<p>This is an interesting concept for for-profit colleges, but I’m not so sure about regular, non-profit and state colleges and universities. Also, the examples in this article aren’t that compelling. Coos Bay, Oregon is a fishing based economy and Medford is timber based. They are both several hours from any real metropolitan location. Bend was an up and coming retirement community and is most widely known for rock climbing, skiing and microbrews. It went through a realestate boom and crash, but doesn’t have a solid non- retail/hospitality/service economy. This would be more compelling if they were saying that students in Portland, Salem and Eugene were finding that education didn’t lead to better job prospects.</p>