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Research Blog #6: Visual


A Major Decision

The picture to the right illustrates the growing epidemic of college students who are deciding to be undecided in their first year of college. With the pressure higher than ever to find a major and stick to it due to the high cost of a college education, we still find students choosing to remain undecided. This growing number is concerning because indecision among students means that graduation rates will begin to lower. However, this number is not a clear estimate of how many undecided students there really are- most first-year students pick a course of study that they believe they are interested in, only to find themselves switching to a different discipline later in their education. This statistic has caused pressure for many four-year public universities to decrease the time-to-degree completion rates, which is displayed in a national ranking. This presents an interesting question: are colleges really concerned about the financial being of their students, or are they more concerned about how their institution presents itself in statistics?

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