<p>Is the freshman retention rate important, for some reason the more and more I look for different schools I keep getting turned off by retention rates under 80%. Do you guys think its ok to consider retention as a very important factor.</p>
<p>It is definitely an important factor for us when considering colleges.</p>
<p>I think retention rate freshman to sophomore is an important factor but graduation rate is even more important. Some schools have high retention after one year but low graduation rate after 6 years.</p>
<p>Retention and graduation is mostly a reflection of selectivity. The higher the SATs, the higher the retention and graduation rates. Retention is mostly due to student quality and what the college does only makes perhaps a 5% difference up or down. US News has a very informative piece of information in their Best Colleges issue: overperformance and underperformance with regard to graduation rates. Schools on the plus side are doing a good job with the caliber of students that they enroll.</p>
<p>does anyone have a (free) link to freshman retention and graduation rates of all colleges ?</p>
<p>thanks for any help</p>
<p><a href="http://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/cool/%5B/url%5D">http://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/cool/</a></p>
<p>look up one at a time</p>
<p>cool :) thanks.</p>