University of Wisconsin has an 11 percent gap between the graduation rates of Federal Pell Grant recipients and students who didn’t receive the grant.
The Pell Grant is a federal financial award given to students from low-income families. An Educational Trust report, released Sept. 24, found students at UW who didn’t receive the grant had an 84 percent graduation rate, while recipients had a 73 percent rate.
Associate Provost and Director of Academic Planning and Institutional Research Jocelyn Milner said she hopes people don’t get the idea Pell students don’t do well at the university.
“The 11 percent gap doesn’t mean Pell Grant students aren’t succeeding,” Milner said. “They are and they’re graduating at rates close to the very high rates of the students overall.”
Pell Grant recipients, Milner said, have a good chance of graduating. While there are no academic or advising programs specifically designated for Pell students, they have access to all the services offered to the rest of the student body.
Milner said, however, UW-Madison has more Pell Grant recipients than other universities at the top of the list who had higher graduation percentages.
In an effort to close the gap, Milner said the university has been building its advising services for students, as well as renewing their efforts to further offer financial assistance to Pell students.
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Director and Associate Researcher for the Wisconsin Center of the Advancement of Postsecondary Education Noel Radomski said the data is indicative of everything the university isn’t doing when it comes to helping Pell Grant recipients after they enroll.
Radomski said these disparities are also present in other UW System schools. UW-Superior and UW-Whitewater have two of the higher gaps with 14 and 16 percent respectively.
“It’s pretty intuitive when you think about this because it’s hard to get into UW-Madison and less difficult to get into Stevens Point,” Radomski said. “So why is it that less selective institutions have a smaller gap than UW-Madison? It seems like it should be the opposite because it’s hard to get in here, regardless of if you’re eligible for Pell or not.”
Up until the report from Educational Trust, Radomski said the data wasn’t available. As of 2008, prospective students were able to call universities for graduation data, but with the government putting $32 million into Pell grants, Radomski said the burden of the data is now asking if UW-Madison is a good fiscal steward of federal tax money in the form of Pell grants.
Radomski said moving forward, the university needs to focus more on the graduation of Pell Grant students. Universities that have better support services have a tendency to graduate a higher percentage of Pell students, especially if they require Pell students to seek advising as opposed to making it voluntary.
Being the state’s land grant institution, Radomski said UW-Madison has the obligation to educate a wide range of students, including those who are economically disadvantaged.
“We’re the state land grant institution, and we only have 15 percent of our students Pell-eligible, which is the lowest in the UW System,” Radomski said. “We’re educating a smaller percentage, and we have a larger gap. So what’s the problem, UW-Madison?”
