Many Adults Falling Short of Degrees - AMY ZIPKIN, NY Times

As the economic benefits of having a college degree become better known, the number of full-time adult learners — those over 24 — is growing, according to the National Center for Education Statistics, increasing more than 8 percent to over 2.5 million in 2011 (the last year for which statistics are available) from 2.3 million in 2009. Some are veterans eligible for benefits under a post-9/11 G.I. Bill. Still, the completion rate for older undergraduates lags that of their younger peers. Among full-time students at four-year institutions who entered college in 2007 and graduated within six years, 81 percent of those who entered when they were younger than 20 years old graduated, while the rate was 61 percent for those older than 24 at entry, according to data compiled last year by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center in Herndon, Va. Robert J. Hansen, the chief executive of the University Professional and Continuing Education Association, a Washington trade group, estimated that 700 four-year campuses offered continuing education programs in for older students to earn a bachelor’s degree. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/18/education/many-adults-falling-short-of-degrees.html