Students from immigrant backgrounds make up a larger share of U.S. college students than they did two decades ago.
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Over 36 million Americans have earned some college credits but have yet to complete a credential, demonstrating gaps in higher education that leave students with only part of a degree and often student loan debt.
Colleges and universities have invested in their retention strategies to improve students’ completion and the cost of education by helping them complete a degree in a timely manner.
Recent data from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center found that academic outcomes in the first year and first- to second-year persistence were significant indicators of a student’s likelihood of completing a degree and doing so expeditiously.
Survey Says
A 2023 Student Voice survey from Inside Higher Ed and College Pulse found 69 percent of undergraduate survey respondents (n=3,004) expected to graduate in the standard two- or four-year time frame.
Thirteen percent of respondents said they didn’t expect to graduate in a timely manner because they planned or expected to take longer, and 3 percent said it was due to factors that they believe to be the fault of the institution.
The background: The federal government tracks first-time degree seekers’ graduation rates in terms of six- and eight-year completion, but a typical associate or bachelor’s degree program can be categorized as two-year or four-year, respectively.
The six-year completion rate for all college students entering two-year and four-year institutions in 2017 was 62.2 percent, with a 34-percentage-point gap between private nonprofit four-year institutions (77.5 percent) and public two-year colleges (43.4 percent).
Timely completion is associated with lower financial burdens, due to prolonged enrollment and improved socioeconomic mobility for students, as well as optimized institutional resources for the institution. Individual challenges and institutional policies can impact students’ timely progression, including academic challenges, personal struggles, basic needs insecurity, financial instability, transfer barriers, unclear degree requirements, developmental education, registration policies or insufficient advising.
The study evaluates early success indicators, including first-year GPA, credit completion ratios, second-year enrollment and credits earned, and how these indicators predict completion across credential types and demographic profiles.
Methodology
Timely completion, as defined by the report authors, is “the student having earned the credential they initially sought, at any institution, within a specific time frame,” allowing for variance between associate, credential or bachelor’s programs.
Researchers evaluated four factors: first-year credit completion ratio, first-year credits earned, first-year grade point average and second-year enrollment. Study participants (n=307,500) included first-time, full-time starters enrolled in fall 2016 in bachelor’s degree (63 percent) or associate programs (37 percent). Data was sourced from the Postsecondary Data Partnership by the National Student Clearinghouse and therefore is not representative of the national population.
The findings: Researchers found a majority of timely completers demonstrated early success indicators, including having a significant number of credits earned, above a 3.3 GPA and re-enrollment for a second year. Further, “Students who completed in a timely manner had higher early indicators than non-completers, regardless of race, gender, age at entry, or major field of study,” according to the report.
Even students who took 150 percent (three years for an associate degree, six years for a bachelor’s) or 200 percent (four and eight years, respectively) of the expected time to complete had higher success indicators than their noncompleting peers.
In their first year, students who completed a credential had higher GPAs, earned more credits and completed on average 90 percent of the credits they attempted. They were also more often enrolled in their second year—even if at another institution—compared to their peers who did not finish in a timely manner.
First- to second-year persistence was a distinct factor of timely completion for two-year or certificate students; students who did not complete enrolled in their second year at a rate 32 percentage points lower than those who did complete. This was the most important success indicator, followed by first-year credits earned.
For bachelor’s degree seekers, a student’s first-year GPA was the most important early success indicator, followed by second-year retention.
A student’s field of study can also relate to their timely completion, with bachelor’s degree seekers majoring in social sciences or business more likely to complete and associate degree seekers pursuing STEM or a social science degree more likely to complete. However, the researchers utilized program of study as a demographic category, and therefore analysis cannot be made of program requirements or courses that could help or hinder student completion.
“These findings emphasize the need for targeted, evidence-based interventions that prioritize early academic achievement, support retention, and address program-specific challenges to improve completion outcomes,” according to the report.
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