Graduation rates as defined by Top Hat is “a measure of how many students who began in the same cohort will graduate in six years for four-year programs or three years for two-year programs”. That is, graduation rates is the percentage of students who graduated as compared to the number of students that matriculated. Here we will see about What is Graduation Rates?
Graduation rates is an important metric to take into account when applying to a college, it gives an insight on how committed schools are to graduate their students.
What is Graduation Rates?
Graduation rates tell you at a glance the percentage of students that graduates from an educational institution out of the number that were admitted as freshmen at that educational institution at a stipulated period of 150% of the expected completion time. For a four-year degree program a student is expected to graduate in six years.
How is it Calculated?
Graduation rates are calculated in percentage. The general formula for calculating graduation rate is the number of students graduating divided by the number of students admitted as freshmen and it is calculated in percentage.
Mathematically:
Graduation rates = No of students graduating/No of students admitted as freshmen ×100
Why is it Important?
Graduation rate is important because it generally give students an insight on how committed a school is towards graduating their students. The importance of graduation rate is outlined below;
A Measure of Accountability and Transparency;
Graduation rates may show how accountable are the school management to the students. It says something about the school academic supports to the students. Are the students getting the required academic supports they need to succeed?
A Measure of Quality;
This highlights about the quality of learning and the corresponding student’s environment. A “peer affects” environment suggests that a school with high graduation rates mostly have students who want to finish college. A high graduation rates may suggest an academic environment with positive peer pressure and this can have a positive impact on a freshman to finish college.
Factors that Affect Graduation Rates
The numbers for graduation rates only takes into account full-time students beginning as freshmen in the fall and continuing on a traditional four-year programs. Currently, non-traditional students make up a sizeable population of college students. When you consider transfer students, older students returning back to college to complete their degree, and part-time students are not accounted for in the calculation for the graduation rate of a an educational institution. If the population of non traditional students were to be considered, the graduation rate of a college may become lower.
Top 10 Colleges with the Highest Six years Graduation Rates
According to the CollegeSimply, Below is a list of top 10 universities and colleges with the highest graduation rate in Georgia. Emory University tops the list with a graduation rate of 89%.
| S/N | College/University | Graduation Rate (%) |
| 1 | Emory University | 89.1 |
| 2 | University of Georgia | 84.9 |
| 3 | Georgia Institute of Technology Main Campus | 83. |
| 4 | Spelman College | 74.9 |
| 5 | Agnes Scott College | 70.1 |
| 6 | Gupton Jones College of Funeral Service | 69.3 |
| 7 | Savannah College of Arts and Designs | 65.9 |
| 8 | Berry College | 62.7 |
| 9 | Mercer University | 62 |
| 10 | Georgia College and State University | 60.8 |
Where does Colleges in Georgia Rank in the USA?
The highest ranking college in Georgia short fall when compared with the highest ranking college in the country. According to the Chronicle of Higher education, Yale University is the highest ranking college in the country with 97.5% graduation rates which dwarfed 89.1% graduation rates obtained by Emory University which is the highest ranking college in Georgia. Emory University which is Georgia’s highest ranking college came 56th in the United States.
Admission into Colleges with High Graduation Rates
A study carried out by Hess in 2009 concluded “that there’s a higher average graduation rates by the selectivity tiers outlined by acceptance percentage”. What it means is that colleges with high graduation rate tends to accept admission seekers with high test scores (SAT and ACT).
Ultimately, it could be understood that colleges with high graduation rate may have lower acceptance rate.
Eligibility Criteria
Eligibility criteria to study in universities and colleges with high graduation rate is the even for those with a lower graduation rate. The most significant criteria to note is a student that wish to study at a college need to have a good academic record. A high SAT or ACT score will increase a student’s chances of being accepted.
Conclusion
Graduation rate is an important metric to look into when applying for college, but should be considered as a secondary metric. Graduation rate can tell you more about a school prospective, but it is also a flawed metric because it can be affected by a lot of factors. Factors such as retention rate(percentage of students who continue on from their first year to their second year) and number of dropouts can affect the graduation rate of a school.
Finally, it’s worth note that there’s a correlation between the acceptance rate of the college and the graduation rate.
