(from Forbes):
By Thomas K. Lindsay
Debt and dropout rates are the twin plagues of today’s college students, both in Texas and across the nation. Nationally, the Wall Street Journal reports that the average college graduate will owe $35,000 in student-loan debt. Here in my hometown of Austin, Texas, only 49 percent of those who start college complete their degree.
If you are an adult working a job and attending community college in Texas, your chances of graduation are even slimmer. If you can somehow manage to go to school full time while holding down a job, there is less than a 15 percent chance that you’ll ever earn your degree. If you need to go to school part-time—as 80 percent of community college students do—then your odds drop significantly. Nationwide, more than 30 million adults have earned some college credit but have failed to complete their degree.
So, it is notable that a small nonprofit in Austin has developed what they see as a vaccine for the modern plagues of debt and dropout.
“None of our students owes college debt,” said PelotonU’s Director of College Completion, Sarah Saxton-Frump, “and 83 percent of our students are on track to earn their Bachelor’s degree on time. This, while all of them also hold down jobs and go to college.”
How does the PelotonU model work? CONTINUE READING HERE