\n<\/p>\n
First-generation students are twice as likely to leave college without completing a bachelor\u2019s degree than their peers, even if they come from higher-income backgrounds and come to college academically prepared, according to a new report from the Common App. The findings suggest these factors do make a difference for student success outcomes but don\u2019t erase other barriers first-generation students might face.<\/p>\n
The report, released Thursday and the fourth in a series on first-generation students, used data from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center to track enrollment, persistence and completion rates for 785,300 Common App applicants in the 2016\u201317 application cycle. (Students whose parents didn\u2019t complete bachelor\u2019s degrees made up 32\u00a0percent of the sample.) The report also took into account how a range of factors could affect student outcomes, including students\u2019 incomes, their levels of academic preparation and how well-resourced their colleges are. <\/p>\n
Previous studies have shown that \u201cfirst-generation students are certainly not a monolith,\u201d said Sarah Nolan, lead author of the report and a research scientist at Common App. \u201cWe were hoping to give readers a sense for\u00a0\u2026 which first-generation students might in particular need more support.\u201d<\/p>\n
The good news is the report found first-generation applicants enroll in college at rates on par with their peers. Over 90\u00a0percent of Common App applicants, first-generation and otherwise, enrolled in college within six years of applying.<\/p>\n
But first-generation students were slightly more likely to not enroll immediately (17\u00a0percent) or to enroll at a two-year college (12\u00a0percent) compared to other applicants (14\u00a0percent and 4\u00a0percent, respectively). That gap mostly closed when comparing students with strong academic records, defined as having SAT or ACT scores or GPAs in the top quartile. According to the report, that finding may be because a higher share of first-generation students may need extra coursework before enrolling in a four-year institution.<\/p>\n
Students might also work to save up for college first or opt for community colleges\u2019 more affordable tuition rates, the report suggested. Lower-income first-generation students, who qualified for application fee waivers, were also less likely to immediately enroll at four-year institutions and more likely to first enroll at a community college compared to similar students not from first-generation backgrounds.<\/p>\n
Over all, \u201cwe are really heartened to see that there\u2019s really not very strong differences in college enrollment,\u201d Nolan said.<\/p>\n
Completion rates, however, are another story. While about 70\u00a0percent of first-generation students do complete a bachelor\u2019s degree within six years of enrolling, the report found stark disparities between them and their peers.<\/p>\n
About half of first-generation students completed a bachelor\u2019s degree within four years, compared to 68\u00a0percent of continuing-generation students, a gap of 18\u00a0percentage points. And that disparity persisted when looking at six-year graduation rates. About 69\u00a0percent of first-generation students graduated within six years, compared to 86\u00a0percent of continuing-generation students, a 17-percentage-point difference.<\/p>\n
These gaps shrank but didn\u2019t disappear for first-generation students with strong academic records and higher incomes. Academically prepared first-generation students were twice as likely to disenroll with no degree than their continuing-generation counterparts, 14\u00a0percent and 6\u00a0percent, respectively. In a similar vein, 24\u00a0percent of higher-income first-generation students left college without a degree within six years compared to 12\u00a0percent of their continuing-generation counterparts. Even for first-generation students who were both academically prepared and relatively well-off, these gaps remained.<\/p>\n
Differences in the institutions first-generation and continuing-generation students attend\u2014and the levels of supports they offer\u2014didn\u2019t account for completion-rate gaps, either.<\/p>\n
Even when attending the exact same institutions, first-generation students were 10\u00a0percentage points less likely to earn a bachelor\u2019s degree within six years than continuing-generation students.<\/p>\n
However, higher per-student expenditures did seem to contribute to better student success outcomes. At institutions that spent at least $20,000 per student, 84\u00a0percent of first-generation graduated within six years, compared to 94\u00a0percent of continuing-generation students. The gap between first-generation and continuing-generation students\u2019 completion rates widened to 15\u00a0percentage points at colleges that spent more moderately, $10,000 to $15,000 per student, and 17\u00a0percentage points at colleges with low per-student expenditures, less than $7,500.<\/p>\n
These findings suggest that, while first-generation students disproportionately face financial constraints and barriers to college prep, it doesn\u2019t explain away their graduation rate gaps. And students attending less resourced institutions isn\u2019t a full explanation, either. Other obstacles must be at play.<\/p>\n
What those barriers are may be \u201cbest answered by speaking with first-generation students themselves and unpacking what\u2019s happening at the individual level,\u201d Nolan said. But first-generation students likely struggle with limited access to information about higher ed and its \u201chidden curriculum\u201d of expectations, regardless of income, high school performance or which college they attend. <\/p>\n
\u201cHaving the right resources at the right time on the pathway\u2014that\u2019s really critical for student success,\u201d Nolan added.<\/p>\n
The stakes of success are high\u2014the report found many first-generation students spent considerable time and money on college with no degree to show for it. Almost a third of first-generation students who didn\u2019t earn a degree were enrolled for at least four years.<\/p>\n
But a hopeful finding is that \u201cadditional investment can be quite positive for helping these students really actualize their potential,\u201d Nolan said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
First-generation students are twice as likely to leave college without completing a bachelor\u2019s degree than their peers, even if they come from higher-income backgrounds and come to college academically prepared, according to a new report from the Common App. The findings suggest these factors do make a difference for student success outcomes but don\u2019t erase<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25463,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[15388,15387,15389,8124,678],"class_list":{"0":"post-25462","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-education","8":"tag-completion","9":"tag-contextualizing","10":"tag-firstgen","11":"tag-gaps","12":"tag-students"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25462","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=25462"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25462\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/25463"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=25462"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=25462"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=25462"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}