@ucbalumnus “So most of the student’s likelihood to graduate (and on time) can be predicted based on the student’s prior academic record.”
In the end, as a parent, there are no odds. Either the individual student graduates or they don’t. If there were a way to tell who will and won’t graduate with just grades and test scores, we could save almost 1/2 of the countries college students a lot of wasted effort. However, there are many factors that impact that and I think that many of those impacts depend on the school.
I don’t know what percentage is determined by high school grades and test scores, and I don’t think anyone does, but grade and test scores are very far from determinative. Otherwise, everyone would just go to the cheapest school. That doesn’t mean that the cheapest school is not the right choice. It may well be. It just means you have to know the school and the kid to sort it out.
Many other factors have a big impact including:
- The students choice of major
- Degree of student engagement
- The supportiveness of the family
- Family attitudes about education
- The student’s fit at the school
- Access to tutoring support
- Course availability
- The quality of the students around you
- Greek Life, for all of it’s negatives, has a positive correlation to graduation rates
- Quality of and access to professors
- Quality of and access to TA’s
- Do they like the school?