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Four years of college can take much longer
© St. Petersburg Times, When calculating how much college will cost, many parents assume their children will graduate in four years. That often turns out to be wrong. A U.S. Department of Education study found only 31 percent of the degree-seeking freshmen who enrolled in four-year colleges and universities earned bachelor's degrees in four years. Another 26 percent finished in the fifth year, 15 percent were still working on their degrees at the five-year mark and the rest had dropped out. What's taking students so long? They change majors. They fail, drop or postpone required courses. The classes they need are filled when they try to register or not offered the semester they want to take them. Some take less than a full load so learning won't crimp their partying, but many do so to leave time for work or family responsibilities. "Most of our students work," said Robert Sullins, dean of undergraduate students at the University of South Florida in Tampa. "So many of our students are part time, and even those who try to go full time tend to take just 12 hours to qualify as full time for financial aid purposes." A typical degree program requires 120 credit hours (some require more), so the student who earns 12 hours at a time will take at least 10 semesters to graduate. Sullins said switching majors can be a big problem if the new choice has many requirements that are supposed to be met during the first two years of college. He cites education majors as an example. "If you have a student planning to major in engineering, premed or business who decides at the end of the sophomore year to go into teaching, that student will have at least another year of general education to take," he said. At USF, classes fill up fast in high-demand majors such as computer information sciences, so students with later registration appointments may be shut out. "We have a few programs where we just don't have enough resources to serve the students who want to be in the program," Sullins said. Some students stick around college longer for their own enrichment, pursuing a double major or minor or taking extra classes they think will help them get a job or get into graduate school. Regardless of the reason, a fifth year in college can be an unanticipated drain on family finances.
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From the Times Business report
From the AP
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