Wealth of data on community colleges
By Kathleen Pender, San Francisco Chronicle
Students shopping
for a four-year college or university can find a wealth of reviews and ratings
comparing them on anything from SAT scores and acceptance rates to dorm food
and party scenes. Finding such data on community colleges is hard, even though they
serve far more students.
The California
Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office is about to release some new reports
that should make comparison shopping a bit easier, at least when it comes to
academic and career achievement.
Within a month, the
office will issue a report comparing the median income of students before and
after they got an associate degree or certificate from each of the state’s 112
campuses. It will show their income two years before they started school,
compared with two years and five years after they got their degree or
certificate. It will show median wages of graduates by program and school.
In early April, the
office will roll out a new student success scorecard that will show each
college’s success rates in six areas. They include the percentage of students
who are seeking a certificate, associate degree or transfer to a four-year
university and who achieve that goal within six years; the percentage of such
students who complete at least 30 units; and the percentage who enroll in three
consecutive terms.
Another data point
is the percentage of students who needed a remedial course in English, math or
English as a second language and then completed a college-level course in the
same subject. The score sheet will break out these numbers by race, ethnicity,
gender and age group.
Assessing schools,
programs
Much of the
scorecard data is already available on the office’s website, but not in a way
that’s fit for ordinary human consumption.
The chancellor’s
office still won’t rank colleges from best to worst, but the new data should
make it easier for those who want to compare colleges or programs.
“Generally students
choose (community) colleges based on proximity and convenience,” says Davis
Jenkins, a senior research associate at Columbia University’s teachers college.
The scorecard might
sway some to look further afield for the best program, even if it means taking
a BART trip or moving. (Some community colleges have dorms or private residence
halls. For a partial list, see www.cccco.edu/communitycolleges/collegehousing.aspx )
In the meantime,
how can students compare schools?
Spar ratings
One way is by
looking at the Student Progress and Achievement Rating, which measures the
percentage of students seeking a degree, certificate or transfer and who
complete it within six years. My column lists the colleges with the best and
worst ratings for the student cohort that entered community college in 2005-06.
To see ratings for all colleges, visit my blog at http://blog.sfgate.com/pender
In the past, this
so-called Spar calculation was criticized for ignoring a large percentage of
community college students. The denominator only included students who already
had taken at least 12 credits and enrolled in a college-level math or English
class. That covered only about 40 percent of all incoming students, says
Colleen Moore, research specialist at the Institute for Higher Education
Leadership and Policy at Sacramento State University.
For the scorecard,
this rating has been expanded to cover students who have taken at least six
credits and any math or English class. Moore predicts that “rates will go down
because they capture more of the entering cohort.”
Not surprisingly,
“a college serving poor students is going to have a lower rate” than one in a
higher socioeconomic area, Jenkins says. So take that into account, and don’t
rely on this one rating alone.
Other resources
The U.S. Department
of Education’s College Navigator website http://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/
also has information
on community colleges nationwide, including costs and financial aid.
Students intent on
transferring to a certain four-year college should see if it has an
articulation agreement with nearby community colleges that guarantee admission
if they complete a certain course of study.
There is no list of
articulation agreements, but you can track the flow of students from individual
California community colleges to individual state four-year institutions at
The state has
created a program that guarantees admission into the California State
University system to students who get a new associate degree for transfer from
any community college that offers one. For more information, see http://www.adegreewithaguarantee.com
or my colleague Nanette Asimov’s Feb. 20 story at http://tinyurl.com/arj555k
No matter which
community college students choose, they do best “when they have a clear idea of
what they want to do,” Jenkins says. There is a lot of support within colleges
from counselors, faculty and department chairs, “but it’s up to the students to
find them. You are generally not going to get directed.”
With college costs
rising and financial aid getting tighter (the maximum Pell Grant has been cut
to 12 semesters from 18), “you have less time anymore to find yourself,” he
adds.
Kathleen Pender is
a San Francisco Chronicle columnist. Net Worth runs Tuesdays, Thursdays and
Sundays. E-mail: kpender@sfchronicle.com Blog: http://blog.sfgate.com/pender
Twitter: @kathpender
