Recently on an email list, someone who holds an MBA and teaches as an adjunct asked whether there would be enough additional teaching opportunities to make it worthwhile to do a doctoral program in business administration, which costs $35,000. That person, and any others interested in doing a doctoral program solely for the possibility of getting into teaching as an adjunct, may want to consider the following:

1. This program costs $35,000. Many doctoral programs cost even more than that, up to twice as much, but well stick with this figure. Remember, however, that whatever the tuition price tag is, thats before all the interest youll pay on your student loans. When years of interest are added, what will the total monetary cost be? According to this online student loan calculator, assuming 6.8% interest and a ten year repayment plan, that just jumped to about fifty grand.  And many people wrap their loans into a longer term consolidation loan to keep their monthly payment manageable, meaning the grand total is even higher.
2. The money you spend to pay off those loans will come from whatever money you have after its taxed, and any additional income you get from teaching more will be taxed. So lop off nearly half of whatever you make teaching when you figure it into your repayment calculations.
3. Getting a doctorate requires not just money, but also tremendous effort. What is the opportunity cost of devoting all your non-job waking hours for four years to a doctoral program?
4. How sure are you to find additional work at the end of this expensive, laborious process? Are you certain that universities will still hire adjuncts the same way for as many years as it takes for you to pay off your loans, much less see any actual positive return? Are you certain they wont offshore some of this instruction, or replace instructors with educational technology, leaving you holding the bag on a big student loan balance?
5. Even if everything goes right, all the teaching you have to do to pay off your student loans is more opportunity cost. So if youve done a doctorate and then taught twenty extra courses, youve probably finally broken even financially, but youre still in the hole for all the years of effort youve devoted to it.

My point is that youre not thinking things through very thoroughly if youre thinking, “It costs 35 grand and teaching pays three grand a course, so everything after twelve courses is profit!” I do believe that there are reasons to consider doing a doctoral program. But going through the expense and inconvenience of doctoral study just to have a better chance to teach additional courses part time? Sorry, but if thats your only expected return, then thats a terrible investment.

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