higher standards increase retention and success in higher ed

From Mary Beth Marklein in USA Today (hat tip: Linda Christiansen)...

Researchers studying how to improve graduation rates at public colleges and universities have come up with a surprising and counter-intuitive finding: Many students may fail to complete a bachelor's degree not because the work is too hard — but because they're not challenged enough.

It's well known that colleges with the most selective admissions criteria tend to have the highest graduation rates. But even when researchers compared groups of students who had similar academic qualifications, they consistently found that those attending schools with the more demanding academic requirements were more likely to graduate...

While everybody does better at stronger schools, "the difference in outcomes…is greater for minorities..." [Princeton University president emeritus William Bowen, lead author of Crossing the Finish Line: Completing College at America's Public Universities] says....

The findings underscore age-old advice: Students should enroll in the most selective college that will admit them. But the problem is not that qualified students are being rejected from academically demanding schools. "They never apply in the first place," Bowen says. And the research found that those aiming too low were most likely to be minorities, low-income students and those whose parents never finished college....

The focus of the article is more challenging universities. A probable application would seem to be the importance of more challenging classrooms as well.