In an essay posted at Minding the Campus, Rich Vedder takes a look at the new book Crossing the Finish Line, which inspired the NYT article I have twice mentioned. He hasn’t read the book (officially released today), and neither have I, but I’m going to review it soon.

Vedder points to a serious problem with the authors’ thesis, namely that America is losing a lot of human capital because of “under-matching” — in which students could attend “better” colleges but for some reason settle for lesser ones.

Here’s what bothers me about that view. The supposedly “better” schools are scarcely better academically than the “lesser” ones. If a student could perhaps have gotten into, e.g., Davidson College but instead goes to UNC-Charlotte, he’ll find the curriculum and coursework pretty much the same. Davidson might be marginally more demanding, but the difference is not likely to matter in the long run. The reason why Davidson is called “better” is that it has a higher U.S. News ranking, and that’s in part because it admits more of the kind of well-prepared and motivated students who pass their courses and earn their degrees. But a student who has that ability and motivation will also graduate from UNCC (and with less expense and debt).

Playing musical chairs with college students, as the authors evidently want to do — ensuring that students go to “the best” schools they can — won’t accomplish much. Vedder explains, “If every highly-qualified low- income student applied to the best university plausible, it would likely impact graduation rates only marginally (partly because the more highly qualified low-income students attend elite schools, the more other students will be forced to attend schools with lower graduation rates given the rigid supply limits at elite schools.)”

It appears to me that Crossing the Finish Line is another of those books that make much ado about nothing in order to justify yet more government intervention. If not, I’ll say so after I’ve read it.