Summary
Two learning institutions, namely School H and Blueberry Community College, were given a free tuition program to implement at different time intervals. School H rolled out its program in the year 2006, while Blueberry Community College implemented its own between 2014 and 2018. However, the data available for both were different, with school H presenting its information as full-time and part-time enrollment. On the other hand, Blueberry captured its facts as males and females.
This created confusion in coding, analysis, comparison, and interpretation of the results. Consequently, this was cured by removing categories and providing only the totals for each year (no full-time, part-time) in terms of enrollment and persistence per year for (tuition assistant Program- 2004-2008) in school H. At the same time, data for Blueberry Community College was reorganized by extracting males & females variables and providing only enrollment and graduation for each year for the Bridge Program 2014-2018. The final information extracted from the two programs by the School H and Blueberry Community College is displayed in Tables 1 and 2, respectively.
Table 1: School H’s students’ tuition enrollment rates before and after the implementation of the assistance program in 2006
In Table 1, the data are presented in columns showing variables for the year, existing enrollment before the year, new enrollment in that year, total enrollment for the whole year, and enrollment and persistence rates per year. Furthermore, the information is divided into that collected before and after 2006, the year in which free tuition took effect at School H.
Table 2: Blueberry Community College enrollment and graduation rates after the implementation of the bridge program from 2014 to 2020
In Table 2, the data derived from the Bridge Program (2014-2018) for Blueberry Community College is displayed in five columns. These represent variables, namely year, enrollment numbers, proportion of the total number of enrollments, number graduating that year, and percentage of the total number graduating in each year.
Analysis of the Graphs
The bar graph, labeled Figure 1, displays information about School H before, during, and after the introduction of the free tuition initiative. The y-axis represents the time in years from 2004 to 2008, while the x-axis represents the percentage of the total number for both enrollment persistence (CFI Team, 2023). Figure 2, a bar graph labeled, displays information about Blueberry Community College before, during, and after the implementation of the free tuition program. Years from 2015 to 2020 are plotted on the y-axis, and percentages for total enrollment and yearly graduation proportions appear on the x-axis.
Figure 3 is a combined bar graph that includes information from both School H and Blueberry Community College. It compares the rates of enrollment on one hand and the graduation/persistence numbers on the other for both institutions based on the years in which free tuition was implemented.
In the first graph, which provides information about school H, the blue color represents the enrollment rates before, during, and after the adoption of the tuition-free program. The trend shows that between 2004 and 2005, before the implementation, there was an increase in the number of enrollments and persistence levels, and both recorded higher numbers in 2007. However, both declined in 2008 at the tail end of the implementation.
For bar graph 2, the enrollment and graduation rates increased during the implementation period from 2015 to 2018. In the case of enrollment, it registered the highest percentage of 22.3%% in the last year of the program. The graduation rate was highest in 2017, at approximately 31%. However, there is a similarity between the data from School H and Blueberry Community College. In both instances, there is a general decline in enrollment and graduation/persistence rates at the end of the program’s implementation.
Consequently, it means that the free tuition program has no positive impact on enrollment and graduation/persistence in the institutions. In other words, the present free tuition policy at Blueberry Community College did not sustain enrollment and graduation numbers at higher levels beyond the implementation period; hence, it has failed to create a valued outcome. Therefore, these results suggest that the free tuition policy at Blueberry Community College has been ineffective and will likely have no impact in the future.
Reference
CFI Team. (2023). Bar charts (data visualization and technical analysis). Corporate Finance Institute. Web.