Bennett Leckrone, in a [recent *Chronicle* piece on a qualified backlash against the "return-on-investment" (ROI) analysis of U.S. colleges](https://www.chronicle.com/article/Is-It-Fair-to-Judge-a-College/247955):
> Recent headlines proclaiming the long-term payoff of liberal-arts colleges were greeted enthusiastically by advocates for those institutions, which are often derided as impractical destinations for students concerned with finding jobs and paying off debt after they graduate.
>
> But the analysis prompting the headlines, which was conducted by Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce and calculated the 40-year return on investment for 210 liberal-arts colleges across the country, also cast a harsh light on a subgroup of institutions — those that serve higher numbers of Pell Grant recipients or are located in less-prosperous regions of the country.
The critique spelled out in the [article](https://www.chronicle.com/article/Is-It-Fair-to-Judge-a-College/247955)—that the ROI measure is skewed on the basis of institutional and incoming student wealth—is fair enough. But the real issue is with the underlying premise of "ROI"—of borrowing a business term, unabashedly oriented to profit, to describe the purpose of higher ed.