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CNNMoney ranks EGCC among top 5 community colleges in Ohio
By Denise Dick
Youngstown
A recent CNNMoney article lists Eastern Gateway Community College as No. 5 among Ohio’s community colleges for transfer and graduation rate.
The rankings are “based on the percentage of students that graduated within three years or transferred to four-year colleges,” the article says.
EGCC saw a 37 percent combined graduation and transfer rate. Lorain Community College in Elyria was Ohio’s best with 45 percent. Southern State in Hillsboro also logged 45 percent and Lakeland CC and Belmont Technical saw 41 percent and 40 percent, respectively.
The highest in the U.S. is East San Gabriel Valley Regional Occupational Program in California which boasts 93 percent.
Laura Meeks, EGCC president, said that for the past seven years, the college has been working to increase retention, graduation and course-completion rates through the Achieving the Dream program, aimed at success for more community college students.
The college’s graduation rate is 24 percent, and its transfer rate is 27 percent.
Meeks said EGCC hopes to improve upon that.
Though the graduation and transfer rates are a measure of a community college’s success, she considers the course completion rate a more significant barometer.
“At a community college, a lot of students don’t plan to graduate,” Meeks said. “They plan to transfer, to take a class for work or to brush up.”
Generally, though, every student who takes a class plans to complete it.
EGCC’s course-success rate is 75.3, although the goal is 80 percent, Meeks said.
“Over 50 percent of students enrolled in college across America attended a community college,” the college president said.
One way Eastern Gateway has increased its course- completion rate is by revamping its developmen- al courses, those that students must take to brush up on subject areas.
Rather than students sitting in a classroom while an instructor talks, the developmental courses are in a lab setting using computers, and instructors come to the students if they get stuck.
The college also is focusing on improving what it terms gateway courses or those required for many fields.
Accounting, anatomy and physiology are gateway courses in which many students struggle.
Meeks said supplemental instruction and a computerized help desk are some of the new strategies used to help students in those classes
“We’re providing intervention in those courses to try to improve completion,” she said.