Are You Most Likely to Succeed?

From the Chronicle of Higher Education
A report released by the U.S. Department of Education, found that the rigor of a student's high-school curriculum is the strongest indicator of whether he or she will earn a college degree, regardless of major. The "academic intensity" of students' high-school courses played a larger role than did their grades and standardized test scores, according to the report, "The Toolbox Revisited: Paths to Degree Completion From High School Through College."
• Timing: When students enrolled was more important than where they went to college. Students who had not matriculated by the January after their high-school graduation saw their chances of earning a degree plummet.
• Academic progress: Earning at least 20 credits by the end of the first year of college is a crucial benchmark, the report said. Among students who attended a four-year college and earned fewer credits, only 22 percent went on to earn bachelor's degrees.
• Summer study: The report recommends that colleges expand the use of summer terms. More than 60 percent of students in the survey enrolled in summer classes, having "shattered the observance of the traditional academic calendar." Earning more than four credits during summer terms correlated positively to degree completion, particularly for black students.
• Dual enrollment: Earning some college credits while still in high school is also positively associated with degree completion. "If traditional-age students entered college or community college with a minimum of six credits of 'real stuff,' not fluff, their adaptation to the critical first-year will not be short-circuited," the report says.
• Sophomore year: "The second academic-calendar year offers students the opportunity to recapture any lack of momentum of the first," the report says. "In that respect, the second year may be even more important than the first."
• Mathematics: "The world demands advanced quantitative literacy, and no matter what a student's postsecondary field of study ... more than a ceremonial visit to college-level mathematics is called for," the report says.
• Demographic background: Students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds were less likely to attend high schools that offered high-level courses. Latino students, for instance, were far less likely to attend schools that offered calculus or trigonometry than white or Asian students.
• Geographic mobility: Of the 58 percent of students who attended more than one college, 37 percent crossed state lines in the process.