Chris Paul will make $13,520,500 next year as the New Orleans Hornets starting point guard. He finished fifth in the MVP voting last year. Kevin Durant will earn $4,796,880 as the starting small forward for the Oklahoma City Thunder (formerly known as the Seattle SuperSonics). At the end of the 2009 season, he shared the starting line
up with Russell Westbrook ($3,755,640 in 2009-10) and Jeff Green ($3,516,960). Besides being insanely talented athletes, what do these four have in common? They all went back to school this summer, capitalizing on the NBA’s $15,000 education reimbursement, to work on finishing their degrees at Wake Forest, Texas, UCLA, and Georgetown, respectively.
It’s a nice story and a good lesson for the kids, but it’s also about economics. 60 percent of NBA players are broke within five years of leaving the league. With a diploma, they at least have something to fall back on.
Lowering Student Loan Default Rates: What One Consortium of Historically Black Institutions Did to Succeed 
College and Career-Ready: Using Outcomes Data to Hold High Schools Accountable for Student Success
03/11/10 | Kevin Carey is quoted on the rising costs of education in The Economist.
03/10/10 | Chad Aldeman's False Fronts paper is quoted on Accuracy in Academia.
03/09/10 | Ben Miller is quoted on Federal Family Education Loan defaults on The Huffington Post.
03/09/10 | Ben Miller is quoted on loan origination on the Firedog Lake blog.
03/07/10 | Kevin Carey calls for a Race to the Top in higher education in a column in The Chronicle of Higher Education.
$15,000 education reimbursement? Are you kidding?? That’s less than the fine for cursing out a referee! These players need a lot more money than that to go back to school. Do you know what a Georgetown credit costs these days???
[...] And four NBA players didn’t attend summer school to teach kids a good lesson, they’ll need the degree. Filed under: Newsroom Print Share Posted at 8:35 pm [...]