I never thought about it either because I also graduated in four years. But also I’d assume my advisor would have let me know…
I looked in the published catalog for my undergrad school and couldn’t find anything. I imagine that it’s not often an issue, since the 6 year graduation rate is 93%, and that 7% is mostly students who transferred away, failed, or went crazy. A leave of absence requires a stated time of return that must be approved by the school. Returning after withdrawing from the college requires an application for readmittance. In all cases I’m aware of, students are tied to the requirements of their expected year of graduation. For example, if I were expected to graduate in 2014, my requirements would be the same even if I finished in 2013 or 2018.
I know of only one person who graduated extremely late. 8 years IIRC. His requirements never changed, although those for the rest of the student body did extensively. I’ve found smaller school can often afford to be flexible and they want students to graduate. My PhD is an example of that; I skipped my defense (or “viva” as I’ve heard it called here) because it was inconvenient.
I never thought about this while I was in college, but now that I’m involved in actuarial exams, the issue is very familiar to me. We reorganize the syllabus every five years or so, and every time, there are huge controversies over what old exams are equivalent to what new exams and how new requirements apply to people in mid-stream.
In hindsight, obviously, colleges face the same issue, although probably less intensively and less often.
How could you not know you didn’t graduate?
I never even thought about it. I finished the requirements in 4 years and graduated.
Or did I? :eek:
Well, did they give you a diploma? I didn’t show up to commencement and I forgot to go to the registrar’s office to pick mine up, but I know it was there because they kept calling me.
Yeah, I wonder about that, too. You’d think either having or not having the diploma would be a clue…
As an undergraduate, it didn’t matter – I went for four years, so it was never an issue.
As a graduate, I did get a letter that said I would have to reapply to get my degree. Luckily, they had already awarded it to me. SUNY Albany was hardly a paragon of efficiency. :rolleyes:
Yes, I got a diploma. I was joking.
I never really thought about it as an undergrad, but I know the rules for my grad program better than I’d like. Without an explicit waiver (from the graduate school, not from your adviser or individual department chair), MS classwork expires after six years and PhD work after eight.