The Dallas County Community College District will seek approval from its accreditor later this year to merge its seven schools into one in an effort to help more students graduate.
Joe May, the district chancellor, said he was motivated to pursue the change after realizing that thousands of students were being denied their degrees despite having sufficient credits to graduate.
Between 2016 and 2017 school years, more than 1,600 students applied to earn a degree from a school in the district after completing additional coursework elsewhere. Under state law, students who leave community college for a four-year university elsewhere can later decide to transfer those credits back to complete an associate’s degree. But over that two-year period, only 16% of people who applied to do so at the community college district were successful.
