Five Florida Schools Among Private Colleges With Lowest Graduation Rates

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Five private Florida colleges are among the 25 schools with the lowest graduation rate.

Five Florida schools have landed on a list of private colleges with the lowest graduation rates.

Barry University in Miami Shores and Florida Memorial University in Miami Gardens and Bethune-Cookman University in Daytona Beach had the sixth-, seventh-, and eight-lowest graduation rates, according to an analysis of federal data by CBS MoneyWatch.

About one in three students graduate from those schools within six years.

Lynn University in Boca Raton also made the list. The school will be the site of the third and final presidential debate. Florida Southern University in Lakeland was the final Florida school to make the list.

The lowest graduation rate belonged to Western Governors University, an online school targeting adults trying to finish their degrees.

Harvard University had the highest graduation rate in the country. No Florida schools made the top 25 on that list.

Graduation rates are among the factors students and parents are studying more before making a college choice. Graduation rates now factor into to Florida university funding as well.

The federal government has tried to simplify comparing the cost of colleges by boiling things down to a net cost after financial aid and other tuition breaks are factored in.

Defaults on federal college loans are now more than 13 percent for those in their first three years out of college.