Why some students take so long to finish college?

Introduction

College student retention continues to be a concern to colleges and universities. When students leave college prematurely, they can lose self-esteem and confidence in their abilities. They may not realize the real reasons for their departure and see it as a life failure. Students need to be able to complete programs that they are interested in pursuing. Students who are recruited and admitted to a college should have a reasonable expectation that programs and services will provide them with an opportunity for success.

Discussion

That is, collegestudents are those most likely to fail or drop out of college due to the challenges of poverty, broken homes, violence, limited English language proficiency, and other disadvantages in the family and community context (Tinto, 69). Furthermore, because the associations among race, ethnicity, and low academic performance and/or college failure are positive, increasingly at risk has become code or synonyms for low-income (or poor) and racial and ethnic minority students. The two groups are not the same, however, despite the correlations. Perceived by some thinkers as a pejorative label of students believed to be “culturally deprived,” the term is laden with historical, political, and social meanings (Tinto, 89). A survey of the term's usages shows that its meaning varies.

Reasons for Students Experiencing Long Tenure in College

There are many reasons for why American college students find it difficult to complete their education within the stipulated time. Few of the reasons are stated below:

For what prospects are students labeled “at risk”? Attaching the collegelabel to the concept of “student” immediately signals that one outcome pertains to academic well-being. Yet, not only are such students at risk for lower educational outcomes but also for health-related conditions, engagement in criminal activity, low economic productivity, and higher mortality rates (Bers, 21). Collegestudents are most likely to be absent from college, fail a grade and have to repeat, be suspended from college, and withdrawing permanently from college. Below are some of the critical areas and issues that collegestudents either engage in or confront (Astin, 66).

Absences

Students who are frequently absent from college are at risk for academic failure because of exposure to fewer academic opportunities than students who attend college more regularly. Analyses reveal that students who scored at or above the proficiency level on the math portion of 2005 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) had fewer absences than those who scored lower. Among eighth graders in 2005, 75% of those students who had no absences in the past month performed at or above the basic level compared to 56% of those who had three or more absences (Higgins, 99).

Grade Retention

Grade retention—or being held back from promotion to the next grade—is another area of college where we can locate students who are vulnerable to either being or becoming at risk. The correlation between race and grade retention is significant. Nearly one in five Black elementary and secondary students—17%—than elementary and secondary students of another other race/ethnicity has been retained and thus compelled to repeat a ...