UAH graduation rate

ThreeKidsMom
Sun, 10 Apr 2016 19:24:12 +0000

DS is a current freshman at UAH. Last year, when looking at the low graduation rate I determined it was likely caused by two factors. A lot of UAH students participate in co-ops. These are typically 1 or 2 school semesters plus 1 or 2 summers. The other factor is that it is/was more of a commuter school. The age skews a bit older than other universities we looked at, so I figured there were more students with jobs and families. These students would likely take lighter loads and stretch out their education over a longer time frame.

Addressing some other points made above:
Merit Scholarships:
I don’t think losing scholarships is much of a factor. If you look at the numbers from the Common Data Set, particularly H2A (n), it certainly appears that the vast majority of the students with academic scholarships keep them.

Commuter School:
In my son’s honor classes, particularly Honors English & FYE, the classes that all honors students must take, he found a lot of OOS students. He has friends from all over the United States, plus a few internationals. Like him, most came for the awesome scholarships. He does have friends from the local area as well. It is a nice mix. Among his friends & suite mates, I don’t think any of them regularly go home for the weekends. I think all, certainly most, of his friends are planning to live on campus next year as well.
I imagine that the non-honors student body is less geographically diverse.

Weed Out Classes:
My son is in the college of engineering. He came in with lots of dual enrollment classes, and at a sophomore level for the engineering specific classes. If there were any weed-out classes, he either came in at a level above them or he just hasn’t noticed. He had 2 years of excellent, high level, college instruction from dual enrollment, so he has not experienced any transition problems. He already knew how to study at the college level. Some of his UAH classes have been mostly review for him, but for the other classes he has put in the time and effort to earn his high grades.

“I want him to have professors who are supportive , with a warm, friendly college experience. He will be far from home and I want him to feel comfortable gong to professors, and engaging in the campus community.” :

Yes, my son is also far from home & I wanted those things as well. I think UAH has been very good in these areas. It is a nice, comfortable, friendly campus. He does feel welcomed and he is engaged with other students and professors. His complaints have been the weather (we are from a climate with very dry air), that it is so far from home, and the food (“everything is fried”). Otherwise, he is quite happy there. One interesting remark he made was about Dr. Wilkerson, Dean of the Honors College. My son said that, after meeting him once at a campus visit in the spring of his senior year, Dr. Wilkerson remembers him and greets him by name every time they pass each other on campus. Son is very impressed by that!

Job Opportunities:
Yep, I’m impressed. We chose UAH for the awesome merit scholarships, friendliness & size of the campus, reputation, and the job opportunities in the community. Sure enough, he was offered a great summer internship with a company in Huntsville. And a great perk is that we don’t have to scramble trying to find a place for him to live during the summer. He can stay on campus. Now, if he was a “true freshman” I think it would have been much more difficult to land an internship, but with all his dual enrollment courses he is a sophomore for the engineering sequence.