In January of this year, the Kansas Board of Regents — the governing body that oversees the state’s higher education — released its data and statistics on how many students at each public university have, or will graduate, in four, five, six or eight years.
KBOR governs Wichita State University, Emporia State University, Fort Hayes State University, Kansas State University, Pittsburgh State University and the University of Kansas among other institutions like community colleges.
The data pertains to first-generation, full-time freshmen that entered their respective university in Fall 2015-2020. The rates are reported in four years, five years, six years and eight years based on the 120 credit hour degree requirement.
KBOR used Integration of Postsecondary Education Data System definitions to calculate the rates of graduation. The total number of freshman full-time degree-seeking students enrolled in the fall semester is divided from the students who graduate from that class to determine the percentages.
Before the 2023 State University Data Book, the data used for this calculation was sourced from surveys submitted by the institutions. Since 2023, this data has been sourced from the Kansas Higher Education Data System Academic Year and Fall Census collections.
