Only 1/3 or Higher Ed students who return complete within 6 years

Among students who dropped out of college for a year or more and then re-entered, about a third earned a degree within eight years, a new study shows.

Findings are based on data from the National Student Clearinghouse for a cohort of 4.5 million students who returned to college between Aug. 15, 2005 and Aug. 14, 2008 after at least one year away from higher education. Among that group, 33.7 percent graduated by Aug. 14, 2014.
Among students who never left school, 54.1 percent who started in fall 2006 earned a degree within six years, Clearinghouse data also show.

Returning students at four-year private institutions fared best; 52.5 percent graduated, compared with 44.1 percent at four-year publics. Just 27 percent graduated from two-year public colleges. But all groups lagged far behind students who never left their studies. Their completion rates were 26 percent higher at two-year public colleges and 27 percent higher at four-year publics and privates.
The smallest gap is at four-year for-profits, where 37.1 percent of non-first-time students graduated, compared with 42.7 percent of first-timers.

The study, an ongoing joint project of several education groups, helps fill a void in federal data, which counts graduation rates only for full-time, first-time entering freshmen.  Participating in the study were: InsideTrack, the American Council on Education, NASPA: Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education, the University Professional and Continuing Education Association, and the National Student Clearinghouse.

Some states — Texas, New York and Florida — have been better about getting returning students to graduation, the report says. But states like California and the District of Columbia are lagging, either not graduating or serving enough non-first-timers.


“One thing is certain,” InsideTrack Vice President of Marketing Dave Jarrat said in a statement. “If our nation expects the more than 30 million adults with some college but no degree to complete a credential, we need to do a much better job supporting them once they’ve made the decision to re-enroll.”