According to a recent study done by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, about one in five students will transfer to a different institution during their course to obtain an undergraduate degree. SAM will aid MSU in accounting for an increasingly mobile student population.

In its most recent report, MSU achieved a 79 percent six-year graduation rate for students that started college in the summer and fall of 2006.

“Graduation rates are good, but still look artificially low,” Acting Provost June Youatt said of the initiative in the last Faculty Senate meeting held earlier this November. “Because the numbers are calculated based on first-time, full-time completers, we don’t get to count students that come in and complete a degree or international students that come for a year and leave.”

MSU Director of Institutional Studies Mary Black said the initiative will attempt to make information about all students’ progress more readily available to collect data and analyze trends.

“The data includes (students who are) still enrolled, graduated, enrolled elsewhere, graduated elsewhere at a point in time,” Black said. “What this does is allow institutions to report on students who started at the institution but have transferred to and may have graduated from other institutions.”

Although SAM will report on the same population the government-led graduation rate system does, the initiative could provide a better understanding of what paths students take to graduation.