Docolleges thatspendmoreonstudents havehighergraduation rates? With the cost of a college education growing considerably faster than the inflation rate, prospective students (and their parents) are carefully evaluating and comparing colleges before makingacommitment.Ofparticularinterest isgraduationrate-or theproportionofstudentswho graduatewithinfiveyearsofmatriculation(enteringthecollege).Inanefforttobetterunderstand the factors affecting graduation rate, a wide range of higher education institutions were surveyed in 2008.A subset of these data, from 172 colleges and universities, containing the variables graduationrateandper-studentexpenditures(in$000's)arecontainedbelow.