How does graduating in four years help students economically?

Graduating in four years has important economic impact:

• Students who graduate in five or six years pay considerably more for their education than students who graduate in four years.
• In addition to the increased cost for their education, they lose earnings from one or two years of full-time employment.
• By some estimates, this loss over a lifetime of earnings maybe more than $250,000.
• Students who take more than four years to graduate also are more likely to have to borrow money, and their average loan indebtedness is greater. For the Twin Cities campus, the average debt load for four-year grads is $26,277; for six-year grads, it leaps to $31,027.