Part-Time Students Lag behind Full-Time Peers, Study Finds

Students who attend college part time are at a disadvantage relative to their full-time peers, according to a report released in June by the National Center for Education Statistics, an arm of the U.S. Department of Education. The report analyzes data from a 2004 national postsecondary student-aid study to create a profile of part-time undergraduates and determine the relationship between part-time study and college persistence and degree attainment. The researchers found that, even controlling for factors like gender, family income, and educational expectations, part-time students lagged behind full-timers in both areas. According to the report, "Part-Time Undergraduates in Postsecondary Education: 2003-4," 35 percent of undergraduates during the 2003-4 academic year attended college on a part-time basis. Compared with their full-time counterparts, those students tended to be older, financially independent, and first-generation students. They were also more likely to be female, Hispanic, and less academically prepared; to come from low-income families; and to have lower educational expectations than full-time students. In a representative sample of undergraduates who entered college in 1995 and attended exclusively on a part-time basis, only 15 percent had completed a degree or certificate by the end of six years, and none had attained a bachelor's degree. Seventy-three percent had left college without earning a degree, and 46 percent had left within their first year of study.