How to regain the highest college graduation rate in the world: Talk with our students

by Wayne Burton and Rick Dalton
Salem News, July 22, 2009

Recently at Macomb Community College in Warren, Mich., President Obama unveiled the American Graduation Initiative, his administration's plan to ensure that by 2020 we reclaim our position of having the highest proportion of college graduates in the world.

Much of the Obama plan focuses on strengthening community colleges, the sector that serves nearly half of our nation's undergraduates.

Specifically, the president proposes we strategically invest resources in community colleges, align the education and training they offer with work force needs — not just today's but tomorrow's, and that community colleges ratchet up virtual offerings, which is especially important for residents of rural communities, where we are seeing troubling trends.

Obama's plan is on target. Although underappreciated, America's 1,200 community colleges bring unprecedented value to our work force and our low-income populations. Take the health care professions — which are becoming increasingly important for our aging baby boomers — where nearly two out of three nurses are coming from community colleges. And it's hard to argue with the price — community college tuitions can be anywhere from four to 20 times less than that at four-year colleges.

To achieve the Obama goal, we will need to increase the number of students who graduate from college by 5 million in the next decade. This requires that we reach a generation of children who live at or below the poverty line and look to our community colleges to do so. Currently, low-income students are half as likely to enroll and only a third as likely to graduate from college, with either an associate's or bachelor's degree, than their middle-class peers. We are paying a steep price for this disparity — for letting our low-income students fail. Consider the fact that fewer than 20 percent of the students in urban districts like Detroit, Chicago and 18 other of our nation's largest cities enroll in college. In our work, we have seen there is not an ability gap between those who graduate from college and those who drop out of high school. There is an expectation gap, and the costs are staggering. Dropouts this year alone will cost the nation $319 billion in lost wages.

The greatest challenge facing the American Graduation Initiative is not revamping our community colleges but changing a culture so that the upcoming generation of low-income students sees college in their future. We need to change the mindset, and we can do that by creating a college culture in our K-12 schools.

Here are a few examples of schools where students are beating the odds — what they share is a culture of high expectations, a culture that embraces college — even though most of their children live at or below the poverty line.

Talk to Eric or any of his fifth-grade classmates at Vermont's Castleton Elementary School, who developed a business plan for their school store (which is totally run by students) by working with students and professors at Castleton State College. Or talk with Claudia and her eighth-grade peers at Ford School in Lynn, who were trained by professors at North Shore Community College to become mentors of younger peers at their school. Or chat with Miguel or any of the other fourth-graders at John Russwurm School in Harlem who spend time this year on the campuses of Howard, St. John and Fordham universities.

Eric, Claudia and Miguel aren't talking about "if" they're headed to college. Instead, they're talking about when they're going and what they will study. Each of these schools partners with a college, and higher education is part of the daily conversation in the classrooms and on their playgrounds.

You see, these younger children are following the example of Ozzie at East Boston High School — a young man who four years ago turned his failing grades into honor roll performance — and who's now headed to Bunker Hill Community College. Ozzie became a peer mentor; he became immersed in the culture of college and he became a student leader committed to helping younger students succeed.

It's a simple formula, and it's the reason why 1,632 other high school seniors like Ozzie — 97 percent of the underserved students nationwide involved in this program — are going to college this fall. If the president wants to achieve the laudable goals of the American Graduation Initiative, we suggest he talk with Ozzie or Eric or Claudia or Miguel.



Rick Dalton is president and CEO of College For Every Student. Wayne Burton is president of North Shore Community College.

Questions or comments to news@northshore.edu.