above the profile and obviously it is not possible to have everyone beneath it. Yet this should not be taken to imply that the general profile is not helpful. Our interpretation of the data must be judicious in order to guide policy and in order to be effective. It would be silly to commit the error attributed to a statistician who assumed that since the average depth of  water in a river was 3 feet then it would be safe to walk wade to the opposite bank. Unfortunately he drowned when the water was at a depth of 10 feet in the center of the crossing :-)

Keeping in mind that there are many students who are better off than the profile suggests but others are much worse off the following few data points should prove to be helpful:

The average student debt carried by a Pace graduate (2010).... $38,035.00

Percentage of graduates with debt (2010)..................................69%

The estimated tuition and fees at Pace (2010)...........................$32,816.00

Proportion of Pace graduates in debt (2010)............................51%-75%

Graduation Rate of Pace students (2010).................................51%-75%

Enrollment size at Pace (2010)................................................5001-10,000

Number of Private Institutions in the same size group (2010)...36

Rank of Pace Graduates by debt load (2010).........................3

Note: Once Pace crosses the rank to be included with the private Universities with enrollment above 10,000 then Pace will become only second to NYU in the average load of student debt carried by the average graduate. & out of every 10 graduates at Pace University are in debt. It cannot be much higher than that, can it?

The most common and most widely accepted general rule about the maximum level of student loan debt is that it should never exceed the expected first year earning after graduation. The above data suggest that many at Pace are probably in violation of this yardstick

It is also to be noted that the level of debt carried by the average Pace graduate has increased from $29,622 in 2008 to $34,115 in 2009 to $38,035 in 2010. This rate of increase is neither healthy nor sustainable.