An “On the Issues” Post from the Campaign for the Future of Higher Education [http://futureofhighered.org]

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As happens too often in higher education these days, the recent push to increase college completion rates shows how laudable goals can become problematic when pursued in narrow, rigid ways.  Who wouldn’t want to increase the numbers of college graduates?  The goal is certainly a no-brainer.

However, a report to be released next month by the National Student Research Clearinghouse Center showing unchanged college completion rates over the last year could encourage a policy push in the wrong direction.

As the report shows, some groups—working students, parents, and other students who (for any number of legitimate reasons) can only attend college part-time– have a harder time graduating in the “magical” 6 years defined as “successful completion.”  That, too, is a no-brainer.

The 6-year standard for “successful college completion” will not work for all students, especially those with family and work obligations.  Policy initiatives to “incentivize” 6-year graduation could just mean even more obstacles to graduation—and less success—for some students if they are pushed into taking more courses than they can handle successfully.

Such unintended consequences can be avoided if we keep focused on the real goal of providing more students with high-quality higher education and if we temper our urges for simplistic, one-dimensional measures of our progress toward that goal.

For more information, see http://chronicle.com/article/College-Completion-Rates/143191/?cid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en.

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Previous “On the Issues” Posts are available at the CFHE website or here:

“MOOCs, Pearson, and Profits”: https://academeblog.org/2013/05/01/moocs-pearson-and-profits/

“The Cold Facts about Higher Education and Contingent Faculty Appointments”: https://academeblog.org/2013/05/07/the-cold-facts-about-higher-education-and-contingent-faculty-appointments/

“More Bad Ideas on Higher Education from Florida”: https://academeblog.org/2013/05/09/more-bad-ideas-on-higher-education-from-florida/

“Who Needs a Liberal Education These Days?”: https://academeblog.org/2013/05/10/who-needs-a-liberal-education-these-days/

“Who Says College Can’t Be Free?”: https://academeblog.org/2013/06/07/who-says-college-cant-be-free/

“MOOCs: Are They about Access or Money?”: https://academeblog.org/2013/06/08/moocs-are-they-about-access-or-money/

“Adjunct Faculty Need Far Treatment in the Implementation of the New Healthcare Law”:  https://academeblog.org/2013/06/28/adjunct-faculty-need-fair-treatment-in-implementation-of-the-new-federal-healthcare-law/

“The ‘Business Model’ for Higher Education”: https://academeblog.org/2013/07/01/the-business-model-for-higher-education/

“Udacity/San Jose State MOOC Experiment Fails”: https://academeblog.org/2013/08/27/udacitysan-jose-state-university-mooc-experiment-fails/

“Big $$$ Foundations Are Driving the Policy Train”: https://academeblog.org/2013/08/28/big-foundations-are-driving-the-policy-train/

“American Higher Education: Separate and Unequal?”: “Pay It Forward”: https://academeblog.org/2013/10/25/on-the-issues-pay-it-forward/

“The End of History?”: https://academeblog.org/2013/12/12/on-the-issues-the-end-of-history/

Other posts related to the CFHE are available here:

https://academeblog.org/?s=CFHE&submit=Search