ACTA's What Will They Learn?® (WWTL) project is designed to help students choose the best college or university for them. The printed report and its online companion WhatWillTheyLearn.com represent the only assessment of U.S. colleges and universities that focuses on what schools are actually teaching. This report assigns grades to over 1,130…

This companion document to "New Eligibility Rules for the University of California? The Effects of New Science Requirements" provides the following technical appendices: (1) Transcript Evaluation Service (TES) sample; (2) Cal-PASS Plus (CPP) sample; (3) Additional tables and figures; and (4) Qualitative interview questions. [These…

"What Will They Learn?" has been documenting for the last 13 years the crisis of weak core curriculum requirements. In addition to helping students choose the right college for the right reasons, American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) works with college and university leaders on campuses around the country to strengthen curricula…

In this 12th edition of its flagship annual survey of college general education curricula, "What Will They Learn?," American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) shines a light on the wide disparity in academic standards at institutions of higher learning across the country. "What Will They Learn?" reviews the core curricula…

College students struggling to pass a college level math course required for Quantitative Literacy (QL) credit1 has been a common issue facing many institutions in higher education. In the fall of 2014, the Utah State Board of Regents solidified a statewide initiative that set goals for each of the Utah System of Higher Education institutions (UU,…

Although about 40% of high school graduates who take the ACT® test express interest in pursuing a career in a science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) field, the percentage of first-year students in college who declare a STEM major is substantially lower. The pool of prospective STEM workers shrinks further as the majority of STEM…

Linguistic diversity is part of Europe's DNA. It embraces not only the official languages of Member States, but also the regional and/or minority languages spoken for centuries on European territory, as well as the languages brought by the various waves of migrants. The coexistence of this variety of languages constitutes an asset, but it is also…

In 2007, the State Board of Education conducted a study to determine what course credits students were "required" to take in order to graduate from high school. In 2008, the Board commissioned a transcript study by the BERC Group to determine what course credits students in the graduating class of 2008 were actually "taking".…

In 2007, the State Board of Education conducted a study to determine what course credits students were "required" to take in order to graduate from high school. In 2008, the Board commissioned a transcript study by the BERC Group to determine what course credits students in the graduating class of 2008 were actually "taking".…

This study describes a typology that allows us to explore and analyze the career and technical education (CTE) credit-taking experience of all high school students, not just those traditionally considered CTE (or vocational) students. We argue that this new typology provides a better framework for understanding CTE than the more traditional…

In this research brief, the authors examine transcript data from 54 high schools in California to look at the specific course-taking patterns of English language learners (ELLs). They investigate the patterns by which ELLs complete 9th grade in English and mathematics and how that links to the accumulation of a comprehensive sequence of rigorous…

This report examines the extent to which California high school students fail to meet the high school course requirements for admission to California's four-year public universities. It investigates students' course-taking patterns and whether the courses they take meet the universities' entrance requirements. Because students from a variety of…

Researchers examined the status of general health education courses in 248 colleges and universities. Survey results indicated the number of institutions offering and requiring a general health education course increased since 1981. Slightly less than 3.9 percent of the student population at the institutions completed a general health education…

The 1990 High School Transcript Study (HSTS) collected 21,607 transcripts from 330 schools. Similar studies were conducted of high school course taking patterns in 1987 (the 1987 High School Transcript Study of approximately 22,700 transcripts) and in 1982 (approximately 12,000 transcripts from the High School and Beyond Study). The introductory…

In spring 1987, a study was conducted at Johnson County Community College (JCCC) to ascertain student preferences for courses which fulfilled a set of new degree requirements and to develop a broader understanding of factors affecting class selection decisions. A representative sample of JCCC students attending 32 classes was surveyed in class…