Newsgroups: bit.listserv.erl-l
Date:         Sat, 12 Sep 1992 16:13:00 CDT
From:         P30JWP1@NIU.BITNET
Subject:      OERI: Postsecondary ed. student outcomes (170 lines)

The following is provided by The Office of Educational Research
and Improvement, U.S. Department of Education.  Please feel
welcome to distribute.


                  U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
         OFFICE OF EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH AND IMPROVEMENT
            NATIONAL CENTER FOR EDUCATION STATISTICS

   REPORTING OF STUDENT OUTCOMES INFORMATION BY POSTSECONDARY
            INSTITUTIONS EXAMINED IN BENCHMARK STUDY

The Student Right-to-know and Campus Security Act (P.L. 101-542)
calls for consumer information to be developed on graduation and
completion rates at postsecondary institutions. A publication
mandated by the Act, POSTSECONDARY STUDENT OUTCOMES: A
FEASIBILITY STUDY, looks at these data in new ways.

Just released by the National Center for Education Statistics,
the study determines the current availability and utility of
postsecondary student outcomes statistics and considers the
desirability and feasibility of institutions reporting various
student outcomes. It also looks at the potential usefulness of
comparable student performance data for prospective students,
their families, federal and state providers of postsecondary
support, and the institutions themselves. It concludes with
several suggestions about "best practice" for nationwide
collecting and reporting of institution-level student outcomes
statistics. For instance, it recommends that each postsecondary
institution should:

o    Utilize the same forward-looking cohort methodology to
     determine a valid and comparable graduation/completion rate.
     This requires each institution to use a standard definition
     of students to include in the cohort and to report the rate
     by the same student and institutional characteristics.

o    Establish separate but parallel cohorts of full- and
     part-time degree-seeking, entering undergraduates, because
     almost 30 percent of the students who enroll for the first
     time in any postsecondary institution enroll part-time.

o    Report all graduation rates in all institutions by
     meaningful, static, student characteristics such as gender,
     race/ethnicity, age, and intended major field of study.

However, there are other points to consider:

o    Reporting graduation/completion rates by actual major field
     of study, academic division, or any variable that could
     change frequently over a short period of time is difficult
     using a forward-looking cohort methodology. Therefore, it is
     not suggested.

o    The transfer of a student to another--perhaps higher level--
     institution should be a separate student outcome. In
     addition, determining such transfer rates is highly
     dependent on state-level involvement. The percentage of
     students that transfer should be reported separately from
     graduation/completion rates.

o    Surveys of individuals after they leave the institution
     often produce inconsistent and biased data due to low
     response rates.  An efficient and cost-effective methodology
     for determining employment outcomes of graduates/completers
     by institution could be done through electronically linking
     files containing graduate/completer records for the state
     with available Unemployment Insurance (UI) Wage-Record Data.

o    Two major problems are associated with reporting by
     institution of graduates'/completers' licensure or
     certification examinations pass rates that are required for
     employment in a particular vocation, trade, or professional
     field: uneven coverage across fields of study, and the great
     difficulty of obtaining institutional aggregates of student
     performance on such examinations from the multitude of
     licensing and certification boards. These, currently, are
     prohibitive obstacles. Additionally, many examinations are
     administered at the state level with each state having its
     own examinations and criteria for passing.

o    There should be consideration of the development of a
     postsecondary assessment program. It could entail either a
     test of basic postsecondary-level skills to measure changes
     in skill levels of students regardless of their initial
     skill level upon entrance into the postsecondary
     institution, or multiple tests of subject-matter
     achievement. Either of these approaches would be a long-term
     and costly effort, but one may be tenable in view of the
     current interest in postsecondary assessment.

The report also contains two other general suggestions intended
to make reports of student outcomes as meaningful as possible to
all potential users:

o    First, it is vital that contextual information describing
     the particular institution's student population be
     considered in conjunction with its student outcomes data.
     Much of the research has shown that student characteristics
     are better predictors of student outcomes than institutional
     characteristics or process.

o    Second, there should be a reconsideration of the different
     requirements in sections 103 and 104 of Title I of the
     Student Right-to-Know Act regarding the collection and
     reporting of student outcomes statistics among institutions
     based upon their athletically-related student aid policies.
     These different collecting and reporting requirements will
     tend to perpetuate the non-comparability of student outcomes
     statistics among institutions. If information about
     graduation rates by gender, or race/ethnicity, or average
     graduation/ completion rates are useful, they should be
     available to all potential students and their families from
     all postsecondary institutions.

Copies of POSTSECONDARY STUDENT OUTCOMES: A FEASIBILITY STUDY are
available from New Orders, Superintendent of Documents, P.O. Box
371954, Pittsburgh, PA 15250-7954. The stock number is
065-000-00489-5, and the price is $5.50.


                 OERI ELECTRONIC BULLETIN BOARD
                     GPO PUBLICATION REQUEST

                              TO FAX YOUR ORDERS (202) 512-2250



---------- copy(ies) of POSTSECONDARY STUDENT OUTCOMES: A
FEASIBILITY STUDY at $5.50 each (stock number 065-000-00489-5).

The total cost of my order is $             .  International
customers please add 25%.  Prices include regular domestic
postage and handling and are subject to change.


COMPANY OR PERSONAL NAME:

(PLEASE TYPE OR PRINT)


STREET ADDRESS, CITY, STATE, AND ZIP CODE):





DAYTIME PHONE INCLUDING AREA CODE:


PURCHASE ORDER NUMBER:


PLEASE CHOOSE METHOD OF PAYMENT:







------------------------------------------------- -------------
Authorizing Signature                                DATE

Mail to:       New Orders, Superintendent of Documents
               P.O. Box 371954
               Pittsburgh, PA   15250-7954

               Thank you for your order
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU