Report Links Community College Graduation Rates, Costs

A 50 percent improvement in community college graduation rates would create $5.3 billion in taxpayer revenue as well as $30 billion more in lifetime income for the 160,000 new graduates, according to a study by Mark Schneider, a visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, and Lu Michelle Yin, an economist and researcher at the American Institutes for Research. The report praised Valencia College for its "competency-based model," and said community colleges could boost graduation rates by streamlining the degree path, using more online courses and borrowing innovations from for-profit colleges.