Distance picked, peer institution selected, the nearest IPEDS

Other Peer Institution Selection Article

** If you are using Microsoft Internet Explorer or Google Chrom browser, you would not be able to read the formulas in this article. These formulas were written in MathML, a W3C standard, and can be viewed in FireFox.

Summary
The goal of this article is to provide mathematical insights into the selection of nearest peer institutions. The discussion begins with a general review of distance in mathematics and extended the idea to the measurement of nearness. Examples were used to demonstrate the importance of properly selected distance function.

The idea of peer
In many fields of study, it is a useful practice to tag objects that are similar to a particular object, the Anchor, as peers. The similarity can customarily be measured by the shortness of distance. The smaller the distance, the more similar an object is to the Anchor and the more likely an object to be selected as a peer of the Anchor.

Distances in Mathematics
In mathematics a metric or distance function is a function that defines the distance between two elements/objects (see Wikipedia article). However, as the abstract nature of the mathematics, the 'set theory' set criteria on behavior of the distance function but left the explicit definition of the distance to the case of application since the explicit definition is irrelevant in the content of the set theory.

For cases were the elements are Euclidean geometry points, the distances are commonly defined as:  $\sqrt{{(x_1-x_2)}^2+{(y_1-y_2)}^2}$

However, this is not the only permissible definition for distance.


Distance in a case of study
The lack of explicit definition of distance for a case of study call into question of the distance between the mathematics and the real world.

However, contrary to most believes, mathematics is not isolated in its own abstract world, plenty of mathematical branches grow out of real world problems. For example, the criteria for the distance function are abstracted qualities of the common distance definition of the Euclidean geometry.

The absent of the definition, in essence, offer the opportunity to select a sensible definition for the case of study.

In the land of peer selection, properties are constantly associated with objects and distances are customary defined through properties.

In the case of higher-education-institution objects, possible properties are fall enrollment headcounts, percent of male enrollment, total revenue, ... etc, like those collected by IPEDS ( Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System) survey.

Distance of Interest for this article
Of all the possible choice of distance definitions, the following are of demonstrative interest. The subscript i denoted various properties while the X denoted the Anchor object in the set and x a different object. The D denote the distance

1. Sum of the square of the difference
   $D=\sum _i{d}_i=\sum _i{(x_i-X_i)}^2$
2. Sum of the Ranking of difference
   $D=\sum _i{d}_i=\sum _i$ Ranking of $|x_i-X_i|$
   where the minimum value has a rank of 1 and the next smallest has a rank of 2 ... etc.
3. Sum of the square of the percent difference
   $D=\sum _i{d}_i=\sum _i{(\frac{x_i}{X_i}-1)}^2$
4. Sum of the absolute value of the percent difference
   $D=\sum _i{d}_i=\sum _i|\frac{x_i}{X_i}-1|$

Fabricated demonstrative data
For the sack of demonstration, higher education institution IPEDS like objects were considered. The Anchor institution, My Inst, alone with three other institutions and their fabricated property values were listed in Table 1. Comparisons of these institution were presented in Figure 1. Data are fabricated to demonstrate that a good methodology would not depend on data to produce reasonable result. With Figure 1, it is clearly shown that Inst-1 is the institution that most similar to My Inst, the Anchor institution, followed by Inst-2 and Inst-3.

Table 1 - demonstrative data

Inst	Enrollment	% Men	Revenue
Institution 1	1900	63%	105,000
Institution 2	2050	90%	101,000
Institution 3	1970	35%	104,000
My Institution	2000	60%	100,000

Figure 1 - comparing institutions (click to see the picture)

Distance evaluated with each illustrative definition

Table 2 - Sum of the square of the difference

Inst	Enrollment	Percent Men	Revenue	Distance
Inst 1	10000	0.0009	25,000,000	25,010,000.0
Inst 2	2500	0.09	1,000,000	1,002,500.1
Inst 3	900	0.0625	16,000,000	16,000,900.1

With the 'sum of the square of the difference' approach, the similarity ranking is in the order of Inst-2, Inst-3, and followed by Inst 1. Table 2 demonstrated that, in this model, the property having larger value would overshadow differences in other properties. It is, therefore, important to scale properties to a compatible matter.t


Table 3 - Sum of the Ranking of difference

Inst	Enrollment	Percent Men	Revenue	Distance
Inst 1	3	1	3	7
Inst 2	2	3	1	6
Inst 3	1	2	2	5

The 'Sum of the Ranking' practice considered the Inst-3 as the most similar peer with Inst-2 and Inst-1 following. The problem with this approach may not be obvious. Couple of points can be made, if observe carefully. First of all is the misrepresentation of the true differences with category like integers, which by itself can't even avoid rounding errors. Using ordering also create problem in that distances between adjacent values are been replaced by 1.

Table 4 - Sum of the square of the percent difference

Inst	Enrollment	% Men	Revenue	Distance
Inst 1	0.3%	0.3%	0.3%	0.8%
Inst 2	0.1%	25.0%	0.0%	25.1%
Inst 3	0.0%	17.4%	0.2%	17.5%

Inst-1 is ranked as the most likely followed by Inst-3 and Inst-2 in the 'Sum of the square of the percent difference' process. 

Under this approach, differences are represented by the percent difference from the Anchor with no categorization attempted. Another benefit of this approach is the straightforward approach and the ease of explanation to audiences. Weighting to each property, as will be discussed later, is also plain to see and easy to identify.

Lesson learned
Properties' value varied in magnitudes, invoking values directly undermined the difference in properties with smaller magnitude. The employ of ranking could over-shadow the difference in value and, in effect, assigned a difference of 1 for all adjacent values.

The square vs. the absolute value (definition 3 vs. definition 4) 
The fact that ${\left(\sum _i{A}_i\right)}^2\succ \sum _i{A_i}^2$ implied that the squared method would favor multiple smaller differences than a single larger difference while the absolute value method will weight small differences and single bigger difference equally. Visually, the squared method made sense.

Weighting properties
Once standardize to the 'sum of the square of the percent difference', weighting can easily be done by multiples to the 'square of the percent difference' before the sum.

* While customized distance can be used in Nearest Neighbor analysis, Nearest Neighbor represent a specific topic in the cluster analysis.

Doctor's degree by field of study, race, foreign, and gender

The field of choice for US doctor awardees are similar regard less of race. Non-resident alien accounted for almost 30% of the supply for higher education instructors!

Observing of doctoral degree conferred in the United States provided us a unique look into the US higher education system. It provided implications for our future higher education system. For one, the doctors are the main source of future college instructors, and secondly, they are future leaders of our higher education institutions. They are also the main research talent that will continue to move the country forward. Lawyers also play important roles in the social justice of our society, especially in protecting minorities' legal rights.

The CL education center has just released a set of data processing reports based on the IPEDS (Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System) 2011-12 completer survey - the analysis can be found under the section: United State's Doctor Production.

IPEDS survey classifies Doctors into 3 groups: The Research Doctors, the Professional Practice Doctors, and the Other Doctors. For non-legal, and non-medical field, the research doctors are the main source for college instructors. The professional practice doctors are mainly the lawyers, and the medical doctors, but also includes doctors that are mainly prepared for specialized career practices like ...

Total Doctor Degrees Awarded by Field of Study (CIP)

Figure 1, Doctors' field of study for each race (click to view the whole chart)

The major field/CIP of interested are list in Table 1 below.

Table 1, major field of interest for each race (multiple and unknown race not displayed)

CIP	Title	Native	AsianPI	Black	Hispanic	White	Alien
11	Computer and Info. Sci.	0.3%	0.8%	0.4%	0.2%	0.5%	4.2%
13	Education	8.6%	1.9%	15.9%	6.6%	5.8%	3.4%
14	Engineering	1.6%	3.7%	1.4%	2.0%	2.4%	24.8%
22	Legal Prof. and Studies	37.5%	21.2%	29.1%	38.8%	30.5%	5.7%
26	Bio and Biomedical Sci.	3.1%	4.1%	2.6%	3.7%	4.0%	11.2%
40	Physical Sciences	1.3%	1.5%	0.9%	1.5%	2.4%	11.3%
42	Psychology	3.5%	1.7%	3.9%	5.5%	4.0%	1.8%
45	Social Science	1.1%	1.0%	1.3%	1.5%	1.7%	5.9%
51	Health Professions related	36.3%	58.7%	32.3%	33.3%	39.4%	10.1%

Figure 1 and Table 1 revealed that, for US citizen, almost all races are favoring Legal, and Health Professions roughly equally, except Asian Pacific Islander are skewed more toward Health Professions. Beside the point made above, in general, all races exhibit similar field-of-study pattern. The major disparities in the chart come from the non-residence alien, where the dominated field is the engineering. Their domination on physical science and biology is also noticeable.


Total Doctor Degrees Awarded by Race
Table 2, total doctor degree awarded by race

Native	AsianPI	Black	Hispanic	White	Alien	Unknown	Mult.Rc
0.5%	9.5%	6.1%	5.5%	58.8%	11.5%	7.3%	0.7%

Total Research Doctors Awarded by Race
Table 3, total research doctors awarded by race

Native	AsianPI	Black	Hispanic	White	Alien	Unknown	Mult.Rc
0.4%	5.3%	6.3%	4.1%	49.2%	27.3%	6.8%	0.6%

The research doctor degree, which mainly removed the lawyers and medical doctors from the total doctor count, awarded to non-residence alien comprise a whooping 27% of all the research doctor degree awarded. Research doctors are the major supply of teachers for our higher education system.

Table 4, research doctors awarded by fields(CIP) and by race

CIP	Title	Native	AsianPI	Black	Hispanic	White	Alien	Unknown	Mult.Rc
1	Agriculture and Operation	0.7%	2.5%	1.3%	4.1%	34.5%	52.0%	4.5%	0.4%
3	Nature Resource and Conservation	0.4%	3.4%	2.5%	3.4%	56.7%	27.4%	5.6%	0.5%
4	Architecture	0.0%	17.8%	4.0%	3.5%	29.2%	37.1%	6.4%	2.0%
5	Area, Ethnic, Cultural, Gender Studies	2.2%	8.6%	11.9%	5.0%	44.2%	16.9%	10.4%	0.7%
9	Communication, Journalism	0.7%	2.6%	5.7%	2.1%	56.3%	25.3%	6.9%	0.3%
10	Communication Technologies	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	100.0%	0.0%	0.0%
11	Computer and Info Sci.	0.2%	8.3%	2.0%	1.2%	33.0%	50.4%	4.7%	0.2%
12	Personal and Culinary Services
13	Education	0.8%	3.1%	16.6%	6.1%	58.3%	7.0%	7.5%	0.6%
14	Engineering	0.2%	7.0%	1.7%	2.2%	28.2%	56.2%	4.2%	0.4%
15	Engineering Technologies	0.0%	5.5%	1.8%	1.8%	49.1%	34.5%	7.3%	0.0%
16	Foreign Languages, Literatures	0.1%	3.6%	1.7%	6.6%	47.0%	32.4%	8.4%	0.3%
19	Family, Consumer Sci.	0.3%	3.4%	9.1%	2.2%	57.2%	25.3%	2.2%	0.3%
22	Legal Prof. and studies	0.0%	1.6%	0.5%	2.1%	11.0%	77.0%	7.9%	0.0%
23	English, Literature	0.4%	3.4%	4.0%	3.8%	70.8%	8.5%	7.9%	1.1%
24	Liberal Arts, Sci. General Studies	0.0%	4.5%	3.4%	1.1%	56.8%	12.5%	20.5%	1.1%
25	Library Sci.	0.0%	2.0%	2.0%	2.0%	48.0%	42.0%	4.0%	0.0%
26	Bio. Biomedical Sci.	0.3%	8.2%	3.3%	4.3%	49.8%	27.2%	6.3%	0.6%
27	Math. And Statistics	0.3%	5.7%	1.4%	1.8%	39.4%	46.5%	4.7%	0.1%
28	Military Sci. Leadership
29	Military Tech.	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%	83.3%	16.7%	0.0%	0.0%
30	Interdisciplinary Studies	0.5%	5.3%	10.0%	4.8%	52.3%	20.2%	5.6%	1.4%
31	Recreation, Leisure Studies	0.4%	1.2%	7.0%	2.1%	62.8%	24.8%	1.2%	0.4%
32	Basic, Remedial Education
33	Citizenship Activities
34	Health Knowledge and Skill
35	Social Skills
36	Leisure, Recreational Activities
37	Self-Improvement
38	Philosophy and Religious Studies	0.1%	2.6%	5.4%	2.9%	62.5%	18.1%	7.5%	1.0%
39	Theology, Religious Vocations	0.0%	4.7%	10.8%	3.3%	61.0%	12.6%	7.3%	0.2%
40	Physical Sciences	0.2%	4.6%	1.7%	2.6%	43.7%	40.6%	6.2%	0.5%
41	Science Tech.	0.0%	33.3%	0.0%	0.0%	66.7%	0.0%	0.0%	0.0%
42	Psychology	0.6%	4.7%	6.7%	8.0%	63.1%	6.9%	9.0%	0.9%
43	Protective Services	0.0%	3.8%	11.5%	3.1%	63.4%	12.2%	5.3%	0.8%
44	Public Administration	0.4%	4.7%	15.1%	5.3%	47.2%	17.0%	9.7%	0.7%
45	Social Science	0.3%	4.5%	3.8%	3.9%	47.4%	32.2%	7.2%	0.7%
46	Construction Trades
47	Mechanic, Repair Tech.
48	Precision Production
49	Materials Transportation
50	Performing Arts	0.4%	6.1%	1.9%	3.5%	57.8%	22.1%	7.8%	0.5%
51	Health Professions	0.3%	5.9%	7.7%	3.3%	60.9%	13.3%	8.1%	0.5%
52	Business, Marketing	0.4%	5.2%	12.5%	4.4%	41.2%	26.0%	10.2%	0.2%
53	Secondary Diplomas
54	History	0.5%	2.6%	4.5%	4.5%	64.7%	12.3%	9.6%	1.2%
60	Residency Programs

Figure 4 further breaks down the research doctors by field of study (CIP) and by race. The engineering stand out. 56% of the engineering doctor degrees were awarded to non-resident alien. Other non-resident alien heavy fields include Agriculture(52%),
Architecture(37%), Computer Sci.(50%), Engineering Tech(35%), Foreign Languages(32%), Library Sci.(42%), Math. And Statistics(47%), Physical Sciences(41%), Social Science(32%). All of these fields displayed a non-resident alien rate that is higher than the 27.3%, the average rate held by non-resident alien.

Total Research Doctors Awarded by Gender
Men(51%) and women(49%) held roughly the same share of all the research doctor degrees awarded by US institutions. The lowest fields with women recipients are Military Tech(17%), Theology(19%), Computer(20%), and Engineering(22%).

Professional Practice Doctor Degrees Awarded by Gender
In this category, men(53%) held a slightly larger share in the Legal Profession while women(57%) hold larger share in the Medical Doctor field.

Salaries for Professor, Instructor and Graduate Assistant - an IPEDS derivation

** If you are using Microsoft Internet Explorer or Google Chrom browser, you would not be able to read the formulas in this article. These formulas were written in MathML, a W3C standard, and can be viewed in FireFox.

For the 2012-13 IPEDS (Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System) data collection year, National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) changed the information it collected through its Human Resource component. This change in data collection dictates how the average salary for Full-Time instructional Faculty can be calculated.

This article intended to provide a comparison of the new and the old way of calculating the average salary. The discussion is intentionally simplified in order to demonstrate the conceptual differences.

Prior to 2012-13 data collection, headcount numbers and salary outlays were collected for faculty with 9- or 10-month contract and 11- or 12-month contract for each gender and rank. So, for each gender and rank, there are basically 4 numbers: Total Salary Outlay for faculty with 9- or 10-month contract (S₉), Total Headcount for faculty with 9- or 10-month contract (H₉), Total Salary Outlay for faculty with 11- or 12-month contract (S₁₁), and Total Headcount for faculty with 11- or 12-month contract (H₁₁). The suggested way (by NCES) to calculate the annual 9-month average salary for each gender-rank combination is given by:

  $\frac{S_9+\frac{9}{11}{S}_{11}}{H_9+H_{11}}$

, which, in essence, is the average of the monthly salary times 9.

Beginning 2012-13 data collection year, for each gender-rank combination, 5 numbers are collected: the Total Headcount for faculty with 9-month contract (H₉), the Total Headcount for faculty with 10-month contract (H₁₀), the Total Headcount for faculty with 11-month contract (H₁₁), the Total Headcount for faculty with 12-month contract (H₁₂), and the Total Salary Outlay for faculty with all four contract length (S₉+S₁₀+S₁₁+S₁₂). The suggested way (by NCES) to calculate the annual 9-month average salary for each gender-rank combination is given by:

$\frac{S_9+S_{10}+S_{11}+S_{12}}{9H_9+10H_{10}+11H_{11}+12H_{12}}x9$

, which, in essence, is the total salary outlay distributed into the total number of manpower-month.

Logically, the methodology changes begged the explanation of the differences between these two methods.

For simplicity, case with only 9-month and 11-month faculties are considered. Under this condition, the 2012-13 method reduced to:

  $\frac{S_9+S_{11}}{9H_9+11H_{11}}x9$.

By carrying out the difference of the new and old methods, we arrived at:

$\frac{\frac{2}{11}{S}_{11}-\frac{2}{9}x\left(\frac{S_9+\frac{9}{11}{S}_{11}}{H_9+H_{11}}\right)x{H}_{11}}{9H_9+11H_{11}}x9$.

The difference indicates if the new number is higher or lower than the old number and by how much. The value represented by the parenthesis is that of the old method - the average monthly salary times 9 month. By multiplying it by two over nine and times the number of faculty with 11-month contract, the result represents the amount of money needed to bring the 11-month faculties' average salary to that of the old method for the two months (9-11). The leading term in the numerator indicates the two month allocation from the total salary outlay for the 11-month faculties. The net value of the numerator is, therefore, the amount of money that can be used the raise or lower the value of the new method apart from the average monthly salary of the old method. By solving the inequality equation:

$\frac{2}{11}{S}_{11}-\frac{2}{9}x\left(\frac{S_9+\frac{9}{11}{S}_{11}}{H_9+H_{11}}\right)x{H}_{11}>0$
$\mathrm{ }$
, it can be proofed that higher monthly salary for the 11-month faculties would result in higher value for the 2012-13 formula than the older formula and the reverse is also true.

By consideration above and by making the same assumption NCES had made in the past (i.e. assuming all faculty with 9- or 10-month contracts are actually 9-month contract and that all faculty with 11- or 12-month contract are actually 11-month contract), it is possible to apply the new method to the pre 2012-13 data with predictable discrepancy.

Even though NCES had used the 9- and 11-month assumption in the past, the new 2012-13 data can be used to gauge if that assumption is a valid one. For example, the 2012-13 data revealed that majority of Nebraska's colleges are either have 9-month contracts or 12-month contracts. There are some 10-month contracts, but the 11-month contracts are nearly none. With these observation, the following formulas is a better estimate for the pre 2012-13 data:
$\frac{S_9+\frac{9}{12}{S}_{12}}{H_9+H_{12}}$ 

At the same time, by discounting the minorities, the following formula can be applied to all years:
$\frac{S_9+S_{12}}{9H_9+12H_{12}}x9$

This would show the effects and differences caused by the new formula and also provide a ( reasonably ) compatible trend from the past to current.

On Obama’s Bold Plan to Reshape American Higher Education

Original Article

Summary goes here!

A step finally taken, which I have advocated for a long time.

Jest few points about things the author of the article like to see to be included in Obama's plan.

On 'Nobel Prize winner wants to get in the Physics 101 business' should get more weight:

• Personally, I don't think a Researcher is necessary a better teacher. They may have their own way of understanding things, it does not necessary mean those understanding are on all levels and that they can transfer those idea effectively especially to students that may have totally different mindsets.
• If there is going to have an objective measurements of outcome, why do we try to add some un-objective impurity to the formula? This is more like going back to the old system where the established (regional accredited) are carrying more weights.
• By providing this loophole to encourage high level researcher to teach low level courses, aren't we promoting inefficiency? I am not saying there would have no benefits to the students, but I am saying that this by-law is not needed. If they can provide extra benefits to lower level courses, those benefits should be build into the objective measurement formula and, therefore, it will show if the benefits is there and, would, therefore, render the by law unnecessary.

A song for the Ed community

Educate future generation and change the world!

 Gem like you, Gem like you, here is a song for you.

Give me a song, give me a song, give me is the name of the song.

Give me the word, give me the word, give me has taken the world.
Game boring girl, game boring girl, give me has taken them all.
Bragging boy, bragging boy, give me is their whole.

Boring game, bragging game, give me is all their game.
The give me will never end their game.

Gem like you, gem like you, may the give me never got you.
Gem like you, gem like you, may the ring never got you.

May the ring never replace you. May the ring never replace a gem like you.





- Of cause, there is a story behind it.

 

Summary of the IPEDS data release schedule

The Best Known Date for IPEDS data release!

IPEDS stand for Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System and is a set of survey conducted by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), a division of the United State Education Department(US ED).

All the IPEDS survey data can be obtained through the IPEDS data center. IPEDS survey data are published in various quality control levels. The most recent guide line are covered in the document: IPEDS Data Release Procedure. In essence, beginning with data submitted in the 2011-12 survey year, data will be released in 3 phases: preliminary, provisional and final, geared toward national, state and institutional level analysis. In tech terms, these are what they mean:

• Preliminary - Edited but unimputed for non-responding school
• Provisional - Fully Edited with Imputing for non-responding institutions
• Final - Includes Edited updates from PYR - were referred to as 'revised data'

However, to track down when each set of data were published, it is not an easy task. One source of this kind of information is the 'This Week in IPEDS' news letter/email. The archive for these news letters can be found at IPEDS news site. However, even with the news letter, sometimes it is still hard to pinpoint the date a certain data set is made available at the IPEDS data center.

The following info is compiled from the news letters mentioned above. The only thing can be said about the date is these are the 'best known date'. Procedures to derive these info are detailed in this document.

Survey Year 2010-11

Survey Year	Survey	Preliminary*	Provisional	Final
2010-11	IC	2/8/2011	9/20/2011	4/27/2012
2010-11	C	2/8/2011	9/20/2011	4/27/2012
2010-11	E12	2/8/2011	9/20/2011	4/27/2012
2010-11	HR	-	11/22/2011	Target ?/?/2013
2010-11	SFA	-	-	4/27/2012
2010-11	EF	-	-	-
2010-11	F	-	-	-
2010-11	GR	-	-	-

Survey Year 2011-12

Survey Year	Survey	Preliminary*	Provisional	Final
2011-12	IC	-	9/26/2012	Target ?/?/2013
2011-12	C	-	9/26/2012	Target ?/?/2013
2011-12	E12	-	9/26/2012	Target ?/?/2013
2011-12	HR	-	9/26/2012	Target ?/?/2013
2011-12	SFA	-	9/26/2012	Target ?/?/2013
2011-12	EF	10/9/2012	Target ?/?/2012	Target ?/?/2013
2011-12	F	10/9/2012	Target ?/?/2012	Target ?/?/2013
2011-12	GR	10/9/2012	Target ?/?/2012	Target ?/?/2013

* Preliminary data will not be accessible once the provisional data is made available.

IC -Institutional Characteristics
C - The Completion Survey
E12 - 12-month Enrollment Survey
HR - Human Resource Survey
SFA - Student Financial Aid Survey
EF - Fall Enrollment Survey
GR - The Graduation Rate Survey

* A personal note: It take about 5 months for preliminary release and about 7-11 months for provisional release.

Homeland: Immigration in America Refugees

Original Article
 

Keep that spirit up - not that the America is a Great country, but that how lucky we are and how to light the spirits of our youth and best our efforts.

My first reaction after watching the show is that this is why America is a Great country - the heart of American people.

It has been a long time, I totally appreciated the America Dream - You will get there as long as you work hard for it - the opportunity. Just imaging how these refugees have to go through to survive in America and compare with our kids that growing up in America. Shouldn't our kids appreciate how fortunate they are - as the old saying goes: Counting your blessings - my feel is that a lot of us have lost that and that big heart. A lot of us seems to forget how fortunate we are and what we should have done our best to advance the world.

Have we done our best? With tones of fortune after the World War II, have we not worked our best to educate our children to keep that spirits up? Or have we been blamed other countries for products and jobs we can do with our ancient education?

America is a Great country, don't let that fade away!

Please keep that spirit up - not that the America is a Great country, but that how lucky we are and how to light the spirits of our youth and best our efforts.

It’s time to drop the college-for-all crusade

Original Article

Summary goes here!

Personally, I would attribute some of these kind of  bad American policies to the generosity of American and some to the idea of 'Political Correctness'.

As a foreign born American, I am totally impressed by the generosity of American and, at times, puzzled and resisted. Growing up, I took nothing for granted even though I have supporting parents. I was educated, taught and self-studied, that begging is of no dignity and god only help people that help themselves. Personally, I have been summon all these under the 'responsibility'.

As to the 'Political Correctness', for one thing, I would like to remind the reader that OPPORTUNITIES is all it should be considered. Given the opportunity, in the sense of promote responsibility, it is up to the people to work hard to get what they want.

More practically, we should realized that not all people were born equal, intellectually. The best a society can hopeful is to have everyone do their best. To have people reach their best is to teach them being responsible. To teach responsibility, the operation of the system and the society must, by itself, promote responsibility. For example, to entitle to education as a right, students must demonstrate their wiliness to put in efforts in studying. For a normal people, this can simply be a requirement to reach certain testing scores. This is nothing new, what is new is the infusion of the idea of responsibility.

In theory, I am willing to support the idea of free education for all those who did their best. On the other hand, since resources are limited, we should support those who will benefit the society the most. With the full support of the society, I am visioning the building of a system where the freely educated scholars recognizing the support from and the responsibility to the society. Formula may need be sought to build a practical system, the idea is to promote responsibility as the core value of education.

For people reaching their best but were not able to be the best, this is where the society come in to benefit the constituent of the whole society.

Can Financial Aid Improve Student Success at Louisiana’s Community Colleges?

Original Article

Summary goes here!

An old saying: "Help people who helped themselves."

Financial Aid can help if students were matured enough to realize the value of the extra time they got and put it into study. If not, I don't see how the extra money can improve students' success. It may even distract them from the study to enjoy other things in life.

This is a good demonstration of why building the sense responsibility is the number one task in education. Any attempt to improve the education outcome without promoting students' sense of responsibility is a wrong approach. You can hire personal coaches that following student around to improve his/her education. But does the society have the responsibility to support people this way? Will this ever been sustainable?

The histories of a lot of Federal Aid programs have shown that a lot of people will take advantages of these systems in undesirable ways and a lot of these programs were later re-tweaked or added responsibility strings to it.

US College Graduation Rates by Race by State - 2010 IPEDS

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College Graduation Rates by State - 2009 Ranking
Data release: College Graduation Rates by State for 2008-09 graduates

Race in United States is a much debated topic. Tying race to discrimination is a sequel of historical events. The subsistence of the racism is continually disputed. The data revealed here is too limited to settle the disagreement. But we do hope the data can pointed to the weak spot in our education system and, hopefully, solutions with emphasis on personal obligation can be developed. In author's opinion, some of today's approach in improving minorities' education attainment is overreaching and is themselves racial biased and undermined the important principle of personal responsibility. Services should be made available to all regardless of race. It takes responsible person to seek helps. Which race group actually uses these services is not a racial issue.

Opinion aside, objective view of the data is definitely in order.

This analysis is based on the data released earlier by the CL Higher Education Center. The analysis dis-regards the non-residence alien. The US total also excludes US minor islands and territories.

The College Graduation Rates by Race for the US states are shown in table 1 while the table 2 shows the same data with the inclusion of US minor islands and territories with differences highlighted. The difference for Asian are mainly caused by the inclusion of the Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands. The changes for Hispanic are the effect of including the Puerto Rico. The rest of the analysis would focus on the US states and Washington DC. Changes from last year's number are included in the parenthesis.

Compare with last year, the public-four-year, public-two-year and the private-not-for-profit-four-year sectors are seeing improvements. Basically, the graduation rate for all races in these sectors are either improved or stay the same. Viewing the data with respect to race, White-non-hispanic improved in all sectors while minorities showing mixed result.

Table 1 - US states - including DC

Sector	Native	Asian	Black	Hispanic	White	Total
Public 4Yr	35%	65%	36%	(+1)44%	57%	(+1)54%
NProfit 4Yr	(+3)49%	(+1)76%	44%	(+2)59%	67%	(+1)65%
Profit 4Yr	(-3)38%	(+4)46%	31%	(-2)41%	(+5)45%	(+3)41%
Public 2Yr	17%	(+1)26%	12%	16%	23%	20%
NProfit 2Yr	(-8)15%	51%	(-2)44%	(-1)46%	(+1)56%	(-1)50%
Profit 2Yr	(+1)59%	(-3)69%	(+2)49%	(+2)65%	(+2)65%	(+1)60%
Overall	32%	57%	32%	40%	50%	47%

Table 2 - With US minor islands and territories**

Sector	Native	Asian	Black	Hispanic	White	Total
Public 4Yr	35%	64%	36%	43%	57%	53%
NProfit 4Yr	(+3)49%	(+1)76%	44%	(+2)45%	67%	63%
Profit 4Yr	(-3)38%	(+4)46%	31%	(-2)39%	(+5)45%	(+2)40%
Public 2Yr	17%	25%	12%	(+1)17%	23%	20%
NProfit 2Yr	(-8)15%	51%	(-2)44%	(-1)62%	(+1)56%	(-2)53%
Profit 2Yr	(+1)59%	(-3)69%	(+2)49%	(+3)64%	(+2)65%	(+1)60%
Overall	32%	56%	32%	40%	50%	46%

Fig. 1 shows the US average graduation rates by race by sector. In general, White and Asian stand out in the public-four-year, public-two-year and private-not-for-profit-tour-year institutions. In other sectors, White and Asian college graduation rates are more comparable to other races. Overall, the public two year sector shows the lowest college graduation rates for all races (except the Natives). Within each sector, the Black usually exhibit the lowest rate except at the public four year sector, where the Native American show the lowest college graduation rate. It is also interesting to see that the private not-for-profit sectors have higher college graduation rates than their public counter parts.

Fig. 1 - US average graduation rates for each sector by race

Figure 2. present the same information as in Figure 1 except grouped by each race. Within all races, the private for-profit two year sector demonstrates high rates, only within White and Asian it seconds to the private not-for-profit four year sector. It is also remarkable to see how similar the rates within each race relative to each other - public-two-years are, in general the lowest. The private-not-for-profit-four-year and the private-for-profit-two-year are usually have the highest rate.

Fig. 2 - US average college graduation rates for each race by sector


== The following have not been updated to 2010 data yet =======
Figure 3 is an un-traditional display of a set of histogram for Asian. Each histogram/curve show the number of states at each graduation rate for a given sector. For example, there are 12 states that have college graduation rates for Asian greater than 55% and less than 60% for the public four year sector/curve while there are 9 states have college graduation rates greater than 30% and less than 35% for the private for-profit four year sector/curve.

Figure 3 demonstrates clearly that, for Asian, the average college graduation rates for each sector are representative except for the not-for-profit two year sector, where most of the states have a rate of 0% and rates are spread out without some kind of concentration or locality.

Fig. 3 - College graduation rate for Asian by sector


Figure 4 displayed similar information as in Figure 3 except it is for the Black. Even though the US average college graduation rate for the private not-for-profit four year sector is comparable to other sectors for Black, figure 4 shows that the rate varies a lot in regard to different states.

Fig. 4 - College graduation rate for Black by sector


Figure 5, 6 and 7 illustrate the same kind of information for Hispanic, Native American and White.

Fig. 5 - College graduation rate for Hispanic by sector


Fig. 6 - College graduation rate for Native American by sector


Fig. 7 - College graduation rate for White by sector


Figure 8 modeled after previous figures to display the college graduations rates for each race in the public four your sector. This chart clearly shows that the White and Asian are comparable except that there are some states where Asian exhibits higher rates.

Fig. 8 - College graduation rates for public four year sector by race


Figure 9 to 13 show the similar information as in Figure 8 for each sector.

Fig. 9 - College graduation rates for private not-for-profit four year sector by race


Fig. 10 - College graduation rates for private for-profit four year sector by race


Figure 11 is an very interested one. For one, this is the only one that all races are having good localities. Second of all, the White seems to be the one that is doing better even though the US average college going rates for public two year sector clearly show that the Asian is doing better than the White. The mystery is solved when dig deeper into the data. The data show that the high average college graduation rate for Asian in the public two year sector is caused by a single state with high Asian public two year sector enrollment, the California, which has a college graduation rate of 36% for Asian. This means that even though on average, Asian is doing good in public two year sector, it is not a Nation wide fact. It is also worth to note that the only state with meaningful high college graduation rates for the Native American is Wisconsin which enrolled 199 students. The other two states only enroll a total of 7 Native Americans. The other high rate state worth noting is the South Dakota, which post a rate of 64% for White.

Fig. 11 - College graduation rates for public two year sector by race


Figure 12 demonstrates that value of this kind of charts, where the meaning of average college graduation rates for private not-for-profit two year sector have very limited value.

Fig. 12 - College graduation rates for private not-for-profit two year sector by race


Fig. 13 - College graduation rates for private for-profit two year sector by race

US College Graduation Rates by State - 2010 Ranking

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Related Articles:
Last Year's Ranking
US College Graduation Rates by State for 2009-10 graduates
College Graduation Rates by State for 2008-09 graduates
US College Graduation Rates by Race by State - 2009 IPEDS

Due partly to the economic downturn, college enrollments throughout the United State are going up and President Obama's call for more higher education have been partially answered. However, to fully respond to Obama's call for more education for our kids, we need pay attentions to students' success too. College graduation rate is one of such measures.

To pursue this agenda, we compiled the IPEDS graduation data collected by the US department of Education in a state by state basis. The idea is to put the data out in the public and, hopefully, it will be used to drive states' public education agenda and achieve the goal of improving our higher education's performance.

In doing so, we decided to publish the graduation rate data related to public institutions since, for most states, public institutions are what state governments have much more influence on. We also decided to concentrate on the public four year colleges and  the public two year colleges since, based on a published data, it had been shown that there are very few public institutions that fall into categories of less-than-two year or non-degree-granting institutions. The analysis excluded the non-resident alien.


By running summarized statistics on this two groups of schools, we found that, statistically, they deserved to be compared in separate groups. As shown in the following 2 charts, almost all states have a graduation rate between 40 and 70% for public four year institutions and a graduation rate between 10 and 40% for public 2 year institutions.

Public 4 year institutions:


Public 2 year institutions:


Exceptions to the rule above are the District of Columbia, the state of Alaska and the state of South Dakota. The District of Columbia has a very low rate (12%) for public four year institutions. But our data also show that District of Columbia had very low public four year enrollment. Most of the enrollment at District of Columbia are in private not-for-profit institutions. The state of Alaska has hardly any other type of institutions except the four year public institutions and the overall four year public institution rate is at a low of 29%. As to the state of South Dakota, it simply have a very high graduation rate (53%) for its public two year institutions.

Ranking of the graduation rates for both the public 4 year institutions and public 2 year institutions are presented below:

For public four year institutions:

State	Cohort	Graduates	Graduation Rate	Rank	Previous Rank	Previous Rate
Iowa	9,212	6,392	69%	1	1	69%
Delaware	4,439	3,051	69%	2	6	64%
Virginia	27,133	18,559	68%	3	2	68%
New Jersey	15,487	10,295	66%	4	3	66%
California	66,751	43,504	65%	5	5	65%
New Hampshire	4,787	3,089	65%	6	4	65%
Washington	15,512	9,822	63%	7	8	61%
Vermont	3,178	1,997	63%	8	10	61%
Illinois	24,920	15,558	62%	9	12	60%
Maryland	14,499	9,047	62%	10	7	63%
Pennsylvania	42,627	26,169	61%	11	9	61%
Connecticut	8,705	5,247	60%	12	13	60%
Michigan	38,029	22,743	60%	13	14	59%
South Carolina	14,716	8,695	59%	14	11	60%
North Carolina	28,677	16,938	59%	15	15	59%
Wisconsin	25,129	14,608	58%	16	16	57%
Rhode Island	3,516	2,035	58%	17	19	56%
Arizona	14,693	8,378	57%	18	23	55%
Minnesota	16,284	9,264	57%	19	18	56%
Massachusetts	13,019	7,318	56%	20	22	55%
Nebraska	6,926	3,850	56%	21	17	56%
Missouri	17,252	9,468	55%	22	24	55%
Oregon	9,145	4,955	54%	23	25	53%
Kansas	11,757	6,364	54%	24	21	55%
US Total	913,162	487,749	53%			53%
Wyoming	1,487	790	53%	25	20	55%
Colorado	20,640	10,896	53%	26	26	53%
Ohio	44,291	22,679	51%	27	30	50%
Mississippi	7,943	3,973	50%	28	27	52%
Indiana	30,356	15,094	50%	29	28	52%
New York	45,066	21,962	49%	30	29	51%
North Dakota	5,939	2,829	48%	31	34	47%
Florida	60,984	28,921	47%	32	31	48%
Texas	59,791	28,288	47%	33	36	46%
Alabama	17,080	8,066	47%	34	33	47%
Maine	3,991	1,852	46%	35	32	47%
West Virginia	10,325	4,789	46%	36	39	44%
South Dakota	4,607	2,127	46%	37	41	44%
Tennessee	17,432	7,929	45%	38	35	47%
Hawaii	2,484	1,118	45%	39	43	42%
Kentucky	16,516	7,414	45%	40	38	45%
Georgia	29,841	13,367	45%	41	37	45%
Montana	5,111	2,214	43%	42	40	44%
Oklahoma	15,337	6,405	42%	43	42	42%
Utah	8,748	3,509	40%	44	44	41%
New Mexico	6,622	2,651	40%	45	45	40%
Idaho	4,823	1,885	39%	46	48	37%
Louisiana	23,834	9,087	38%	47	47	38%
Arkansas	11,629	4,358	37%	48	46	38%
Nevada	6,430	2,385	37%	49	49	37%
Alaska	2,110	607	29%	50	50	26%
District of Columbia	322	39	12%	51	51	11%

Compare with last year's graduation rate, state of Delaware made the biggest improvement of 5% and moved up 4 spots to land on the second place, just behind state of Iowa. Both the Delaware State University and University of Delaware improved by about 5%.


For public two year institutions :

State	Cohort	Graduates	Graduation Rate	Rank	Previous Rank	Previous Rate
South Dakota	2,045	1,082	53%	1	1	61%
North Dakota	1,071	414	39%	2	2	38%
Florida	12,294	4,681	38%	3	3	37%
Utah	3,715	1,324	36%	4	5	34%
Iowa	12,621	4,164	33%	5	7	32%
Wisconsin	10,827	3,383	31%	6	6	34%
Alaska	29	9	31%	7	4	36%
Nebraska	4,112	1,268	31%	8	10	28%
Montana	1,379	424	31%	9	19	24%
Kansas	9,526	2,888	30%	10	8	32%
Wyoming	2,322	695	30%	11	9	29%
Maine	2,237	593	27%	12	14	25%
New Hampshire	1,775	467	26%	13	16	25%
Minnesota	16,985	4,468	26%	14	11	27%
Mississippi	17,902	4,516	25%	15	15	25%
Georgia	17,397	4,383	25%	16	18	25%
Washington	9,342	2,343	25%	17	12	26%
California	95,026	23,776	25%	18	13	25%
Kentucky	8,086	1,936	24%	19	17	25%
Arkansas	6,549	1,455	22%	20	22	21%
Colorado	5,753	1,210	21%	21	20	23%
Missouri	13,054	2,686	21%	22	21	21%
US Total	628,788	127,884	20%			20%
North Carolina	19,051	3,872	20%	23	27	20%
Idaho	1,749	354	20%	24	24	21%
New York	50,827	9,942	20%	25	26	20%
Illinois	27,556	5,342	19%	26	25	20%
Alabama	14,531	2,783	19%	27	23	21%
Virginia	17,074	3,094	18%	28	28	18%
New Jersey	26,496	4,593	17%	29	31	16%
Oklahoma	7,457	1,290	17%	30	29	17%
Nevada	679	110	16%	31	45	11%
Arizona	8,133	1,315	16%	32	32	15%
Massachusetts	12,599	2,023	16%	33	30	16%
Vermont	192	30	16%	34	42	12%
Louisiana	6,941	1,083	16%	35	33	15%
Michigan	19,886	2,972	15%	36	35	15%
New Mexico	6,230	917	15%	37	38	13%
Pennsylvania	17,274	2,417	14%	38	34	15%
Oregon	7,057	966	14%	39	36	14%
Maryland	13,757	1,874	14%	40	39	13%
Hawaii	2,488	334	13%	41	41	13%
Ohio	16,412	2,183	13%	42	40	13%
Texas	50,928	6,615	13%	43	43	12%
Delaware	2,296	277	12%	44	48	10%
South Carolina	12,617	1,437	11%	45	44	11%
Tennessee	11,848	1,345	11%	46	46	11%
West Virginia	2,804	290	10%	47	37	14%
Connecticut	6,161	637	10%	48	47	10%
Rhode Island	2,251	208	9%	49	49	9%
Indiana	6,874	593	9%	50	50	8%
District of Columbia	0	0	0%	51	51	0%

Regarding to last year's data, state of Montana shows the biggest improvement in graduation rate for public two year institutions. State of Montana moved its rate up by about 7% and moved up 10 spots to earn the state number 9 spot in the ranking. Browsing through Montana's two year public schools, it revealed that almost all schools contribute to the overall improvement with Miles Community College leading the way with an improvement of about 22%, from 38 to 60%.

As we all know, reasons for variations in the rates are many. For example, the open access policy of school enrollment could easily affect the graduation rates. The posting and ranking of the state college graduation rates, nevertheless, provides the context for dialogs between citizen, policy makers and educators. Further research should help to reveal the favorable mechanism to improve college graduation rates.

US College Graduation Rates by State for 2009-10 graduates

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CL Higher Education Center

Related articles:
US College Graduation Rates by State - 2010 Ranking

College Graduation Rates by State for 2008-09 graduates
College Graduation Rates Ranking by State - 2008-09 Graduates
US College Graduation Rates by Race by State - 2009 IPEDS

The CL Higher Education Center just released the compiled state by state college graduation rate data for 2009-10 college graduates. The compiled rates includes state rates for different types/sectors of institutions breaking down by race and gender. Graduation rates for non-resident alien are also included.


The released data is based on the 2010 Graduation Rate survey conducted by the IPEDS (Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System) division of the National Center for Education
Statistics (NCES) of the US Department of Education. For the IPEDS graduation rate survey, IPEDS only collect the race, gender and non-resident alien status from schools that offer degrees that take two or more years to complete. For schools that offers degrees with less than two years to complete, only the total head counts are collected. Short discussion on the scope and limitation of the IPEDS graduation rate survey can also be found in my previous article : College Graduation Rates by State for 2008-09 graduates.

For 2010, the overall college graduation rate for US citizen is 49% for the continental US states and D.C. assuming that all students attending less-than-2-years schools are all US citizen. For degree-granting schools, the US continental graduation rate is 46%. The corresponding rate for non-degree granting schools is 67%. For the 2010 survey, about 12% students accounted for attended non-degree-granting schools and most (74%) of the students attending non-degree-granting schools attending less-than-2-years institutions.

In terms of gender profiles, which is only applicable to colleges offer at least 2 year degrees, women posted an overall graduation rate of 48% for degree-granting schools while men posted a rate of 43%. In comparison, the non-resident alien women posted a rate of 51% while the alien men posted a rate of 48%. For non-degree-granting schools, US women posted a rate of 68% while men posted a rate of 64%. There are very few (a total of 264) non-resident alien enrolled in US non-degree-granting schools with an average rate of 63% (64% for women and 63% for men).

Related articles will be posted later.

Where Did 2009-10 High School Graduates Go to Colleges?

CL Higher Education Center
 

Do you like to know where your high school graduates went to college? What percentage of your high school graduates went to out of state colleges? To what kind of colleges? Private or public? The recent data release from CL Higher Education Center can answer your questions.

IPEDS Higher Ed Residence and Migration - 2010 state level data released

The CL Higher Education Center just put out the early release of the state level summaries for the 2010 NCES IPEDS¹ residence and migration survey. Institutions reported the state of residence of their fall-term first time degree seeking students to the Residence and Migration section of the IPEDS fall enrollment survey. The CL Higher Education Center aggregates the institutional level data into the state level summaries. Sector information is maintained through the aggregation process. What this mean is that, for a given state, user can tell how many of their students went to public(or private non-for profit) 4 year institutions outside of their state. Separate files are also published for people interested only in degree-granting institutions.

IPEDS Higher Ed Residence and Migration - 2010 state level data released

¹The Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System managed by the National Center for Education Statistics of US Education Department.

Transforming a Region

Original Article

Summary goes here!

Haven't blog for quite a while. This one resonant with me. So much of it matched perfectly with what I have been advocate: The responsibility, the culture, the work study, the adaptivity ...

Our unprepared graduates

Original Article

Summary goes here!

To me, I have read this kind of articles long enough and have heard enough of proposed solution and I am basically not very interested in this kind of articles anymore.

For this particular one, the value is that it pointed out the quality of college graduate is of concern. However, this is not the first time this idea been pointed out. Personally, I have asked this question for a long time and there are various others.

The bigger question is what we are going to do to solve this problem.

For the beginner, we have to understand couple of things. First of all, our higher education all like to be unique and all have their own mission and there is no way to compare them - claimed our higher education insider (Presidents, Professors ... alike). Second of all, all our higher education claimed to equipped our students with critical thinking skills that none of our higher education insider knows how to quantify it. Third and not the last, our higher education insiders believe United State has the best higher education system in the world and there is no need to fix.

As we all know, higher education insiders include a lot of well educated, sophisticate professors, whose words carry weights - right or wrong is a different issue. But, as we all know, protecting self-interest is not immunized by any human beings including professors. In order for us to inches to anywhere closer to the solution, we have to exam these myth.

To continue...

The University of Wherever

Original Article

Summary goes here!

This has been my idea all these times. Like the article said, a lot of those in question can be resolved. For example, the evaluation or test can be arranged at a test center similar to what ACT has been handled all these years.

The biggest problem I see is actually the accreditation. Just think about this, they can't even trust Thrun to issue a Standford credit. The 'statement of accomplishment' may good to show someone who knows who Thrun is. But in general, it is useless for any practical purpose. Do you think that is what a 'normal' student is looking for? I doubt it.

One thing I would like to point out is that the statement 'There would be huge audiences and paychecks for superstar teachers, but dimmer prospects for those who are less charismatic.' is not necessary true. In the learning world, it is not the best written book will have the best effect on all students. Based on student’s background, some less than stellar book may have the most effect on some students. The same is true for lecturer. Based on the growing-up experiences of a lecturer, their illustration of a topic can be totally different and affect the same audience at different level. So, there is no short of the need for lecturer. Even for that non-lecturer, they can serve the purpose of counselor and customize the information to students' need.

Again, I see the greatest obstacle in evaluation and accreditation. Given that none of the professors these days supporting some kind of uniformed evaluation and the accreditation is still based largely on none student-achievement based factors, I see no light in front of this yet.

5 Myths of Remedial Ed

Original Article

Summary goes here!

Quick notes on points:
1. College Ready Standard - more important is standard on HS outcome which should be based on the reasonable achievable goal.
2. Don't care what college do with it's incoming students, the outcome is what should be demonstrated and published.
3. All solution should encourage responsibility.