Giving College Students Credit

Posted by
Estela Kennen
Dec 20, 2006

There is the right way to go to college – the way that takes into account a student’s educational preparedness, economic situation, and familial obligations. Then there is the measured way. Typically, this means bachelor’s degree completion in 4 years (or, to accommodate the federal financial aid definition of full-time enrollment as 12 credits, an “extended” measure of 6 years). At the institutional level, it also means a linear matriculation at one institution.

This way of measuring collegiate success makes sense for the “traditional” student, the ones who graduate from high school in the spring, enroll in college full-time in the fall, and walk out four years later with bachelor’s degree in hand. The only problem is that the traditional student is a minority today, making up only 27% of the national college population.

As Zachary Karabell writes in What’s College For? for millions of students, “college is a choice…it is not a choice without sacrifice – of time, of pride, and most of all, of money, which means many of these students are working… They juggle family, job, and school…”

Today, the median time from college entrance to Bachelor’s degree completion is 56 months. That time span jumps considerably for students with “nontraditional” traits, which are also considered risk factors for non-completion. Students with two or three factors take a median of 76 months; and highly nontraditional students with four or more traits, 131. Indeed, one in ten Bachelors degree recipients in 2000 completed their degrees 17 or more years after high school graduation. These were not the students that statisticians had in mind when the current measures of graduation rates were developed.

The fact that such few students conform to the traditional model, where higher education can be seen as a sort of entitlement, is not a failure of our society. In fact, to a degree it is indicative of the opposite. Since 1810, the total US population has grown approximately 390%. In that same time span, the college student population has increased by about 3,630%. Post-secondary schools have opened their door to more types of individuals than ever before – including first-generation students, low-income students, and students with remedial education needs.

Policy Recommendations

Clearly, there is a disconnect between the commonly-held perception of how students go through higher education, and the reality. What is needed now is recognition that nonlinear matriculation is a legitimate way of experiencing college and meeting educational objectives. Dr. Estela Lopez, Vice Chancellor of the Connecticut State University System suggests:

Creating new ways of tracking students across institutions, perhaps through state and national databases.
Measuring institutional effectiveness not just by freshmen retention and graduation rates, but also by institutions’ preparation of native students for successful transfer, including basic skills preparation, and/or transfer student retention and graduation
Further collaboration between institutions to ensure that transfer students can receive full credit for previous academic work.
Promoting the use of electronic portfolios to support a more coherent way of recognizing prior academic work.
Especially in the case for older students, offering credit for job experience.
Improving support services such as day care and also provide flexible scheduling, such as evening and weekend programs.
Increasing the robustness of program for transfer students, from orientation to academic advising.
Promoting alternate forms of completing a degree through accelerated programs for high-demand careers such as teaching and nursing.
Reviewing financial aid allocations, which are usually given to native students in most four-year institutions, leaving transfer students with only loans as their sole source of financing their education.

Perhaps the most important thing we can do is acknowledge that “nontraditional” students have now become the norm.