I scrolled across this article in my google reader this morning, admittedly I was behind on several of the key blogs I subscribe to. This post dates earlier this month from the ever insightful Chuck Bomar of College Ministry Thoughts.
What I find fascinating is how shocking these stats were to me. Maybe it’s the proximity to a major land grant university, complete with 40,000 students.
USA Today reports that nearly half of students at a four-year degree school don’t complete their degree within 6 years. Which translates to high drop our rates. And nearly half of college students attend a 2 year degree school such as a community college.
This got me thinking. I trust USA Today’s stats. The trends I’ve seen on campus are more students taking summer school classes at a community college where it’s cheaper, a higher pressure for students to maintain a part-time job while in school to offset the expense, more pressure for high paying internships in the summers. I’m sure the list goes on.
This demographic of college-aged students aren’t any different from you and I and our families. The economic downturn of the past few years has a lot of folks scared and we’ve tightened our belts in a lot of ways. I’m wondering how much of these changing stats are in reaction to such things.
Or maybe simply with the prevalence of online college programs and night school, our population of college students boomed overnight. Either way, I’m passionate about reaching college-aged people regardless of where they go to school (University of Illinois or otherwise).
