Professor Van Ry

Bloated curricula, remediation roadblocks, and students’ meandering path through college are contributing to a completion crisis that is costing students and their parents billions of extra dollars a year, according to a report released on Monday by Complete College America.

The report, “Four-Year Myth,” will be the centerpiece of discussions on Monday and Tuesday here at the annual meeting of the nonprofit group’s Alliance of States. Participants include college administrators, policy makers, and legislators from 35 states whose governors and higher-education leaders have pledged to make completion a top priority and to follow strategies outlined by Complete College America, the group says. Those include tying a portion of states’ higher-education allocations to graduation and retention rates, eliminating most stand-alone remedial courses, and streamlining degree requirements.

The nonprofit group, which is heavily financed by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, has as one of its mantras “time is the enemy of college completion.” <Read more.>

Via Katherine Mangan, The Chronicle of Higher Education.