One and half times as many students as usual graduated at the end of August, a quick analysis by the university shows. According to Eric de Munck of the Education and Research department, the graduation rate among Bachelor’s students who have been registered at the university for four or five years shot up this year. ‘At a first impression, there is even an increase right across the board, including third-year students. Although they were not directly threatened by the slow students fine, the rate at which they are graduating has gone up considerably.’ The increased graduation rate has cause a big growth in the number of students on Master’s programmes – from 3374 last year to 3737 this year. De Munck: ‘Most of them are students who go on to a Master’s from one of our own Bachelor’s programmes. The growth will level off next year. This really was a one-off spurt.’
Slow students speed up
Although the measure is now very likely to be scrapped, the planned fine on slow students has already upped the pace among Wageningen students.