Melbourne University had the nation's highest completion rates. Credit:AP Melbourne University had the highest completion rates in the country, with 88 per cent of the 2009 cohort having completed their studies by 2014. Second in line was the University of Sydney, followed by the Australian National University. The figures are likely to generate debate about the value of taxpayer-funded student loans, which are set to cost the budget $11.1 billion by 2025-26. The minister released the data contained in an Education Department report on Wednesday as part of a push to increase transparency in the sector. He urged students to research their courses before enrolling and spruiked the government's Quality Indicators for Learning and Teaching website.

"To the thousands of students anxiously checking emails, text messages, newspapers and mail boxes this week to learn what your future study options might be, I urge you to take your time to understand those options," SenatorBirmingham said. "We've heard too many stories about students who have changed courses, dropped out because they made the wrong choices about what to study, students who didn't realise there were other entry pathways or who started a course with next to no idea of what they were signing themselves up for." The data showed that students who studied off campus, part-time and were of a low socioeconomic status were more likely to drop out. Federation University's deputy vice-chancellor of learning and quality, Professor Marcia Devlin, said students studying at regional universities were often mature-age students with a family, juggling caring and work responsibilities. "They therefore have slower or lower completion rates than traditional students, who are often unencumbered, child-free middle-class school leavers who either live at home free with Mum and Dad or whose family pay for them to live on campus in college. These are the typical Melbourne university students," Professor Devlin said.

"Regional universities do the 'heavy lifting' in Australia in terms of enrolling students often from low socioeconomic status backgrounds." While students with lower ATARs were more likely to drop out, about half of students with an ATAR between 95 and 100 did not complete their course by 2014, four years after enrolment. Only about 26 per cent of Indigenous students who started their course in 2009 had finished four years later, compared with 45.4 per cent of non-Indigenous students. Girls were less likely to drop out than boys, with 48 per cent of girls finishing their course by 2014, compared with 40.6 per cent of boys.