Dive Brief: 

• Johnson & Wales University on Tuesday announced four three-year bachelor’s degrees that will begin enrolling students in fall 2025, becoming one of the latest institutions to gain approval for the burgeoning program type. 
• The private Rhode Island university's new degrees require 90 to 96 credits versus the usual 120 credits for a four-year bachelor’s degree. Johnson & Wales said the programs will help students “enter the workforce quickly and with less financial burden.”
• To trim down the credits required for a bachelor’s degree, students will either take no electives or fewer than those enrolled in traditional four-year programs. The three-year degrees still require students to take the same core general education credits and major study classes as their four-year counterparts. 

Dive Insight: 

Three-year bachelor’s degrees have been gaining momentum. Advocates say they can save students both time and money, though some higher education experts have expressed concerns that officials may trim liberal arts or general education courses from bachelor’s programs to create truncated degrees. 

At Johnson & Wales, officials plan to debut three-year bachelor’s programs in computer science, criminal justice, graphic design and hospitality management. Students can apply immediately to the programs for enrollment in fall 2025. Workplace experiences during the academic year and summer will count toward the program’s requirements, according to the announcement. 

The programs will be available in person at the university’s Providence campus. The three-year bachelor’s degrees in hospitality management and computer science will also be available online. 

University officials chose majors for the three-year bachelor’s degrees that were both in demand and have a high degree of technical skill, Matt Montgomery, a Johnson & Wales spokesperson, said in an email. They also focused on programs that were “well-established and successful offerings” for the university. 

“Offering three-year bachelor’s degree programs with just 90 credits allows more students to begin their career journeys sooner — and with a lower financial obligation,” Johnson & Wales Chancellor Mim Runey said in a statement. “This is what parents and students have been asking of higher education.”

The university gained approval in September from its accreditor, the New England Commission of Higher Education, to offer the three-year degree programs. 

The commission also approved three-year bachelor’s programs at Plymouth State University, in New Hampshire, and Merrimack College, in Massachusetts, under its innovation policy in April, NECHE President Lawrence Schall said in an email Thursday. The commission plans to monitor initiatives approved under the policy, including through on-site evaluations. After these reviews, the commission may determine that initiatives should end or allow them to continue.   

Efforts to launch three-year bachelor’s degrees have also gained traction in other parts of the country. 

Brigham Young University-Idaho and Utah’s Ensign College, both of which are owned by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, won approval from their accreditor last year to begin offering a limited selection of three-year online bachelor’s programs. The degrees, which are now available, eliminate elective credits but keep general education courses. 

BYU-Idaho and Ensign are part of the College-in-3 Exchange, a collective of institutions piloting three-year bachelor’s programs and sharing ideas on redesigning traditional undergraduate degrees. 

Meanwhile, Utah’s higher education board gave the green light in March for the state’s colleges to create three-year bachelor’s degrees, though it will still need to approve individual programs.

That same month, Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb signed a bill into law requiring each of the state’s public four-year colleges to offer at least one three-year bachelor’s program by July 2025.