College is expensive enough when it lasts four years. But the majority of college students don’t graduate in four years–and the additional years and courses they take can significantly increase their college costs.
Every extra year a bachelor’s degree-seeking student spends in college costs an average of $68,153 in additional tuition, fees, and living expenses, plus forgone income, Complete College America estimates.
Getting into college is exciting–receiving the envelope and imagining your future. But not all colleges are created equal.
For-profit colleges, in particular, have been criticized for being dishonest about graduate employment statistics and leaving students with lots of student debt. Some have even gone bankrupt after being fined or sued for misleading students.
To help students better understand the risks, NerdWallet and USA Today College put together a list of 5 things to consider before choosing to attend a for-profit college.
Four years at college is pricy enough, with the average cost of one year at a 4-year private university topping $40,000 and $18,000 at public universities. Over the course of four years, those costs really add up. But the majority of American college students doesn’t even finish their degree in that time, according to a new report […]
Choosing the right college can be tough. With over 3500 colleges in the United States, finding that perfect match–let alone paying for it–is no easy task.
The folks at PayScale have put together an interesting interactive map that shows the top colleges for different ethnic groups, along with their graduation rates, locations and returns on investment after 20 years.
While many higher education advocates are worried because the national college graduation rate is a less-than-stellar 54%, there’s a silver lining: more college graduates are identifying as an ethnicity other than White.
According to The National Center for Education Statistics, in 2009-2010, over 27 percent of all bachelor’s degrees were awarded to students who identified as Black, Hispanic, Asian/Pacific Islander, or American Indian/Alaska Native.
That’s up from the previous recorded year of 1999-2000, when 22.5 percent of bachelor’s degrees went to students who identified as an ethnicity other than White.
One of the knocks against community colleges has been that students who complete two-year degrees are less likely to continue on and complete their bachelor’s degree than their peers at four-year colleges. This was confirmed back in 2009, when Bridget Terry Long and Michal Kurlaender found that students who initially began at community colleges were 14.5% less likely […]
Graduation rates are a key indicator of a college’s ability to prepare you for future success. A recent report from the Albany Times-Union found that 64% of students who enroll in the State University of New York (SUNY) system finish within six years, one of the highest graduation rates for any public university system in the nation.
But a closer look at the numbers reveals widely varying results among SUNY schools, with some graduating only 16% of students in 6 years.
The Chronicle of Higher Education has come up with a great alternative to the federal government’s College Scorecard–the College Reality Check. This tool makes it easy for high school students and parents to find and choose the right college based on a school’s size, academic quality, location, and price, as well as your family’s income.