Expectations for degrees at the University of Minnesota

The Board of Regents created progress cards that ASR needs to make sure we are aligned with, so that we are better situated to accomplish the various goals set forth for the University of Minnesota. To better understand the expectations for the Provost, Vice Provost and ASR regarding graduation, please read the following:

• Students are expected to complete their degree in 4-years.
• There is an ongoing discussion about how to handle students who finish their degrees before 4 years and whether or not they need to be cleared.  Stay tuned.

• Students that have completed all degree requirements are expected to be cleared for their degree to remain in federal aid compliance:
• A student who completes the academic requirements for a program but does not yet have the degree or certificate is not eligible for further additional FSA funds for that program.
• Degrees should be posted so that students do not receive aid for courses that are not applicable to their degree

• And, here is the link to the whole segment of the handbook, if you need some additional information: http://ifap.ed.gov/fsahandbook/attachments/1415Vol1Ch1.pdf

• Students that have completed degree requirements but are still pursuing a second major (including Honors) or minor get their degree posted and become non-degree students

• Students that have completed degree requirements, have not applied for graduation and are not taking classes should be cleared for graduation (right now this should be initiated by the college, but this may change with the Timely Graduation Policy proposal).

• Students that have completed degree requirements but have in progress coursework that is not applicable to their program should be cleared for degree.

• Colleges should not be forcing students to fill out a readmission form for the sole purpose of degree clearance/posting.  Colleges should contact their OTR representative.

• Colleges should use comments/notes section on the degree clearance page to identify the term in which the student completed their degree requirements (rather than have the student change their grad application term).

Please contact me if you have any questions, as we are not always providing correct information even within our own unit and to others.

Thanks,

Sue

The Regents’ Gold and Maroon measures for progress cards

At their October 9th meeting, the U of M Board of Regents discussed what their expectations are for setting goals and measuring the success of the University and its institutional strength using a progress card framework. The measures they are recommending for implementation are broken into two groups, Gold measures that establish a future-looking road map and Maroon measures that indicate current performance.

Gold measures and goals:

• 4-year graduation rate of 65% for the Twin Cities 2017 cohort
• 6-year graduation rate of 82% for the Twin Cities 2015 cohort
• 4-year graduation rate of 54% for system Pell-eligible students in 2017 cohort
• Twin Cities freshman average ACT score greater than 28

Maroon measures and goals:

• 3-year graduation rate greater than 65% for Twin Cities transfer students
• More than 5,250 graduate and professional degrees awarded
• Median undergraduate debt at graduation for system-wide students to grow no faster than CPI (corrected for federal and state policy changes)
• Maintain recent gains in the Graduation Success Rate for athletics

You can read even more about the Regents progress card goals in the docket materials from their October 2015 meeting.

Completion Scholarships

Bob McMaster has been working with the University of Minnesota Foundation to utilize some unrestricted scholarship funds (meaning, that these scholarship funds do not have predetermined purposes) to assist Twin Cities students in completing their degrees. Identifying the students who will be granted these scholarships will be a true collaborative effort within ASR, as the Student Degree Progress team, One Stop and the Office of Student Finance will all be involved. At the moment $67,500 is available to award annually. The scholarships are for Twin Cities undergraduate students who are on track to graduate, but need financial support to finish their remaining requirements. This is very exciting news and we can hardly wait to award our first scholarship.

Student Degree Progress efforts yielding results

Over the past two weeks the ASR Student Degree Progress group has contacted approximately 150 UMTC students who are close but haven't completed their degrees. Already these efforts have led to conversations with seven students who are interested in returning to the University of Minnesota. Based on this success the group plans to expand efforts in the coming months.