Iowa State is studying the numbers of students graduating in four years to determine whether ISU students are increasingly or decreasingly meeting that goal  — and whether the goal is, in fact, most beneficial to students.

The Iowa Board of Regents strategic plan highlights three priorities: “access, affordability and student success; education excellence and impact; and economic development and vitality.”

The Regents’ strategic plan has a list of eight goals for the five Regent institutions to meet that will help in achieving these priorities.

The third goal on the Regents’ list is, “Iowa’s public universities will increase the percent of undergraduate students who graduate within four years.”

The plan has accountability measures and targets for the universities to meet. The universities are to measure the data of the percent of students who graduate in four years, then increase the graduation rates by 40 percent, or to the median of its peer group.

“It’s important students graduate within four years because the guideline for undergraduate students has students ideally graduating in four years,” said Greta Johnson, ISU alumna and current member of the Board of Regents.

. “If they don’t it’s costing the student more money as well as the university and state.”

Johnson said some of her friends who didn’t graduate on time took study abroad and participated in internship opportunities.

Tammy Stegman, career coordinator in Business Career Services, said internships and study abroad programs do play a role in getting a job after graduation.

“To a hiring manager seeing related experiences and activities on a resume puts the student a step above the rest,” Stegman said. “Employers don’t necessarily want a 4.0 [GPA] student who has never held a job or balanced school with anything.”

Stegman said most employers tend to look at three things, “good grades, related experiences and involvement.”

Johnson said she understands the value of internships and study abroad programs, which are a part of why some students are not graduating in four years, but said it is important for students to stay on task.

“Goofing off instead of doing work needs to be avoided — students need to realize the value in finishing in four years,” Johnson said.

David Holger, associate provost for academic programs and dean of the graduate college, said Iowa State is having a lot of internal discussion about four-year graduation rates and looking into a fair amount of data.

“I guess we feel preparation for a successful post-graduation career is more important for a graduation goal,” Holger said.

He said studying abroad and similar experiences may take more time and might be a good investment for students in the end.

Holger said the university is trying to gather better data to discuss with the Board of Regents.

“Four years might not be the answer. We’re trying to do some analysis of how the student debt compares for students who graduate within four years, and four-and-a-half or five years,” Holger said.

He said the data they have been looking at doesn’t necessarily correlate to higher student debt, and there is a lot of speculation as to why that might be.

“If you do something that does get you money within the five years, some internships and co-op experiences have paid benefits,” Holger said.

He said making a trade of slightly more debt for an immediate income would be fair.

“Right now the data is sort of mixed,” Holger said. “In some of our programs there are opportunities to do other things beneficial to student disciplinary and oriented growth that might make four years not the right answer.”

Luke Roling, president of the Government of the Student Body and senior in chemical engineering, sat in on the creation of ISU’s strategic plan, and said he would be very interested to see the data being gathered and that the goal could be counterintuitive.

“I believe it’s very important that the university places an emphasis on graduating as soon as is appropriate for students at ISU,” Roling said. “Each semester that students spend in school is not only a semester of paying tuition and other costs, but also a semester of not earning money in their careers.”

He said there are important circumstances to consider when determining the reason why some students take more than four years.

“We … have some very intensive programs on campus with degrees difficult to obtain in four years,” Roling said. “I therefore don’t believe it’s the best idea to draw too firm a line at the four-year mark, since many students have circumstances that are beneficial for giving a short delay to graduation. I believe university administration and the Regents are well-aware of this, and will consider this appropriately in analyzing their data.”

Holger said there is a fair amount of discussion going on nationally. “Faster and cheaper isn’t always true,” he said.

The university wants alumni who are happy 10 years after graduation about the preparation they received during college because it helped them be successful, Holger said.

“This is a much harder thing to measure than the time it takes to get a degree,” Holger said.

He said he didn’t think class availability was having much of an impact on whether students graduate within four years.

“We’re trying to be pretty systematic about that in terms of required courses,” Holger said.

Holger is the head of a group that tries to predict what previous needs of students were and what new admission numbers look like.

“We’re trying to look at which of the courses students need to take to get progress toward their degree. We’re looking at if there is mismatch, or over-demand and the number of seats offered,” Holger said. “During the last two or three years we’ve been improving with that.”

He said the priority has to be a course you need to take in a particular term in a degree.