I just sent one of my Sims to college, and then shortly after that I sent another to live with them. At first things seemed fine, however things became very weird for the 2nd Sim. First the message for going to class was popping up when it wasn't even time, the message coming at 11pm while the class was from 10am to 12pm. I could send them to class at that time, but if I sent them they would stay there until the class was normally supposed to end. The performance meter was going up and everything else seemed fine, so I figured I'd ignore the problem with the class. Then once it came time for the final the message about having it came up and the Sim went, but when it was over it just started the first semester over again but also gave the Dean's List memory. After that everything seemed to correct itself and things started working as it should, though I did have to cheat a bit to get the 2nd Sim back even with the other one like they should have been

Has anyone else ever had this happen? I know I've had the problem with the performance meter not going up in the past, but this was just strange.

Nope, I've never had this particular problem...and I usually do move in my younger sims with the older ones in college since I make my own dorm. You could always try NOT going to class and just raise the bar by writing the term paper/ studying and see if they can level up that way (nothing negative if you don't go to class). If that doesn't work try moving them both out and putting them in a different dorm. If it still doesn't work you might want to check to see if you have any mods that MIGHT conflict when it comes to classes or uni. Remove them all and see if you get the same problem- IF that solves it put them in one at a time until you have the same problem. (yeah it's a LOT of work and time but at the rate you're going they may never graduate).

If it's sorted itself out, don't worry about it for now. If it happens again, go to the Help FAQ and troubleshoot it. I play college a lot and have never had this problem, so it's not one of the routine ones.

You know the performance meter doesn't mean anything when it gets stuck in the red even though they've got passing levels of skills, right? It's purely cosmetic and you can ignore it as long as you get enough skills to open the bar where you want it (whether it ever opens or not) and occasionally go to class or do an assignment or research.

I actually had that Sim graduate without having any other problems, so for now I'm really not worried about it. It was just a weird situation because I've never had anything like that happen before, but if it does happen again I do plan on doing like you said and go through all the troubleshoot steps.
Yeah I found that out on my own once when I had that glitch with the meter. I just had my Sim keep doing all the usual stuff to raise performance, though without actually being able to see my progress I know I did a lot more than I needed to but in the end they still graduated with no problems. It's been a while since that happened, so I really don't worry about that glitch.