A few weeks ago, listening to NPR on the way into work, I heard a report on the amount of money lost to taxpayers and governments when students drop out of college. I've been searching for that story on NPR but just can't find it. Apparently though, it is based on this report.
http://www.air.org/news/index.cfm?fa=viewContent&content_id=1405
There are two issues that I have with this report. One is a pet peeve of mine and the other is what I think of as some basic economic assumption problems.
First, the pet peeve - it is often reported that only about 50% of students who enter college graduate within 6 years. That statistic always drives me a little crazy. The true reporting should say "about 50% of students graduate from the school in which they start". Most schools do not keep track of transfers, only their entering new student fall cohorts. I attended a retention symposium last year in which Dr. Donald Hossler of the National Student Clearinghouse noted that the true graduation rate is much higher, perhaps over 70%. In retention we should not be asking if a student comes back to our school for their 2nd (and 3rd and 4th) year. We should be asking if they come back to any school.
The other issue - the "lost money in taxes" makes one giant assumption - that there are high paying jobs just waiting for those students when they get out of school. A 9.1% unemployment rate in the country suggests otherwise.
One more thing to think about. I was talking to my brother recently who was thinking about his chosen profession (computer science) and how it has changed since he graduated college back in the early 80s. His lament is that when he was a student, companies cared very much that a prospective employee finished a college degree in computer science. But now, when he looks around the landscape of the profession, he finds that many companies simply don't care about the degree. They care about certification in a specific skill (either a programming language or software package).
I'm not suggesting that college dropouts are not costly to the country on a variety of levels. I am saying that the issue is a bit more complex than the article would have us believe.
Curtis 9-3-11
Just wanted to comment about the graduation statistic. I agree that there is a higher percentage and have seen it in the athletic world. As a former football coach, I have seen many players transfer into my school who many had previously played at multiple colleges. Just to be eligible for athletics participation, a student-athlete needs to submit a transcript from every school he/she was enrolled at. Most athletes usually attended 1-2 colleges prior. Some athletes attended 5-7 colleges. So there's where the reports do not fall in line with tracking students going on to graduate. They simply leave their first school for some reason and finish at another. Majority of transfers to my school graduated.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with you regarding your "pet peeve." This can be an even bigger problem for community colleges which are also feeling the pressure to retain and graduate students, yet have such a diverse student population with diverse academic goals. I know that the CC's in the UH system are starting to attempt to track the academic goals of their students using the myuh portal where students can designate what their academic goals are, and whether they intend to transfer, get their AA, or just take a few classes. If the CC's are able to successfully track this information, instead of measuring success by how many students they graduate, they could measure success based on whether students met their academic goals, whether that was graduation or just taking a class or two to gain another skill.
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