Time is the enemy of graduation

BY Stan Jones

President Obama's plan to make college more

affordable is noble in intent but misses the

mark in design. If the president and Congress

were to focus on the real culprit of high college

costs — poor college completion numbers — they

could find rare common ground and make substantial

headway on a problem that threatens to

sink U.S. economic competitiveness.

The president was right when he noted that

college is rapidly becoming unaffordable for many.

Yet his threats to reduce federal funding to schools

that don’t cut tuition may open the door for

opponents to push back against reforms by

invoking accusations of “price controls” and

another “big-government takeover.”

College presidents point to what seem like

reasonable arguments for rising tuition: shrinking

state budgets, for one, and the increasing costs of

energy, pensions and health care. But if these

circular arguments simply go round and round, an

important opportunity will be missed.

Data show that time, not tuition, is the enemy of

college completion. Today’s college students are

dramatically different from the archetype of the

U.S. undergraduate: A 2009 Public Agenda study

drawing on Education Department data found that

less than a quarter of U.S. college students attend

full time at residential schools. Most students now

commute to campus, balancing jobs, school and

often family.

Higher education has done little to adjust to the

changing needs of this new majority, with the

result that students are spending longer than ever

in college. The longer it takes to graduate, themore

life gets in the way and the less likely that one will

ever graduate. More time on campus also means

that more is spent on college, adding high costs as

another driver of dropouts. In this instance, time is

money.

All this adds up to a startling fact: Less than half

of U.S. college students graduate, the National

Center for Education Statistics reported last year.

There is a way the federal government can take

on this issue. Because cutting time cuts costs, the

president can achieve the savings he seeks for

students and taxpayers by linking federal investments

to college results and targeting the greatest

obstacles to graduation: failed remediation programs

that waste time and money; broken policies

that make it hard for students to transfer credits;

students roaming the curriculum excessively instead

of following structured, career-focused programs;

creeping credit requirements; and schedules

designed more to please faculty than to help

working students.

Colleges should, of course, become more efficient.

But raising professors’ health-care premiums

or adjusting thermostats won’t boost completion

rates. And appeals to reduce tuition through

higher appropriations are unlikely to fly in

cash-strapped state capitols. The result is that

America will fall further behind: The United States

once led the world in higher-education attainment;

now we trail at least a dozen countries,

according to Organization for Economic Cooperation

and Development data published last year.

Rather than engage in simplistic fights about

runaway tuition, let’s pinpoint the best methods to

reduce time on campus. College completion can be

common ground on which the president and

Congress focus on costs that are directly related to

student learning and success. They should replace

blame shifting with irrefutable facts and seek

data-driven solutions that can be achieved now to

help students afford their dreams while increasing

graduation rates.

Washington should also keep this in mind:

States are not waiting to boost college completion.

Since March 2010, 30 governors have publicly

committed their states to setting graduation goals;

designing comprehensive completion plans; and

moving significant policies to speed student

success, including paying colleges for the students

they graduate, not simply for those they enroll.

Working across party lines, governors, legislators

and education leaders are building a movement.

Their success will strengthen state economies

while taxpayers get a greater return on their

investments and millions more students make it to

graduation day. Washington should follow this

example.

Stan Jones is president of Complete College America, a

Washington-based nonprofit.