Graduate gets article to swim (5)
I believe the answer is:
bathe
'swim' is the definition.
(bathe can mean to swim)
'graduate gets article' is the wordplay.
'graduate' becomes 'BA' (someone with a Bachelor of Arts degree).
'gets' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'article' becomes 'the' (the definite article in English).
'ba'+'the'='BATHE'
'to' acts as a link.
(Other definitions for bathe that I've seen before include "Wash by immersion" , "Wash; swim" , "go into rollers?" , "Suffuse" , "Swim or dip" .)