San Bernardino, CA – Cal State San Bernardino is exceeding most of its own projections in helping students get their degrees in a timely basis as part of the California State University System’s Graduation Initiative 2025 to expedite its students’ path to a high-quality college degree.
The CSUSB results echo a system-wide preliminary initiative report issued on Wednesday, Oct. 17, indicating that the CSU is making strides in improving student achievement as graduation rates for first-time freshmen and transfer students reached all-time highs and equity gaps between students from historically underserved communities and other students narrowed.
The CSU launched the initiative in September 2016 with a clear goal: to increase graduation rates for the CSU’s 475,000 students across all 23 campuses.
“Our commitment is to help our students graduate with an exceptional education in a timely basis,” said CSUSB President Tomás D. Morales. “The fact that we are ahead of our own projections two years into the program reflects on the dedication of our faculty, staff and administrators and their efforts to help our students graduate sooner without losing any of the quality of the cutting-edge educational programs we offer.”
In a glimpse of where CSUSB is midway toward its 2025 goals, according to preliminary reports, the university is making good progress in exceeding those goals – in some instances, registering among the highest graduation rates in the university’s history, and making moderate progress toward another goal.
The categories include: full-time, first-time freshmen four-year graduation rates; new transfer students two-year graduation rates; full-time, first-time freshmen six-year graduation rates; new transfer students four-year graduation rates; and eliminating the gap between the percentage of Pell Grant full-time, first-time freshmen recipients and non-Pell Grant full-time, first-time freshmen recipients; and eliminating the gap between the percentage of underrepresented minority full-time, first-time freshmen and non-underrepresented full-time, first-time freshmen.
Some of the benchmarks include:
- In the 2025 goal to have 30 percent of all full-time, first-time freshmen graduate within four years, the 2014-18 cohort graduation rate is 18.5 percent compared to the 2013-17 cohort graduation rate of 13.9 percent.
- In the 2025 goal to have 62 percent of all full-time, first-time freshmen graduate within 6 years, the 2012-18 cohort six-year graduation rate is 56.8 percent compared to the 2011-17 cohort six-year graduation rate of 54.2 percent.
- In the 2025 goal to have 45 percent of all new transfer students graduate within two years, the 2016-18 graduation rate is 39.8 percent compared to the 2015-17 graduation rate of 36.8 percent.
- In the 2025 goal to have 83 percent of all new transfer students graduate within four years, the 2014-18 graduation rate was 78.6 percent compared to the 2013-17 goal of 76.6 percent.
- In the 2025 goal to eliminate the gap between the percentage of Pell Grant freshmen recipient graduation rates and non-Pell Grant freshmen graduation rates, the 2012-18 rate is 3.3 percentage points compared to the 2011-17 rate of 3.7 percentage points.
- In the 2025 goal to eliminate the gap between the percentage of underrepresented full-time, first-time freshmen minorities and non-underrepresented full-time, first-time freshmen, the 2012-18 rate is 3.7 percentage points compared to the 2011-17 rate of 5.1 percentage points.
To meet the workforce demands of California’s innovation economy in the years and decades to come, Graduation Initiative 2025 will add 100,000 more baccalaureate degree-educated citizens to California over the next 10 years. This would bring the total number of expected CSU graduates between 2015 and 2025 alone to more than one million.
For more information, visit CSUSB’s Graduation Initiative 2025 website and the California State University Graduation Initiative 2025 website.
About Cal State San Bernardino
California State University, San Bernardino is a preeminent center of intellectual and cultural activity in Inland Southern California. Opened in 1965 and set at the foothills of the beautiful San Bernardino Mountains, the university serves more than 20,000 students each year and graduates about 4,000 students annually. The university offers more than 70 traditional baccalaureate and master’s degree programs, education credential and certificate programs, and a doctorate program in educational leadership. Every one of its academic programs that is eligible has earned national accreditation. CSUSB reflects the dynamic diversity of the region and has the most diverse student population of any university in the Inland Empire. More than 80 percent of those who graduate are the first in their families to do so.
