Among the 6 reasons you may not graduate on time: You’re not taking enough credits, writes Meredith Kolodner in the New York Times.
“Most colleges define a full-time course load as 12 credits a semester, which is, not coincidentally, the ceiling for receiving the maximum Pell grant and most state financial aid,” she writes. But it usually takes 120 credits to graduate, which means earning 15 credits a semester, 30 credits a year, for four years.
Only 40 percent of full-time students at four-year, flagship institutions complete a bachelor’s degree in four years, reports Complete College America. The four-year graduation rate drops to 20 percent at four-year, non-flagship institutions. Again, we’re talking about full-time students. At two-year colleges, only 5 percent of full-time students graduate in two years.
The “15 to Finish” campaign, which has boosted graduation rates at the University of Hawaii, is spreading to other states.
