Kansans are more educated than workers across the Midwest and the nation, the U.S. Census Bureau reported today.

In its report, “Educational Attainment in the United States: 2004,” the bureau reported that 89.6 percent of Kansans over age 25 had graduated from high school — and that 30 percent had received a bachelor’s degree.

Nationally, just 85 percent of the population over 25 has a high school degree, the bureau reported. And 28 percent of workers have a college degree. Across the Midwest, the rates were 88.3 percent and 26 percent, respectively.

Reggie Robinson, CEO of the Kansas Board of Regents, said he wasn’t surprised by the findings.

“In my experience, it’s been the conventional wisdom that Kansans access education at higher rates than the national average,” Robinson said. “I think the state has a long history of valuing higher ed.”

The report arrives when the Kansas Legislature is poised to cut higher education funding in order to raise funding for K-12 schools.

“Now is not a time to rest on whatever laurels are represented in those (educational attainment) numbers,” Robinson said.

Education pays. According to the bureau, workers nationwide with a bachelor’s degree earn an average of $51,206 a year, while those with an advanced degree earn an average of $74,602 annually. Workers who have completed high school, meanwhile, earn $27,915 annually.

That gap, Robinson said, may only widen in the future. Kansas’ higher levels of educated workers could be an advantage to the state.

Census report measures earnings potential of college education

“The kind of asset represented by people with knowledge,” Robinson said, “is only going to increase in value in coming years.”