I could totally see Lois doing the extra courses thing. It's actually not that hard to graduate in 3 years if you put the effort into it. She could have taken a ton of AP (advanced placement) courses in high school and therefore would have had a ton of credits to apply to her college (get a 3 or better on the AP exam, get your 3 credits for that class in college). Her taking AP courses (assuming that was around in the 80's of course - I was in high school 1996-2000) would fit in perfectly with her character.
I was an honors student and graduated in 3.5 years (although my degree wasn't conferred until the full 4th year thanks to my honors thesis).
I don't know about how many years would be required for the school paper though - I was a Broadcasting major.
