Graduation Rates: Flawed as a Measure of Colleges, but Still Useful

By Jeff Selingo. It’s commencement season on college campuses, the time when graduating students see their years of effort culminate a victory: getting the degree. That road to commencement was longer for some students than for others, though, and eventually those varying journeys will be reflected in the institution’s graduation rate. The value of that number has been debated almost from the day it was first calculated in the mid-1990s. The flaws of the official government rate are well known: It counts only full-time, first-time students who enroll in the fall, excluding those who transfer out of the institution or transfer in and eventually graduate. Read more...