Half Of People Who Went To College In The Recession Haven’t Graduated

Parent Cafe
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Excerpt: "One side effect of the 2007-09 recession was a surge in college attendance. Nearly 3 million Americans enrolled in college in the fall of 2009,1 half a million more than two years earlier. Some of those were new high school graduates who would have gone straight to work if jobs were available. Others were older workers who lost jobs and went back to school to learn new skills or even to qualify for student loans to cover living expenses.

“Six years later, we are starting to get the first clear look at how all those students fared, and the numbers aren’t pretty. According to a new report from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, barely half — 52.9 percent — of students who enrolled in fall 2009 had earned a bachelor’s or associate degree six years later. That’s down from a completion rate of 56.1 percent for the students who enrolled in 2007. (Graduation rates were especially low for students at for-profit colleges.)…” LINK to article by Bill Casselman: http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/half-of-people-who-went-to-college-in-the-recession-havent-graduated/

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I entered college in 09. I can say from personal experience that this shakes out.

There were no jobs here when I graduated high school in 09. College is what you did because there were no alternatives.

A difference for us is that this wasn’t new. We have been living with this reality for over a decade due to the exodus of factories. I’m sorry that the trend went national.

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I agree it may shake out, however I’ve also seen signs of a “cohort effect” in which the earnings of those who entered the labor force (whether or not they found work immediately) during 2008-9 have lagged behind preceding or subsequent cohorts. It’s not like they’re branded in some way but the bad luck of the marketplace carried over for many in their starting salaries.

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The headline is perhaps a bit misleading. Graduation rates are much higher among “traditional” students (under 20 when they first enroll) who attend public or private non-profit 4-year institutions full time. Among this group, graduation rates remained high—essentially unchanged—during the recession. Graduation rates are abysmally low at for-profit private institutions and got even worse during the recession. Graduation rates are also very low among students who attend college part-time (not a surprise), among older “non-traditional” students, and among students who start at 2-year community colleges (unfortunate, but true). It was in these latter categories—for-profit colleges, part-timers, older students, and community colleges—that enrollment surged during the recession, and that in itself drove most of the decline in the overall graduation rate, because the overall student pool was weighted more heavily toward the types of students who are least likely to graduate.

I’m glad to see the Department of Education beginning to crack down on for-profit colleges. Many of them are nothing more than scams, ripping off the gullible students who attend and end up saddled with a mountain of student loan debt and either no degree or a next-to-worthless degree. At the same time, these schools are ripping off taxpayers by sucking up Pell grants and federal student loans that will never be repaid, while failing to deliver the goods in educational payoffs.

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Gullible students want opportunity, too. Where would these students aspirations for higher education be if we clamp down on their financing options?

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They can go to Accredited community colleges.

I wonder how many of those older retraining students didn’t bother finishing because they found jobs with their old skills?

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I think those students would tell you that community colleges didn’t offer the kinds of opportunities they were interested in.

I also have to point out that I think many of the schools that participated in the student loan bust were, in fact, accredited.

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This is an incredibly important point.

However, the story isn’t always just as simple as “evil for-profit” exploits “gullible student”. That happens a lot, of course.

But sometimes the story is “evil for-proft” and “partially evil student” both exploit the taxpayer. The student applies for Federal grants and loans. They get to use this money to pay for an apartment, food, and other living expenses. It’s a way to fund a (minimal) lifestyle for a few years; the student may have little or no intention of actually getting a degree as long as the money keeps on flowing. The school is very happy to go along and bend over backwards to keep the student in good-standing because they get their slice of the pie too.

Students who can’t find jobs may also resort to doing this. Of course, the student ends up with loans and no degree. Many will default, and it’s all you suckers who work for a living who get stuck with bill.

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kinda of a silly analysis, that one finds on blogs.

First, '09 was the ~peak of high school grads, so yeah, more kids went to college than two years prior.

“full-time students who were 20 years old or younger when they enrolled — the six-year graduation rate was 68.3 percent, down only a bit from 2007.”

But the author’s stupidity arises when they assume that every adult who got laid off and went to college: a) actually desires a degree; b) is going full time.

Wow, they do find that the graduation rate is low for part-time students. Next, they’ll tell us that dogs bite postal carriers. :slight_smile:

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Hasn’t the graduate in 6 years or less always (or at least in the last couple decades) been close to 50% as a national statistic?

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^Yes, that was going to be my point. I’m not even sure if there’s a meaningful statistical difference between 56% and 52%.

But eve if there is, the article says it all:

The low graduation rate shouldn’t come as a big surprise. The recession drove people to attend college who wouldn’t have gone otherwise and who were likely less prepared than other students. Many of them ended up in worse shape than if they hadn’t gone to college in the first place: burdened with thousands of dollars in student debt, but without a degree to show for it. The disappointing results emphasize yet again that merely encouraging people to attend college isn’t enough. We also have to find ways to help them graduate, too.

The only part I disagree with is the last. I think, instead, that we should combat credentials creep and make sure that there are good opportunities for people without college degrees, because most of the jobs in our economy probably don’t require one. Not that I don’t think we should improve college access for low-income and disadvantaged kids - I was one myself, and I’m passionate about and involved in increasing college access for that group. But trying to push everyone, including unprepared and unmotivated students, to go to and finish college isn’t a good idea either. Even if these underprepared students finish, their grades might be so poor that they struggle to find work anyway, or they may perform poorly at a job that requires a BA because it needs a base level of critical thinking skills.

Some of those students simply shouldn’t have gone to college.

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I had a friend (nearly 60 years old) who just lost her job after 27 years there. She is eligible for unemployment and can get up to $5000 to take courses toward a graduate degree (she already has an undergrad degree). She had previously been reluctant to go back to school after all these decades because she couldn’t afford it and was working a ton of hours. Hopefully she will now go back to take some courses, as she has some tentative job offers which require her to take at least a few more courses.

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Some, yes. But if the implication is that no one should go to college unless they’re prepared to finish a Bachelor’s degree, I disagree. I can’t immediately place my hands on the figures, but data I’ve seen say people with “some college” have, on average, higher lifetime earnings than those who never attended college. Lifetime earnings aren’t everything, of course, but if you’re on the bottom rung of the economic ladder, even a small boost in earnings can be life-changing.

Also keep in mind that many who “start college” have no intention of getting a Bachelor’s degree. Many are enrolled in 2-year Associate’s degree programs or even shorter certificate programs in technical/vocational fields. Our local community college, for example, offers Associate’s degrees and/or certificates in fields like medical lab technician, respiratory therapist, home health aide/nurse’s assistant, practical nursing, pharmacy technician, and food service management, not to mention more traditionally “blue collar” trades like plumbing, welding, sheet metal/HVAC, carpentry, cabinetmaking, electrical technology (electrician), auto body repair, automotive service, machine tool technology, machine operator, and on and on. It’s all well and good to say some people shouldn’t pursue Bachelor’s degrees because they’d be better off as welders or plumbers, but it’s practically impossible to get hired as a welder or a plumber without welding or plumbing experience. Where do you get that experience? Well, traditionally in an apprenticeship program, but increasingly in our area, people are going to community colleges to get some hands-on training and experience. In “hot” fields like welding, you may not even need to complete the certificate program; if you take a few classes, do well, show an aptitude for it, and can get your instructors to give you good references, that may be enough to land you your first full-time welding job.

That explains an awful lot of the “started college but didn’t finish a Bachelor’s degree in six years” phenomenon. Of course a lot of people “started college” during the recession by going to a community college to re-tool by acquiring marketable job skills. Are we to judge these people failures because they didn’t successfully complete Bachelor’s degrees? Heck no. Many of them were never in Bachelor’s degree programs, nor were they doing 2 years at the community college in order to transfer to a Bachelor’s degree-granting institution. They were “in college” to gain practical job skills. Many succeeded. I say, bully for them!