Higher Education’s ROI Challenge: Proving Value Before Graduation
A prospective student wants to know whether a degree will lead somewhere. An employer wants to know whether a graduate can contribute. A university leader needs a credible answer to both, while balancing enrollment goals, limited staff capacity, and growing scrutiny of program outcomes.
That answer becomes stronger when an institution can show what students actually do: the problems they solve, the organizations they work with, the feedback they receive, and the opportunities those experiences create.
As higher education faces new earnings accountability requirements, the strategic opportunity is to make career preparation more visible and more consistent throughout the student journey.
Proving the value of a degree starts with the experiences students have before graduation.
Why the pressure to demonstrate value is growing
The transition from college to career remains difficult. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York reported roughly 5.6% unemployment and 42% underemployment among recent college graduates in the second quarter of 2026. Underemployment means working in a role that typically does not require a degree. These figures make the path from learning to employment a pressing institutional concern.
Employer expectations are also becoming more concrete. In NACE’s 2026 spring survey, 59% of responding employers preferred résumés that included specific skills supported by examples. More than half reported assigning interns projects that use AI tools and skills.
For institutions, the implication is practical: students need opportunities to exercise judgment, collaborate, use technology responsibly, and explain their contribution to real work.
Federal policy adds another source of urgency. The Department of Education’s new Student Tuition and Transparency System, or STATS, expands earnings accountability across nearly all programs and sectors. Covered programs that fail the earnings standard in two of three consecutive award years face losing access to federal Direct Loans. Federal Student Aid’s implementation guidance places the new framework’s effective date in 2027.
Together, these pressures make career readiness an issue for institutional leadership, academic programs, employer engagement, and enrollment strategy.
An earnings report cannot tell the whole story
Earnings data can reveal where a program needs attention. It arrives after many of the decisions that shaped a graduate’s prospects have already been made.
By then, the institution may have missed opportunities to connect a student with a mentor, strengthen a project, provide useful feedback, or help them turn coursework into a compelling interview example.
Earnings also reflect a graduate’s field, location, economic conditions, and personal choices. Institutions need a fuller picture to decide where they can make a difference.
Consider a dean reviewing a program with disappointing career outcomes. Knowing which students completed meaningful work with Industry Partners, who received feedback, and who graduated without either gives that dean concrete places to act.
Experience accountability: five questions leaders should be able to answer
Experience accountability means taking responsibility for the access, quality, and usefulness of the experiences that prepare students for what comes next.
It turns a broad promise of career readiness into five practical questions:
- What opportunities are available? Identify the projects, capstones, competitions, mentoring, internships, and co-ops students can access. Check whether there is enough capacity to reach the intended student population.
- Who actually participates? Look at when students participate and what might prevent access, including unpaid work, scheduling, transportation, or reliance on personal networks. Preserve differences in duration and responsibility when comparing experiences.
- What can students show? Capture useful work, such as a market analysis, prototype, policy brief, or business recommendation. Make each student’s contribution clear, with appropriate permission for anything shared publicly.
- Who can speak to their performance? Build in feedback from an Industry Partner, mentor, or supervisor. Specific observations about communication, problem-solving, and follow-through help students understand and demonstrate their strengths.
- What happens next? Follow the progression into another experience, a professional relationship, an interview, employment, further study, or a clearer career direction. Valuable progress takes several forms.
These questions give leaders information they can use while students are still enrolled. They also help identify promising approaches without assuming that one project caused a particular salary or job outcome.
Build career experience into the academic journey
An internship is a valuable pathway, but institutions need several ways for students to practice professional skills. Course-based experiences can expand access for students balancing work, family, and academic commitments.
A business course might use a live company project to evaluate a new market. A public policy team might help a nonprofit assess community needs. An engineering capstone might develop and test a prototype. A live case competition can introduce an employer’s challenge within a shorter timeframe.
The design should fit the learning goals and the partner’s capacity. A short challenge can build confidence and introduce a field; a longer engagement can develop deeper technical skills and professional relationships.
Established programs illustrate the possibilities. BYU’s Engineering Capstone brings students together with industry, government, and entrepreneurial sponsors to produce prototypes, feasibility studies, and system designs, with faculty coaching.
At Notre Dame’s ESTEEM program, students develop technology commercialization plans with support from sponsors, faculty, program staff, and commercial advisers.
Both models make applied work central to the educational experience. Institutions can begin with a single course or program and build from there.
Make the partnership valuable for employers, too
A sustainable university partnership needs a clear reason for an employer to return.
That reason might be customer research, a fresh perspective on an operational challenge, an early prototype, or a chance to get to know emerging talent through working together.
The invitation should be specific: bring a suitable challenge, agree on realistic deliverables, designate a contact, and provide feedback at planned milestones. Clear expectations help partners judge whether the commitment fits their needs.
Industry-sponsored projects can also create a funding pathway for applied learning. The scope and support should protect the educational purpose while giving the sponsor a meaningful role.
Over time, repeat collaboration can support experiential hiring: employers learn how students think and contribute, while students learn about the organization and its work. The relationship has room to develop before a hiring decision.
Give faculty and staff a repeatable way to deliver
Expanding experiential learning requires coordination. Someone must source partners, define the work, prepare students, manage timelines, collect feedback, and keep the relationship moving.
When that work depends on separate inboxes and spreadsheets, expanding a successful program can mean expanding the administrative burden. Institutions also struggle to see which partners are engaged and which students still need an opportunity.
CapSource provides experiential learning infrastructure that brings these activities into a shared environment. Faculty and program teams can organize partner opportunities, student teams, milestones, deliverables, and feedback, with reporting that helps communicate participation and results.
For educators and program leaders, that means a repeatable process for delivering experiences and a clearer view of what is happening across them.
This is the foundation of an Experiential Institution: applied learning and employer engagement become coordinated parts of the academic journey, supported by shared practices and systems.
Turn stronger experiences into a stronger value story
For enrollment teams, documented experiences create something specific to discuss with prospective students: the work they can expect to do, the support they will receive, and the capabilities they can develop.
For deans and program leaders, participation and feedback reveal where to strengthen the curriculum or expand access. For advancement and partnership teams, completed work and returning sponsors create a more tangible basis for future conversations.
That value story is most credible when it reflects the experience students can reliably access. A standout success becomes more useful when leaders understand how to make the opportunity available to the next cohort.
Start with one program and one visible improvement
Choose a program where career outcomes matter to enrollment, employer relationships need attention, or access to practical experience is uneven. Bring together the academic lead, career services, and the people responsible for Industry Partnerships.
Use the five questions to identify the most immediate gap. Then build the next academic cycle around a manageable improvement: one embedded project, a clearer feedback process, or a stronger way for students to explain their work.
Review who participated, what they produced, what partners observed, and what followed. Use those findings to improve the next cycle and decide what to expand.
The strongest case for a degree’s value is built through experiences that help students move forward, with evidence that makes that progress visible.
CapSource helps institutions create, coordinate, and scale those experiences. Schedule a conversation to explore how your institution can strengthen career readiness, engage Industry Partners, and make the value of applied learning easier to demonstrate.