Nationwide, more college students than ever before find themselves studying beyond the standard four years in order to earn a bachelor's degree, a recent National Center for Education Statistics study concluded.
The NCES study, which surveyed one million students in the entering class of 1996 from more than 900 institutions nationwide, revealed 33 percent of students were able to complete all of their requirements in four years. The study also said 21 percent of students finished within five or six years.
However, these statistics do not hold true at the University. According to George Stovall, director of the University's office of Institutional Assessment, the University's numbers have shown a gradual rise since the late 1980s in the percentage of students who graduate in four years.
For students who entered the University in 1996, the same year as in the study, 82.7 percent earned a bachelor's degree four years later, more than double the national percentage.
"There's obviously more emphasis here at U.Va. than at other universities for students to graduate in four years," University Spokesperson Carol Wood said.
Citing the University's undergraduate record, Wood also said the University enforces strict guidelines to ensure students strive to finish their degree requirements within a span of four years.
It is the University's expectation that when students enter the University, they will finish in four years, Wood said.
The College of William and Mary revealed statistics similar to the University. The Office of Institutional Resource at William and Mary shows that 81.1 percent of the full-time freshmen who entered in 1996 finished in four years.
"If you think of William and Mary and U.Va., they are very similar," William and Mary Spokesperson Bill Walker said. "They both have very traditional students. People are very serious here."
Walker also said that while the rate of students completing their degree requirements within four years has remained consistently high at William and Mary, the issue has been monitored more closely in the past few years with the increase in state budget cuts.
"We are monitoring it very closely to make sure we don't slip in that category," Walker said.
According to the study, the amount of time between entering college and fulfilling bachelor's degree requirements increases for individual students due to a number of different factors, ranging from the type of institution, to the route taken in earning the degree, to the parents' own educational experience.
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