It's hard to put a good spin on a report that, when reported in a single sentence, gives the impression than fewer than a quarter of Augusta State University students ever receive a college diploma.
The good news is that single sentence isn't just misleading. It's flat wrong.
The report, from the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, looked at incoming freshmen across the country from the year 2001, the latest available, and then checked back six years later to see how many had graduated.
The result for ASU isn't pretty. The report says just 23 percent of those students received a diploma, the remainder presumably dropping out and scrambling for low-wage jobs.
"My reaction to reports such as this is always to wince," says Ray Whiting, ASU's assistant vice president for institutional effectiveness.
Fortunately there's more to the story -- specifically, what's left out in compiling that discouraging statistic. Looking at the bigger picture makes ASU look much better.
For example, points out ASU Communications Director Kathy Schofe, "It is not 23 percent of ASU students who graduate, but 23 percent of those students who started ASU as freshmen. We have an awful lot of students who start somewhere else and then transfer in to Augusta State and graduate -- but they are not included in this statistic."
In fact, Jackie Stewart, the ASU director of institutional research, says that of all students attending the school as part of a "cohort group" -- in other words, all attending in a particular year -- a much-higher 82 percent received bachelor degrees within six years.
The lowball 23 percent number also doesn't include students who attend ASU as freshmen and then transfer out of state -- say, to USC Aiken's nursing program -- or to any school that isn't part of the University System of Georgia.
The latter schools include the significant number of private or out-of-state colleges that recently have located campuses in our area, including Troy, Michigan State and Phoenix. If a student leaves ASU and later receives a degree from any of those schools, he or she is counted as a "dropout" in these statistics.
Even with these mitigating factors, clearly there's a problem of success with incoming freshmen at ASU. But that's less a symptom of failure for ASU than a demonstration of larger issues addressed by ASU's admissions policies.
The school is not a "open enrollment" campus, taking any student who walks through the door no matter how unprepared. But because there is no University System of Georgia junior college in Augusta, ASU accepts as freshmen lower-achieving students who could qualify only under two-year college standards.
Obviously, such students will be less prepared for the rigors of a four-year college -- and fewer of them will stick it out and receive an ASU degree. Augusta State could instantly improve its graduation statistics either by rejecting those students altogether, or by lowering its standards for all students and thereby churn out more diplomas.
"We are not willing to just pass students through to increase our attractiveness in the market," Dr. Whiting rightly says. "We will not go that route."
They shouldn't have to -- especially not to groom the university's statistics just to make them look better. We already know that no statistics can properly measure the value of ASU to the thousands of students educated at the university each year.
No single simple statistic should damage Augusta State's effort to improve our community, one diploma at a time.
The graduations statistics raise concerns, but they do not offer the final grade on Augusta State's work to improve the community, one diploma at a time.
The Augusta Chronicle ©2010 Morris Communications, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Exactly and thanks for the research. Plus, realize the asset ASU is to the community on so many levels. Having a 4 year school means so much. Now if I could only convince the athletic department to take the basketball team to Div I.
ASU deserves commendation for refusing to buckle to political pressures to adopt the student-injurious "pass 'em all" approach to "education."
Good for ASU. However, you would be suprised at how some "unprepared" students excel in academics when given the chance. Fine, ASU has their standards. But, they shouldn't berate and belittle other SACS accredited colleges whose non-traditional students do transfer to ASU.
correcting institutional problems ongoing at ASU will go a long ways towards improving graduation statistics. 1st and foremost, a massive reform of the financial aid department!! they're almost always late cutting aid checks, they misfile paperwork, they almost lost me my HOPE scholarship. 2nd, get rid of the mandatory class attendance policy. most of the students there work and when choosing between making money for rent and going to class they'll make that choice.. and god forbid if they get sick or something and miss more than the allotted days some professors automatically fail them, others (out of the kindness of their hearts) only drop the grade down a letter for each day over. 3rd, make teachers use the same damn edition for more than a semester! its impossible to get your hands on used books! and ASU library only has a few titles that are required in class! these books are outrageous! i routinely spent upwards of 400 bucks a semester for books! (try doing that on one of those low-wage jobs)
Professors have been known to make the first few weeks difficult to weed out students. This makes it hard for a non-biology major, for instance, to get through core curriculum which requires two levels of biology. Very few make it through ASU in just four years.
omnomnom, as my accounting professors at Ga State said to our evening class (they run from 8A.M. to 11 P.M. for the working class), she didn't care if we worked or not, she expected attendance and doing the work required, if not, drop out. I know a young lady who works full time as a bar tender and is also a full time student at ASU making As. She goes to class and does the work. I fully agree with my old professor at Ga State. I also fully agree on making professors use books more than one or two semesters so they can get their royalties.
I believe attendance is a financial aid requirement not the requirement of a particular college. Students must attend a certain percentage of class hours in order for the financial aid to pay for the class. Why should the government pay for you not to attend or for you to drop the class?
I am happy to have a 4 year college here in Augusta. It makes it possible for those who cannot afford to go away to school to still earn a degree. It's sad that certain statistics can make any school look good or bad, depending on how the numbers were counted. As long as a person graduates with a degree, it shouldn't matter if they started at ASU or ended up there as a transfer student. I believe ASU is definitely an asset to our community.
ASU is an asset to our community. If my children decide being away at college is no longer their cup of tea, I would be just as happy if they finished their degrees here. I just hope there is a solution for the parking problem before I ever get a chance to go back to further my education or they decide to go there. That must be addressed. The last time I registered for some additional courses, that part was worse than I remember it being when I was in my senior year of high school. I thought they would be more efficient by now, but it took much longer. This was in 2006, I hope those were temporary problems.