Diane Auer Jones has proposed that schools start to report a “federal regulatory compliance fee” so that students and others can see the impact of added reporting requirements. She does a nice job of explaining her proposal and the reasons such a move would be useful.

Perhaps her idea is a good one. Not only for the reasons she presents, but because it would be interesting to see how much actually is spent on required reports. A part of me wonders why it would be so difficult and costly to report graduation rates for athletes.

There just seems to be an unending chorus of voices lamenting reporting requirements.  But, per the title of this post, don’t colleges and universities have some obligation to report on the most fundamental aspect of why they exist? Don’t we have an obligation to account for whether learning occurs and people finish their education?

I agree that there have been lots of added reporting requirements, and that these add costs. But the reports that I think we should object to because they are burdensome and costly are in the non-academic areas. Perhaps any federal compliance reports might separate out costs for academic reports and non-academic. Perhaps rather than railing about too many reports, we in higher education should define what it makes sense to report and what does not. Doesn’t it make sense that we should report about learning?

Too often the loudest objections are not about useless and bureaucratic reports, but rather about reporting on the very essence of our work.

What do you think? Please feel free to leave a comment.

Mike

But, I wonder how seriously.  For an organization that has “learning outcomes assessment” in its name, why only look at core learning such as writing, critical thinking and analytical reasoning. What about learning outcomes in the student’s major? At the program level? The report states that the most common approach is to use something like the Collegiate Learning Assessment (CLA), and to focus on the core areas. Of course, if you aren’t going to pay attention to whatever the assessments have to tell you, maybe it is just too much trouble to think about what ought to be measured.

As I have stated many times in this blog, the basic focus of Transparency by Design and its Web site http://www.collegechoicesforadults.org has been on program-level learning outcomes. Some have criticized us because the outcomes are not directly comparable—that is because every school claims unique program outcomes, and that those outcomes differentiate their school and programs. Regardless, why isn’t any other initiative looking at that level of learning? Why isn’t the National Institute for Learning Outcomes Assessment encouraging that level of assessment?  If we are all going to get real about assessing learning outcomes, let’s get down to the important stuff:  what is it that we intend to have students learn in order to earn a degree?  How do we know if our graduates are actually learning what they are supposed to be?

I would hope the courage is out there for others to begin to do what the Transparency by Design institutions have started. But, the outlook is not promising. Just recently I was warned by a person from a traditional school that we should all be careful what we measure, because if you measure it, you may not be pleased with what you find.  You certainly would not want what you find to get out in the open!

The approach of the institutions in Transparency by Design is the exact opposite. Let’s measure what is important and, if we are not doing well today, let’s get about fixing it.  It is unfortunate that much of higher education goes through the motions of assessment, avoids assessing the really important things, and then ignore what they find.  I would suggest that it is precisely because of this culture that we are under such pressure to measure more, be transparent about what we find, and use assessment to drive improvement.

Please feel free to leave a comment. Thank you.

Mike

I empathize with the blight of the public university. While federal stimulus funds may be saving the day for the 2009-2010 academic year, and maybe even into 2010-2011, the 2011-2012 year seems to portend disaster. These institutions must do something different and, likely, dramatic.

But, I am concerned as the public universities consider their options. Let’s say the decision had been made to privatize. Would that not likely lead to fewer of Colorado’s young people having access to a public university education? Certainly that would be one scenario. That leads to another idea discussed by the Board of Governors: to limit admission for students who reside in the state, and to increase the number of students from out of state since they pay higher tuition and fees. That would require some level of policy change since current rules are that state funded schools must assure that 55 percent of their student body is comprised of in-state students.

It is not just Colorado that is wrestling with the budget challenges and arriving at the idea of increasing revenues by admitting non-resident students. Inside Higher Ed reports on a number of states either increasing non-resident numbers or considering doing so. A review of where most states are in terms of serving their residents through their public universities reveals that most schools are very reasonable and are fulfilling their missions to serve students from the state. This article cites the University of Vermont as an exception, with ¾ of its freshmen coming from outside Vermont. But, Vermont is an exception in that it is a blended institution—both private and (as they describe it) “quasi-public.”  The University of Delaware is reported to have more than half its students coming from outside the state. I will simply note that both are small states.

Concerns about possible changes to place a preference on non-resident students are basically about equity of access.  The concern is about state schools “enrolling wealthy white students.”  Pat Callan, president of the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, is quoted on the potential impact of such a move in California, “So, now that the majority of kids in the state will be more Latino, you are going to recruit more out-of-state students who are likely to be white?”

This equity concern is an important one. There is no question that public universities and their boards are going to faced with some tough decisions and some basic considerations about the appropriate mission of the public school. They would be wise to consider the cautions offered in the second article above about whether it will be an easy sell to out-of-state students.  Once again, it will likely be only the elite publics that will find it possible to make the sale.

Please feel free to leave a comment.

Mike

Please feel free to share your thoughts and comments.

Mike

But what they propose is just plain silly; self-serving but still silly. They describe ongoing nursing shortages, saying that the growing shortages caused “93% of hospital-based registered nurses to report a lack of sufficient time and staff to maintain patient safety, detect complications early, and collaborate with other health care team members.” I am not at all sure how they conclude that this is a problem to be solved by education but the idea of increasing the barriers to practice nursing by requiring a bachelor’s degree seems counter-productive at best. This is further evidence that not only is health care dysfunctional but so are the politics of nursing and nursing licensure.

What really irritates me about this piece is that the authors attack (though they insist that is not really what they are doing) the associate degree in nursing (ADN) and the colleges that offer these programs, many of them community colleges. Patricia Benner, one of the authors, is quoted as saying such a change “would hold community college nursing programs more accountable.” That “the minimum amount of time a student has to spend in these ‘two-year programs’ is actually three years.”

Fortunately, Kim Tinsley of North Arkansas College and a member of the National Organization for Associate Degree Nursing pointed out that “I teach in a rural setting and the main advantage of offering a two-year RN degree is that it puts the nurse graduate to work in a shorter amount of time so they can support their family. They cannot afford four years of BSN classes and not work. The ADN student does sometimes have to take up to four years to complete their degree but it is due to the fact that they are working (sometimes full time) and have a family to support. The average age of our students is 27. The majority of our students are either married with a family or are a single parent. They cannot afford the time nor resources to attend a four-year program.”

Thanks to Ms. Tinsley. What her statement lays out clearly is that this is not just an attack on a type of degree but on the people who most often pursue that degree—the other 85%. The students in the ADN programs are older. Rather than being financially dependent on their parents, they more often have families of their own who depend on them. And, whether a family or not, they are often working.

Let’s be honest here. Schools like those that the authors of this report work at are not willing or able to serve the audiences that attend the ADN programs. The authors say that these BSN schools would need to “increase capacity by approximately 90 percent.” Is that likely to happen during a recession? Absolutely not and it would not happen during the best of economic times. That is because BSN programs at research universities use the undergraduate programs as feeders for their graduate programs. They want traditional students who compete for entry into elite programs. They don’t want to serve the folks in the ADN programs because the students in these programs don’t fit the mold and some, if not many, of these students might require remedial assistance. The fact is that there is a racial and class overlay here that is just below the surface. Community colleges and other ADN providers are serving a far more racially diverse audience than the BSN schools as well as many low-income students.

The authors claim that they are not opposed to the community colleges and their suggested change might lead to better articulation agreements. Yes, when hell freezes over. All we need to do is to look at the current state of such articulation agreements nationally to have one more proof point that schools like the ones the authors are defending remain elitist and are not interested in seriously getting at the fact that it is the diverse and low income students who are earning ADN degrees and becoming registered nurses. These nurses are holding our health care system together and there is no way that a group of BSN nurses admitted under current admissions standards that are intended to limit access will ever replace them.

The truth is that this call is about getting more funding for the BSN programs. Any call for continued elitism and raising barriers to entry in a profession that is suffering serious shortages is just plain silly.

I encourage you to share your thoughts.

Mike

The fact that learning has been improved is wonderful. That alone makes this effort worthwhile. But there is no denying that Ms. Twigg is disappointed. She makes that abundantly clear when she says “you’re dealing with a culture that does not care about reducing costs.”

The article cites several schools that just stopped tracking costs. Twigg is quoted again, “if administrators do not continue to be involved and simply let it devolve to a faculty project, most faculty don’t care about costs.” The problem is stated as one where there are disincentives for saving money because the provost merely takes it away.

This is truly scary. There are faculty quoted as saying they think higher education should receive more funding and therefore they are not invested in trying to reduce costs. But, those outside of higher education are fed up and much of their anger is about the constantly increasing price of attending college. This is no small disconnect. The academic culture appears to be one of supposed entitlement because the work of higher education is assumed to be so important. But there are limits and we are either dangerously close to hitting those limits or may even have surpassed them. Twigg is quoted as saying “people in higher education believe in what we’re doing, as long as they don’t have to do it.”

Any ideas on how to change this culture?

Mike

Your thoughts? Please feel free to leave a comment.

Mike

Predictably, the higher education establishment dismissed the idea. Frank Balz of the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities (NAICU) is quoted as saying that there is not a lack of information, but a glut that is hard to wade through and that “its hard to see how adding a layer of bureaucracy will improve anything.” This represents a viewpoint held by many that any new requirements or expectations for accountability should be resisted.  I do not share that view. Anything that empowers the prospective student to make good choices is of great value. And, while there may be lots of data out there, very little has been converted into meaningful, actionable information.  That is especially true when it comes to assessing learning outcomes. The proposal by Soares is probably not perfect, but it certainly is a step in the right direction. And a step forward in an inevitable march toward greater assessment of, and transparency about, whether learning actually occurs in our schools.

I am pleased to see this call for action.  Your thoughts? Please feel free to leave a comment.

Mike

NSSE data has just been released. But so has a critical study. The study says that the NSSE is seriously flawed and has doubtful validity. I will leave it to those better prepared to assess whether or not the instrument is valid to determine if the criticism is sufficient to reduce the use of, or reliance on, NSSE. But, I find a quote attributed to Stephen R. Porter, author of the critical report, to be most telling: “The promise of a survey instrument that can quickly and relatively cheaply provide an alternative to actually measuring learning has, not surprisingly, been alluring to many colleges.”

Isn’t it time to stop relying on proxies in order to avoid the more difficult work of measuring actual learning outcomes? And, not just measuring writing and critical thinking, but also program-level learning outcomes? After all, isn’t the production of learning outcomes what we are supposed to be doing? Engagement is good, but it is a proxy. Let’s get to work on the real thing—like we are starting to do with Transparency by Design.

Please feel free to leave a comment.

Mike

There is no question that trouble is brewing.  The worst economic downturn in decades should be enough to stimulate action.  At least one would hope that to be the case.  And Jane Wellman of the Delta Project on Postsecondary Education Costs, Productivity and Accountability offered what is described as a “blunt” assessment that no new money is going to come to higher education.  Unfortunately, the article reports that this group demonstrated a long-honored tradition of talking about the predominant institutional model at the exclusion of community colleges and, perhaps, other alternative models.

It is good to see that leaders of the institutions that attended this gathering are talking about change – even if they have talked rather than acted for many years.  Maybe this time will be different … though I would not want to place any bets on that.  The real question is not whether change will occur, there are simply too many external pressures for that not to happen, but whether the change can or will come from within mainstream higher education.  Time will tell.

Please feel free to leave a comment.

Mike