Students at Connecticut State Community College (CT State) will soon have an easier path to the state’s four-year universities. The Board of Regents has approved a standard general education requirement for the system.
Officials said they made the change in an attempt to be more transparent about how community college classes transfer to a four-year degree program at Southern, Central, Eastern or Western Connecticut State University.
“The CSCU General Education Transfer Credit Alignment Policy will have a lasting impact on our students as it addresses student success, affordability and systemness,” CSCU Chancellor Terrence Cheng said. “This policy will help ease the path for CT State students to transfer general education courses to CSCU’s four-year institutions, complete a bachelor’s degree program and successfully enter the workforce.”
Aynsley Diamond, the associate vice president of academic affairs at CSCU, said the system is missing out on millions of dollars in revenue from tuition of students who transfer to other schools.
“We need to guide more students to vertical transfer and retain more transfer students within our system,” Diamond said. “But please let me be blunt: our competitors do this faster and better and they are very happy to take our students.”
The state is struggling to recruit and retain students in its public college and university system. Over the past five years, enrollment was down 27% at community colleges and 12% at the four universities.
