CHARACTERISTICS OF THE 1997-98 BACCALAUREATE GRADUATING CLASS

HIGHLIGHTS

• Only one in three  baccalaureate students began at KSU as a beginning freshman       or learning support student, while 67% of the baccalaureate graduates were transfer students.
   
• Of the 1997-98 bachelor's degree graduates who began as freshmen  (486),  38% completedtheir program in five years or less, 49% took six to ten years and 9%  took  eleven to fifteen years to graduate.  Twenty-five students (5%) who began as freshmen took more than 15 years to complete their degrees.  One student who graduated began at KSU in 1967, 33 years ago. 
   
• Many of the transfer graduates (797 or 75%)  completed  their degrees within five years; 20% took six to ten years, and 5% took 11-20 years.  One transfer   student  initially enrolled at KSU in 1969.
   
•  Of the graduates who began as learning support students (37), only 35%completed their degree requirements in five or less years.  Fifty-seven percent completed their degrees within six to ten years.  Three students took 15 years to finish their degree programs.
   
• Fifty-seven percent of the graduates matriculated at KSU in a fall quarter; 43% began in one of the other three academic quarters of the year. Slightly less than one half, (48%) of the transfers chose fall as the term to begin, while the freshmen and developmental studies students were more traditional, with 74% of the   freshman students beginning in a fall quarter.   
   
• The average age of the bachelor's degree recipients at KSU in 1997-98 remained at  30 which is about  seven years older than the average age at traditional residential campuses, reflecting the non-traditional nature of KSU's student body.
   
• Of the 1,582 graduates, 64% were female; 88% were white, 6% were black and all other minorities made up six percent.  (Female graduates were up 10% over the class of 1997.)