Henderson College's Graduation Rate Disappointing
I found this to a surprisingly negative and pointless article. I accept that the numbers are bad and need to be better, but the article's shading is clearly tilted against the institution and puts it in an unfairly negative light.
1) "If no more finish over summer, Nevada’s newest public college will report a six-year graduation rate of just less than 16 percent — one-third of what California’s public state colleges achieve." -- This is comparing completely different types of institutions. In CA, it's a number taken (presumably) as an average over many established institutions. Here, we have a small, growing, start-up institution in a state with already very low academic standards.
2) "Some NSC students discover they are interested in majors the college does not offer, Stewart said. Others leave Nevada or transfer to UNLV. “ ... But NSC was not meant to act as a community college, preparing students to pursue an education elsewhere. A 2001 report supporting establishment of the new school said Nevada needed a state college to produce more college graduates." -- If anyone thought they would have a fully-functioning college offering the full selection of degree programs as a 10,000 student campus within 6 years, they were poorly mistaken. We're happy to finally have our first new building up, with plans to move in shortly.
3) Though only 10 students from NSC’s first full-time freshman class had graduated from the college as of spring, the school has conferred 586 degrees since its inception, with many going to transfer students. -- Thanks for putting this down in the 4th to last paragraph. It really helps to lead with "just 10 had graduated from the institution" and close with "by the way, there are almost 600 degrees that have been conferred."
4) "The California State University system graduates more than 45 percent of its freshmen within six years, a higher percentage than UNLV. The system’s newest campus, at Channel Islands, began accepting freshmen in 2003 and graduated 25 percent of them within four years."
Being from CA, I would guess that 90% of those students are coming straight out of high school and into college, and they are almost all full time students, as this is how most Californians do college. This is likely an unfit comparison as Nevada students are returning from perhaps several years of work and are in need of remediation.
