The United States is no longer the world leader in completion of college based on a recent report from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
While the U.S. leads the world in the proportion of 35- to 64-year-olds with college degrees, it ranks seventh as a developed nation with 39 percent of 25- to 34-year-olds with associate degrees. Canada and Japan lead internationally with 53 percent and 52 percent respectively of their 25- to 34-year-olds reaching the same educational level, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education.
The report also showed that nearly 60 percent of Americans enter college, compared to 53 percent among OECD nations. However, approximately 50 percent of Americans actually earn a college degree, leaving the U.S. with one of the lowest "survival rates," along with Mexico and New Zealand.
However, AU does not have problems with its graduation rates. According to Karen Froslid Jones, director of the Office of Institutional Research and Assessment, the graduation rates for AU students, based on a six-year graduation time frame, were 70.3 percent in 2005.
"That graduation rate is a pretty good graduation rate compared to other institutions," Jones said.
Adrea Lawrence, assistant professor in the School of Education, said she believes the issue with U.S. college completion rates goes "back to access and sustained financial aid."
"I know with some scholarships sometimes it's a flat fee and it's not given every year; therefore, it's difficult for some students to finish college," Lawrence said. "Also, general access to college education is a problem particularly for minority populations."
Lawrence said the reason she believes European nations may have higher education rates than the U.S. is that their federal governments often pay for students' tuition, books and health care.
While ratings of the U.S. higher education system have dropped over the years, the price of higher education has grown exponentially. The number of Federal Pell Grants for low-income students that used to cover 70 percent of college tuition now barely cover half of the tuition, according to The New York Times.
"Pell Grants have been decreased over the past decade, and I think that's having a pretty big impact," Lawrence said.
Daryn Koo, a sophomore in the College of Arts and Sciences, said she is disappointed in the United States' international rank in higher education completion. "The U.S. is failing in some sense since there are higher graduation and retention rates in other countries - we should catch up," Koo said.
Perry Sacks, a sophomore in CAS, said she believes the U.S. government needs to take more action to improve its completion rates.
"Our federal government needs to recognize the connection between having a degree and getting a job in the global marketplace," she said. "That's why I think that our jobs are being outsourced to people from other countries."
Sacks said the quickest solution would be more federal funding, although she doesn't know where the government would get the money.
"Universities need to lower tuition," Sacks said.
Sacks also suggested that businesses and corporations could fund post-undergraduate education for their employees.
Lawrence said that for colleges and universities in the U.S., a lot is coming down to what kind of funding colleges provide, such as work study and academic grants.
"Colleges are having to take on more of that responsibility that was previously the federal government's," she said.
Lawrence said she believes another contribution to the U.S.'s lagging college completion rates is students having to evaluate the opportunity cost of spending a lot of money for school or making money in the job force right now.
The OECD's annual report, titled "Education at a Glance: OECD Indicators," ranks educational systems of its 30 member democracies.
