How to Meet Obama's College-Completion Goal

By Emily Sismour
Is President Obama's ambitious goal of producing 8 million more college graduates by 2020 feasible? And, if so, how will the United States' education system meet this lofty challenge? The challenge can be met, say the results of a new report issued by three higher-education agencies, but meeting the goal will require an unyielding commitment from education leaders and state and federal authorities. And, instead of just discussing how it can be accomplished as has been the case for several months, government and education leaders will need to take action.

The "Strengthening College Opportunity and Performance" report conducted by the National Center for Higher Education Management Systems, the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, and the Delta Project on Post Secondary Education Costs, Productivity and Accountability lays out a series of recommendations that, if implemented, can put the nation on course to meet the 2020 graduation goal.

Primarily, the federal government needs to provide concrete, clear-cut goals for state leaders and state education agencies in order to ensure that actions being taken to improve graduation rates are helping to actively contribute to progress as opposed to inhibiting it.

With strict guidelines, states will have a better understanding of how many more graduates their colleges and universities should be producing. States will then be able to provide their higher education institutions with straightforward goals to meet. Perhaps the most difficult initiative, notes the report, will be focusing on student retention and seeing students through to graduation as opposed to trying to increase revenue.

In fact, effective cost containment will be a major determinant in successfully reaching Obama's student graduation goals. Colleges and universities, nationwide will have to initiate practices that focus on cost-effective ways to recruit, retain and graduate students without relying on additional graduate school or research programs. Changing how higher education is funded and paid for will prove to be the most difficult task, in this respect, as it will mean effectively "abandoning well-understood and deeply ingrained practices."

For President Obama's college graduation goals to be met, 60% of America's students will need to earn a college degree by 2020 compared to the 40% of students who currently hold a college degree. And, while many find the President's goal to be unrealistic, the results of the report show that it is, in fact, "completely feasible" if the correct actions are taken and the federal and state government and education leaders rise to the challenge.