It's May of 2016, and technically I should be getting excited about receiving my Bachelor's degree, but I am not. I should be purchasing my cap and gown, counting my credits and awaiting the last day of my courses. I watch as one by one, my friends post their pictures to social media, holding that long awaited scroll of accomplishment in hand, and here I sit, mouth shut, eager to begin my last semester of school.
When you get to college, everybody you come in contact with repeats the phrase, "in four years," as if that is a guarantee. As if there isn't any question about the fact that every single person who pursues a four year degree accomplishes that, in four years.
Most college students I know are part time workers and full time college students, which means they are balancing a lot more than one thing on their plate at once. With the pressures of money, homework and social strains pulling on the typical college student, who is to say that the staggering number of credits that is required to get a college degree should be easily acquired in as little of a time as four years?
TIME Magazine writes, "According to the Department of Education, fewer than 40 percent of students who enter college each year graduate within four years, while almost 60 percent of students graduate in six years. At public schools, less than a third of students graduate on time."
The whole concept of graduating in the unbelievable time limit of four years is becoming known as "The Four-Year Myth."
"Only 50 out of the more than 580 public four-year institutions in America report on-time graduation rates at or above 50 percent for their first-time, full-time students," states Complete College America. For more information on the topic, please visit this website.
If you're like me, when you started college, you had no idea what you were supposed to be doing with your life. More than likely, you were floundering about, struggling to find a path to take that seemed to lead to a possible future.
The point of college is not to graduate in an allotted amount of time selected for you. The point of college should be to graduate, even if you have to fight tooth and nail, even if it takes you ten years to get there. The point of graduating college is improvement and bettering your life and the lives of those around you. Whether or not you complete that goal in four years is not important.
The message here is, don't let anyone discourage you from your goals because what you're doing doesn't meet society standards. Graduating college at all is an accomplishment, and whether it takes you four years or six, you're working toward something bright and hopeful.
