PVCC's average student age dropping

The average age of students at Piedmont Virginia Community College is dropping, as is the average age of community college students across the state.

It’s a change officials attribute to a number of causes, including a rough economy and transfer agreements that let students turn two years at a community college to half of a four-year degree at a number of colleges.

Between the school year that ended in spring 2001 and the one that ended in spring 2011, the average age of community college students statewide dropped from 27 to 24.5 years old.

This fall, Piedmont will have about 5,700 students, up about 1,300 students from four years ago, and the big growth has been in college-age students, many of whom want to transfer. That category has outstripped the second-leading growth area, students seeking careers in health care, said PVCC President Frank Friedman.

The transfer agreement was one of the chief reasons Bill Moore, a second-year engineering student at Piedmont, chose the school, though he’s switching careers rather than attending straight from high school.

“The economy is weak and the community college is the best value to earn your associate’s degree and to transfer to a senior university,” he wrote in an email, calling his choice “the best value for a great education.”

Jeffrey J. Kraus, assistant vice chancellor for public relations at the Virginia Community College System, said that transfer agreements are being brought to the attention of potential students through methods such as the career coaches whom the community colleges send into schools and an online tool called the Virginia Education Wizard. That said, officials don’t call it a tough sell.

“We have probably the greatest transfer environment of any state in the country,” Kraus said.

Sometimes students even come from out of state to attend with the goal of transferring to a four-year school, Friedman said.

Students take specific curriculums, which vary slightly by school. If they meet a set GPA requirement (the University of Virginia requires a 3.4, William & Mary wants a 3.6), their transfer to a specific university is approved.

“For more and more families, that’s really appealing,” Friedman said.

This year 325 students transferred to UVa from community colleges, though not all students who transfer from community colleges to four-years use the guaranteed transfer route.

Kraus also attributed some of the age drop to an increased focus on higher education.

“I think there’s a growing awareness that a high-school diploma is no longer the finish line,” he said.

Families are also attracted by tuition, which can be roughly one third the cost of a four-year public institution, Kraus said.

Kraus said that many students develop new, bigger educational goals after they enroll at a community college. Someone who enrolls for a certificate might end up transferring, he said.

“We were created to do what no one else was willing to do,” Kraus said.

Friedman said some of the guaranteed transfer courses will probably be offered at the school’s forthcoming campus in Stanardsville in Greene County, which is being built to help students circumvent Charlottesville traffic.

“It’s a major barrier,” Friedman said, particularly for students trying to juggle work and school.

Fundraising is under way for the project’s construction. The school has a 14,000-square-foot space in the library building for $1/year, but the space is unfinished.

Once it’s up and running, there will be not only the “bread-and-butter transfer courses,” but also one specialty course. The specialty course will likely require significant investment in terms of equipment and possibly faculty, so officials want to be sure they choose it wisely, Friedman said. Options under consideration include health care, information technology and intelligence, he said.