Higher Education Enrollment and Graduation Rate: Initial Thoughts

One of my research interests is higher education enrollment. What I mean by this is how many students are enrolled at the many different types of higher education institutions in the United States . This interest stems from my job where the vast majority of students who attend the university I work and teach at are students with many risk factors that contribute to the difficult task of completing a traditional 120 credit undergraduate degree within four to six years. I also taught at community colleges in Arizona where the student demographic has a similar student profile.

Institutions who educate at-risk students are often harshly criticized in the higher education community for poor graduation rates while other institutions are lauded for high graduation rates. Articles at The Chronicle and Inside Higher Education seem to reflect an inherent bias towards associates education and focuses on higher performing undergraduate and graduate institutions, faculty, and students. In this article I will merely present data about higher education enrollments as I work on where to take my initial thoughts and observations.  

Higher Education Enrollment Data:

Using the IPEDS Data Center I downloaded data for all higher education institutions in North America for the academic year 2013 (the most recent available). There are dozens and dozens of reports you can create using IPEDS and for this initial investigation I downloaded: total enrollment, undergraduate enrollment, graduate enrollment, 4, 5, and 6-year undergraduate graduation rate, and the 2010 Basic Carnegie Classification for all institutions.

There are a lot of higher education institutions in the United States. There are 7,764 institutions with a total enrollment of 22,180,669; 18,233,606 undergraduate and 2,947,063 graduate students.

First observation: 86% of the learning occurring at higher education institutions is undergraduate education.

Chart 1 uses the Carnegie 2010 Basic classifications; I divided the higher education landscape into four simple categories; institutions that focus on four-year undergraduate and graduate education; institutions that primarily focuses on associates education; other or specialized institutions; and not applicable (using the exact Carnegie classification).

Chart 1: Number of Institutions and Enrollments

Second observation: The majority of undergraduate education occurs at schools that focus on four-year baccalaureate degrees or schools that also have graduate education (51.03%) but not far behind are schools that almost exclusively focus on associates or undergraduate education (42.15%).

Ivy and Ivy Equivalents:

The Ivy League and Ivy League equivalents get a lot of press. This is understandable because of the prestige, the notoriety, and the sheer wealth of these institutions. When I read higher education articles it seems that these institutions set the bar when it comes to higher education which in my opinion, is not right, is not feasible, and not realistic.

I went through the 7,764 institutions and categorized schools as part of the Ivy League, Ivy EQ (equivalent and private), Ivy EQ State (equivalent state schools), or Baby Ivy (primarily undergraduate). Chart 2 shows the 80 schools I, and others would consider to be part of the top tier of higher education institutions in the United States and their undergraduate and graduate enrollment.

Chart 2: Enrollments at Ivy and Ivy Equivalents

Third observation: Higher education press focus way too much attention on the 1% of the institutions that educate 3.83% of all undergraduates. It doubly focuses way too much time and energy on the Ivy League; those 8 institutions educate 0.36% of all undergraduates.

Graduation Rates:

Graduation rates are important but the problem with graduation rates is the limited manner in which it is measured. The government provides an excellent definition of the very specific metric it uses to measure 4, 5, and 6-year graduation rates.

When looking at the graduation rates for higher education it is nearly impossible to observe graduation rates for over half of the institutions. The institutions that are Carnegie classified as Associate's primarily focus is on associates level education and do not directly contribute to the 4, 5, or 6-year graduation metric. That means that we cannot use Graduation Rates to define the effectiveness of 1,826 institutions that teaches 42% of all undergraduates (there are other ways but Graduation Rate is always in the press).

This leaves the other half of higher education with mostly useable data about graduation rates. Chart 3 contains the Carnegie classified Baccalaureate, Masters, Doctoral, and Research institutions and their average Graduation Rate, mean Graduation Rate, and High(est) Graduation Rate for 4, 5, and 6-years. I did not put the lowest Graduation Rate because it was always in the single digit or teens. I also included the row, 'Ivy and Ivy EQ' as a comparison.

Chart 3: 4, 5, & 6-Year Graduation Rates

Fourth observation: Most higher education institutions struggle with graduation rates, the average 4-year Graduation Rate is 35.24% for the observed schools, and too much attention is given to the highest performing schools.

Chart 4 shows how the Graduation Rates for the for Carnegie classified Baccalaureate, Masters, Doctoral, and Research institutions are distributed. I divided the 100 point scale evenly with the number of institutions per row and the percentage of the total per 4, 5, & 6-year Graduate Rate. Some institutions did not provide Graduation Rates and some data was missing from IPEDS (Blanks).

Chart 4: Distribution of Graduation Rates

Fifth observation: The 6-year graduation rate is more applicable to today's college student.

Finally I graphed the Graduation Rate distribution but did not include the blanks. Graph 1 shows the Graduation Rate distribution for Carnegie classified Baccalaureate, Masters, Doctoral, and Research institutions (does not include Blanks).

Graph 1: Graduation Rate Distribution

Sixth observation: The six-year Graduation Rate is more akin to a bell curve than the 4 or 5-year Graduation Rate.

Conclusions:

My findings from this article is that the higher education community should: 1) use the 6-year Graduation Rate as a more realistic metric for institutions; 2) institutions with 'poor' Graduation Rates should get most of the attention to help improve their Graduation Rates; and 3) stop talking about the Ivy League and Ivy League equivalents, they are fine.

Besides those three broad statements I do not have any solid conclusions yet. Since this is my first foray into higher education enrollments in the United States I am curious to see where my research will go from here and how my observations and conclusions will change over time. 

Song/Week: Lauda per la Natività del Signore, by Ottorino Respighi

I performed Lauda per la Natività del Signore several times back in the day and it is one of my favorite works of all-time. Now it is not the Pines of Rome, it is not the Fountains of Rome, and it is not even Church Windows by Respighi; but it it better. This work is pure chamber beauty that relies on vocal and instrumental subtleties and perfect harmonizing rather than bombastic brass and orchestral effects.

Turn it up, shut out the world, and enjoy.

America's Worst Colleges

I think a lot about higher education. I know, obvious for someone who has worked in higher education their entire adult life but it is true, all of my work day and a substantial portion of my non-work time I think about higher education. When I read articles about colleges and universities I always want to read student success stories, how learning outcomes are improving, how at-risk students are being helped and encouraged to complete, but the one type of article that disappoints me the most are ones about the best and the worst colleges in the country.

The Best:

The best colleges are always the same. Northeast and midwest private schools with large endowments and cute campuses. Large state universities that are have a heavy research focus and good football teams. The quality of these institutions is never doubted even when there is little to no actual assessment data; legacy proof.

The Worst:

This brings me to the worst. I wrote about acceptance rates before and how US New and World Report has two lists (amongst many); 100 Highest Acceptance Rates and the 100 Lowest Acceptance Rates. This list implies, not subtlely, that schools with lower acceptance rates are better; this metric has been used for years to prove quality.

This brings me to an article titled, America’s Worst Colleges at the Washington Monthly. The description reads:

“We set out to make a list of the poorest-performing colleges. What we found is that, while good schools are basically all alike, every crappy school is crappy in its own way.”

Besides being awkward the description leads with negativity. As you read the article the writer does bring-up valid points about the difficulty of going to college, the debt many accumulate, graduation rates, net price to students, and the like. There are four different lists with twenty schools each with some schools appearing on multiple lists. The author explains the four lists and does a good job but he ever shares his metrics which as an online article makes sense, we just have to trust the numbers.

The one thing that that author does not address are the students and the socioeconomic factors that the schools have to deal with. It is like talking about the quality of a novel without actually talking about the words, the sentences, the chapters, the actual story, and the content.

Fast forward to the closing paragraph; although again the author tries to bring up valid and important issues in higher education he assumes too much.  

“The high quality of America’s best colleges creates a strong public belief that all U.S. institutions of higher education must be of similar quality. Top colleges lists reinforce this assumption, while the obsession over admissions sucks up all the air in public debates over college quality.”

I don’t know anyone who assumes that if you go to Arizona State University or Missouri State University the quality of education must be similar to Grinell College or Stanford (undergraduate education only). Is the content covered at those colleges similar? Yes, of course. You also cover the same course content at Shaw University as an undergrad that you do at Princeton; content and curriculum are not magic and there is no elite fairy dust that makes learning outcomes better at elite schools.

The next quote I find the author is just getting mean:

“This is a boon for those schools that are decidedly not world-class and that struggle with debt, cost, and completion. They fly under the radar with little attention and unearned positive reputations. And only the students who have the misfortune to enroll at one of these places find out the truth.

Not everyone can attend Brown University like the author and be high powered by 18. Often, poorer students, at-risk students, and underprepared students go to the local college that fits for them; not everyone can move to Providence, Rhode Island for four-years.

All colleges educate, students try to learn, faculty try to teach, staff try to support, and the administration try to keep it running with the tools and resources they have. To say that school have unearned positive reputations is insulting. Being overly snarky, elite schools have unearned positive reputations because we assume they are the best because of their large endowments, their low acceptance rates, and alumni success. Do these factors mean that undergraduate students learn more during their four years at an elite school? Prove it.

If we want to improve higher education and deal with college cost, the blame game cannot continue. When it comes to educating America’s adult learners I do not care what the elite colleges do, their students are fine and they have the cash to support them in pretty much any way possible. What I care about are the colleges and universities that are educating students who need help getting through school, are working multiple jobs, have kids, have life events occur during schools, et cetera. These are the students that need help attaining their undergraduate degrees and should not be insulted by calling the institutions they go to, the worst.