An Increase of College Drop-Outs in America
Higher Education Losing Students at Higher Rates
Jan 31, 2009
For decades the United States served as the world leader in college education, boasting the highest graduation and retention rates. Since the early 1990s, a growing number of co-eds began dropping out, with that number rising in the past few years.
Ironically, at the same time, universities have been flooded with record numbers of students, perhaps explaining why more are calling it quits before they earn a degree.
Results of studies vary from case to case. On average, it would seem that only about one in three students finishes their degree within five years. Most four-year institutions in the U.S. have shied away from advertising low retention rates.
Pattern Studies and Efforts to Combat Attrition
Louisiana State University held symposiums in 2003 to target problems that face students and might cause them to leave without graduating. According to Benjamin Leger's 10 Februaruy 2003 article, "Officials plan to improve student retention," which appeared in The Revielle. Symposium participants concluded that getting students more involved with school activities early on might be an important step in keeping them. They found that students who were not involved on campus were more likely to drop.
At San Diego State University, Executive Director of Enrollment Sandra Cook said a panel of 100 students and staff members found the leading cause for dropping is a lack of feeling welcomed on campus, as quoted in a 14 November 2002 Daily Aztec article by Abra Degeare.
Peter Zetterberg, director of research at University of Minnesota, helped compile a massive report to try to understand the drop in retention and graduation rates. "Probably about 45 percent of students who begin on [our] campus do not finish on [this] campus. Some drop out of school entirely, some transfer elsewhere, and some may come back 10 years from now," he was quoted as saying by journalist Anne Preller in a 2001 Minnesota Daily article.
Utah State University's coordinator of university assessment Grayson Osbourne said "Marital status, finance, and the relation between ACT scores, high school GPA and first semester GPA at college were all lead factors that contribute to a student's inability to return to the university," as quoted in a 17 October 2007 Utah Statesman article by Nicole R. Grubbs.
One factor that seems to be universal is the high drop rate among athletes. As a social group, the students involved in major athletics programs have some of the worst graduation rates in the country. Ironically, the more successful a sports program is at a school, the worse the rates, according to the 2002 NCAA graduation rates report. Schools like Arizona and Maryland, both with a 14 percent grad rate, or Oklahoma, that failed to graduate a single basketball player within five years.
While it is unlikely that a one-size-fits-all solution is on the horizon, the issue is under further study and analysis by the academic world.
