Understanding Why Engineering Students Take Too Long to Graduate

Abstract

There is growing pressure on public colleges and universities to decrease the time students take to earn an undergraduate degree. There are many factors that slow students’ progress towards graduation. For example, urban universities may have a significant number of non-traditional students who don’t take a full load of courses required to graduate in four years. Also, some freshman students interested in engineering may not be prepared for college and are required to take remedial math and science courses. Engineering is a highly-structured program, often with a long sequence of courses requiring one or more prerequisites. If some courses aren’t offered each semester, this can delay progress toward graduation for some students. This paper examines graduating students’ academic records and surveys senior-level mechanical engineering students to identify some of the causes for the increased graduation times. Students provided detailed information such as their full- or part-time status, how many semesters left to graduation, whether they attended summer school, the courses they had difficulty passing, and other issues related to the length of time required to complete their degrees. Feedback from students is essential as universities look to improve graduation rates. The results presented are based on the data for the mechanical engineering program at a public institution in Texas. Although each institution is unique, the findings presented in this paper are expected to apply to similar institutions throughout the nation.