Colleges struggle to release data on post-graduation employment and other metrics
Inside Higher Ed reports that a pilot group of 18 colleges are stumbling to release data on their education outcomes and post-graduation employment. “(T)he holes in the data were too large,” writes Inside Higher Ed’s Paul Fain, in explaining delays to the Gates Foundation-funded Voluntary Institutional Metrics Project.
Private schools decrease by 7.5 percent
Fewer students are enrolled in private schools and there are fewer private schools in the United States than there were two years ago. That’s according to the latest private school data, released on July 9, 2013 by the National Center for Education Statistics. In the fall of 2011, there were 30,861 private elementary and secondary […]
Small liberal arts schools tend to be more expensive
I was just playing around with the recently updated data on the College Affordability and Transparency Center, and I was struck by how many smaller liberal arts colleges are among the most expensive four-year private non-profit institutions. I expected to see more universities with expensive graduate departments and science labs. To be sure, Columbia University […]
Teens read less today than 30 years ago, national data show
Here’s a bit of data that confirms what we already suspect. According to a 2012 survey by the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), fewer than 20 percent of 17-year-old high school students (19 percent to be exact) say that they read for fun on their own time almost every day. That is the lowest […]
Achievement gap between minorities and whites is closing; gender gaps narrow too
Black and Hispanic students posted much larger gains than white students over the past 40 years on the long-term National Assessment of Education Progress test, which I first wrote about on June 27, 2013. “The improvement and gap closing is not just a theoretical possibility, but it is happening,” said Kati Haycock, president of the […]
High school test scores haven’t improved for 40 years; top students stagnating
Is U.S. high school a wasteland? Or are teenagers getting a better education today than they were 40 years ago? That’s a puzzle offered in a release of national test scores on June 27, 2013 by the National Center of Education Statistics. According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), test scores for 17 […]
Education might be the next weight loss fad; obesity rate much lower among college grads
The obesity rate among college graduates is significantly lower than for high school drop outs or those with only a high school degree. This obesity gap exists not only in the United States, but also in 23 other countries around the world, according to a new data report, Education at a Glance 2013, by the […]
Less math is more: data supports Saxon Math curriculum
A math curriculum that reduces how much new content elementary students are exposed to each day was found to be effective, according to an analysis by Mathematica Policy Research. Mathematica looked at two studies that focused on Saxon Math, a curriculum designed by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. The studies covered more than 8000 students in 11 […]
Data analysis of MOOCs shows that many students skip videos
The MIT Technology Review posted, “As Data Floods In, Massive Open Online Courses Evolve,” on June 5, 2013. Writer Tom Simonite reports that both Coursera and Udacity data show that “a large subset of students who prefer to skip videos and fast-forward as much as possible.” Udacity is already restructuring courses to reduce the amount […]
Data on open enrollment school choice in New York City
Yet another study seems to indicate that white and Asian middle-class families benefit more than minority and lower-class families from open enrollment programs where students can choose to go to public schools outside of their neighborhoods. The latest finding comes from a data analysis of New York City’s school choice program conducted by The Research […]
