Student Success Charts

A quiet month of uncomfortable data

Author

Glenda Morgan
February 26, 2026

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This is the second in my monthly (roughly) Student Success Charts posts where I share charts and graphics that have caught my eye in the past month.

Unsurprisingly, the charts this month are not cheerful. They tell a story about labor markets tightening unevenly, degrees decoupling from earnings, platforms drifting away from universities, and systems aging in place. I’m not going to over-interpret them. But I can’t stop thinking about them.

Returns, Risks, and Relative Decline

A striking John Burn-Murdoch chart showed that the UK is one of the rare cases where the earnings premium has declined as higher education has expanded.

Chart showing the decline in the graduate earnings premium in the UK over time relative to the number of graduates and compared to other countries

Oversupply? Or economic under-performance in creating high-paying jobs?

Either way, the relationship between participation and payoff is not automatic.

The Economic Policy Institute showed employment losses for under-represented groups.

Chart showing that black womens employment dropped sharply in 2025

Black women with bachelor’s degrees were especially hard hit.

Chart showing that black women with bachelors degrees suffered the greatest employment losses relative to other education levels

The EPI ties this directly to federal layoffs — a sector where Black workers are disproportionately represented among degree holders.

Even a degree does not fully insulate against sectoral shocks.

And the US is falling further behind China in terms of first science and engineering degrees awarded.

Chart showing the growth in first degrees in science and engineering in the US lags behind China

Expansion at home. Acceleration elsewhere.

Quiet Realignments

In 2025, 84% of new Coursera courses came from non-university providers.

Image showing that in 2025 84% of the new courses on Coursera were from non-university partners

That is not a rounding error. That is a platform redefining its center of gravity.

Universities built the early MOOC ecosystem, but they are no longer the dominant suppliers inside it.

Meanwhile, the K–12 teacher workforce continues to age.

The bulge has moved steadily to the right. Fewer early-career teachers, more late-career teachers.

Pipelines tighten and replacement gets harder.

And Britain has become markedly less attractive to educated young movers.

Chart showing the UK has slipped from 2nd to 6th in terms of attractiveness to high qualified immigrants

Relative positions may shift again, but for now, the direction is clear.

Institutions age.
Platforms pivot.
Talent flows elsewhere.

Ideas That Refuse to Die

Why do weak ideas persist?

Image of a pyramid showing that stickiness, the socially reaffirming nature of some bad ideas and institutional convenience mean that bad ideas stick around even though they shouldnt

Source: Dave M

Because they are psychologically sticky, socially reassuring, and institutionally convenient.

Data alone rarely defeats incentives.

I had forgotten about the Spurious Correlations site. There are quite a few education-related spurious correlations.

Chart showing a spurious relationship between the growth in the number of music and dance degrees with the growth of solar power in Costa Rica

Correlation is cheap. Causation is expensive. And education debates are not immune.

From the Awful Chart Collection (ACC)

And then there are charts that simply defy comprehension.

Chart showing prices received for cattle, I think

Not all data clarifies. Some of it obscures.

Parting Thought

More next month.

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