Let me tell you about an idea that stopped me in my tracks this week. A startup called Greenway Institute is proposing a college with no dining halls, no sports teams, no Greek life, no climbing walls — just classrooms, dorms, and an education, for $25,000 a year. Students spend two years studying on campus, then two years working jobs paying around $50,000 with faculty support, and graduate with little to no debt.
It sounds almost quaint. But the numbers behind it describe a crisis — and whether or not Greenway succeeds, the math is worth understanding, because it affects millions of families.
The crisis in plain numbers
Here are the figures The Hustle laid out this week, and each one deserves a moment:
- The average cost of college is now roughly $38,000 a year — and $65,500 for private universities, per the College Board.
- The average federal student loan debt per borrower sits around $40,500.
- More than 150 colleges have shuttered or merged since 2016.
- College enrollments are expected to fall 13% by 2041.
Read those together and a picture emerges: prices rising, debt loads heavy, institutions themselves collapsing under the weight of the model, and fewer students coming to sustain it. This isn’t a blip. It’s a system straining at every joint.
Why college got so expensive
The standard explanation — and it’s largely true — is the amenities arms race. Over the past thirty years, colleges competed for students not primarily on educational quality but on experience: luxury dorms, recreation centers, gourmet dining, sprawling athletics. Each addition raised tuition; each tuition increase funded the next addition. Administrative staffs grew. The actual cost of instruction — professors teaching students — became a shrinking share of what families pay.
Greenway’s provocation is to ask: what if you just… didn’t? No dining hall (students cook or eat simply), no sports, no frills — tuition of $25,000 versus a $38,000 average. That’s a $52,000 saving over four years before you even count the working years.
The working-years twist
The most interesting part of the model isn’t the stripped-down campus — it’s years three and four. Students take jobs paying about $50,000, with faculty support continuing. Two years at $50,000 is $100,000 in earnings against $50,000 in remaining tuition. Do the full arithmetic: $100,000 in tuition over four years, minus up to $100,000 in earnings, and the net cost approaches zero. Compare that to the average borrower leaving with $40,500 in federal debt — debt that, at typical rates, costs far more than $40,500 by the time it’s repaid.
Now, honesty requires caveats. Greenway plans its first campus in Vermont next fall, focused on engineering — a field where $50,000 student jobs are plausible. The model is unproven at scale; the founders aim for 10–20 campuses and 10,000+ students a year eventually, but “eventually” is doing heavy lifting. And there’s a real question about what students lose without the full college experience — networks, exploration, the unplanned collisions that shape lives.
But as a thought experiment about costs, it’s devastatingly effective. It forces the question: how much of what you’re paying for is education, and how much is everything else?
How to think about college ROI — Greenway or not
Whether this startup succeeds or not, here’s the framework I’d hand any family:
1. Think in net price, not sticker price. The $65,500 private-university sticker is not what most families pay — financial aid changes everything. But neither is it meaningless; it’s the starting point of negotiation. Always run the net-price calculator before falling in love with a school.
2. Debt is a claim on your future self. That $40,500 average debt, at 6–7% interest over ten years, means roughly $470–$490 a month — every month, for a decade, regardless of whether the job market cooperates. Before signing, ask: what will this payment feel like on the starting salary of the career I’m pursuing? A useful guardrail: keep total borrowing below your expected first-year salary.
3. Earnings during school are underrated. Greenway’s insight — that students can earn real money while learning — doesn’t require a startup. Co-op programs, paid internships, and part-time work in your field can meaningfully dent the bill at a traditional school too. Every $10,000 earned is $10,000-plus-interest not borrowed.
4. The closure wave is information. Those 150+ shuttered or merged colleges since 2016 are telling you something: the market is already voting. Before committing four years and six figures, check a school’s enrollment trends and financial health. A college in decline can cut programs, raise fees, or close — leaving students stranded mid-degree.
5. Consider the whole menu. Community college transfers, in-state public universities, accelerated three-year degrees, employer tuition programs, and yes, experimental models like Greenway’s — the “dream school or nothing” framing is the most expensive mindset in higher education.
The hopeful part
Here’s what I love about this story: it’s young founders looking at a broken, beloved institution and asking “what if?” instead of just complaining. The 13% enrollment decline projected by 2041 isn’t just a threat — it’s an invitation. The colleges that thrive will be the ones that deliver value honestly, and experiments like Greenway push the whole system to justify its prices.
College is still, for most people, one of the best investments available — lifetime earnings premiums are real and large. But “worth it on average” is cold comfort if your debt is above average and your salary is below it. Do the math for your life, not the brochure’s. The numbers will tell you the truth if you let them.
Deo Salvator’s note: this column is for understanding, not advice. Education decisions deserve conversations with counselors, aid officers, and people who know your field — not just a columnist on a Saturday morning.
