Graduation rates alarm state officials
Community colleges trail national figures
Just 16.4 percent of full-time community college students in Massachusetts earn a degree or a certificate within three years, a rate that significantly trails the national average.
At some schools, the rate is even lower -- at Roxbury Community College, 5.8 percent graduated, and at Bunker Hill Community College, 8.6 percent graduated, according to federal data that examined average graduation rates of 2002, 2003, and preliminary 2004 data. All but one school in the state, Berkshire Community College, were below the national average of 24.7 percent.
The numbers have set off alarm among state education officials, who say Massachusetts must assert more oversight of its 15 community colleges.
The colleges serve nearly half of the state's public college-going population, and received $211 million this year in state funds, a quarter of the state's higher-education budget. The state Board of Higher Education last month created a task force to identify ways to improve completion rates.
''None of these numbers are acceptable; anything under 50 percent is unacceptable," said Stephen Tocco, chairman of the state Board of Higher Education. Some community college administrators said the analysis -- a first for the state --is an unfair measurement of their effectiveness. Community colleges have a unique mission and serve a different student body than four-year schools, they say, with open admissions policies that often require only a GED, the equivalent of a high school degree, for entrance.
The state's scrutiny of the schools comes at a time when employers are demanding workers with higher skills, and increasing numbers of immigrants are entering the state, often seeking education through the more accessible and less expensive community college system.
''In listening to the marketplace, it's obvious that we need to move more students toward completion," Tocco said. ''And we need to do it sooner rather than later."
The push to improve graduation rates also dovetails with the national shift toward greater accountability in schools, with testing the preferred measuring stick of students in kindergarten to 12th grades and graduation rates increasingly the gauge of a college's success. In 1997, the federal government began requiring all types of colleges to report graduation rates.
In Massachusetts, the first community colleges were created in the 1960s, during the postwar higher-education boom, in an attempt to make education accessible for all segments of the state's population. Governor Foster Furcolo, in proposing the schools' creation, said, ''If we fail to act positively . . . one out of every three qualified high school graduates will not find a place in a college or university."
As of 2004, the schools enrolled 11,800 full-time students, and 5,700 part-time students who were seeking degrees. Degree programs tend to require two years.
Tuition rates vary from school to school, but are generally $2,000 to $3,000 for full-time enrollment.
Community college administrators say getting a degree is a difficult task for many of their students.
''Graduation rates do not tell the story at all for us," said Stephanie Janey, vice president for enrollment management and student affairs at Roxbury Community College. ''We don't even look at that, it's not meaningful for us. We are dealing with the reality for our students."
The reality, she said, is that many of Roxbury's students work full time and have family and other responsibilities that make school a challenge. A number of students arrive on campus with language barriers or unprepared for college courses, factors community colleges cannot control, she said. Roxbury, upon request, did not provide figures showing the number of students in remedial classes.
''We are caught in the middle between K-12 and four-year schools; we are a catchall for those who are not prepared for four-year [schools]," Janey said.
Janey and others said a better way to measure their schools is by the number of students who complete the courses they take, and the number retained from semester to semester. Moreover, Janey, said it's unfair to measure the colleges' students in a three-year time span when many take much longer to graduate.
But even when Massachusetts graduation rates were viewed over a six-year time frame, a little more than a third of students finished. Another 3 percent were still enrolled in a college, and more than 60 percent had dropped out or could not be accounted for, according to federal data. The government reviewed the progress of the roughly 12,000 new full-time degree-seeking students from Massachusetts.
Other states have been able to record higher graduation rates than Massachusetts, some after making a concerted effort to improve.
In Illinois, 23 percent of its first-time, full-time community college students finished in three years. State education officials there said that the numbers of graduating students started climbing when the schools began using a customized computer program to monitor students' course completion. The program figures out which classes a student needs to graduate, then gives the student priority registration for them.
As of last year, an Illinois higher-education official said, the system saw 51,444 students complete degrees, compared with 38,420 in 2001 -- a 34 percent increase.
''There are a lot of barriers that students do need to overcome," said Scott Parke, the senior director of policy studies for Illinois Community College Board.
''But by showing them how close they are to reaching their ultimate goal, it says: 'With a little more effort, you will be able to finish your certificate or degree.' "
Some Massachusetts schools have undertaken novel approaches to increase graduation rates.
At Mount Wachusett Community College in Gardner, Dan Asquino, the president, said the school three years ago began giving rebates on fees to students who graduate within two years. It has also beefed up its counseling staff and begun tracking class attendance more closely. And it has used money, from a $1 million donation, to provide child care to students at risk for dropping out because of family obligations.
The school's average graduation rate for 2002, 2003, and 2004 was 20.1 percent, higher than the state average, but the figures don't reflect whether the school's efforts are working.
State education officials caution that schools like Mount Wachusett have a benefit that some others do not -- namely, fewer older students who tend to have more obstacles, such as family and jobs.
Mount Wachusett has a relatively low number of students older than 22 -- 56 percent of its student body. At Roxbury, by contrast, 78 percent of its students are older than 22; at Bunker Hill, 66 percent are older than 22, according to state data. Younger students are believed to be likelier to push through to graduation. State officials said they are not sure of what accounts for the shift, but are hoping the task force will shed light on the change.
Judith Gill, the chancellor of the Board of Higher Education, said the difference in the age makeup in the student body is a key factor distinguishing the schools, and she hopes the graduation rates will improve because more students younger than 22 are entering the system.
Educators and others agree that the very nature of these schools could be at stake if graduation rates are made a measure of a community college's success.
The schools would change from access for all to access for those likely to graduate, administrators said. And that would leave the needier but less qualified students with nowhere to go for training they need.
''We'd have to institute a selective admission process," said Mary Fifield , president of Bunker Hill Community College. ''Then we wouldn't be a community college. We'd be a small two-year liberal arts college, but cheaper." 