Since 2000, taxpayers nationwide have spent $300 billion dollars on Pell grants -- the largest federal student grant program. But the government doesn’t collect data on who graduates.
The Hechinger report, an online education news organization, got information from 80 of the largest public and private universities. It found that 70 percent of all students graduate in six years at University of Colorado Boulder, but only 63 percent of Pell recipients do. That was slightly below the national average of a 66 percent graduation rate.
