This chapter describes the benefits and challenges of state-level longitudinal data collection on student veterans and offers recommendations for optimizing collection and reporting for the advocacy of student veteran success.

The interest in and expansion of the interinstitutional research function by state agencies are analyzed. The increasing importance of this function is described in state level coordinating and governing agencies. (Author/LBH)

Author believes that the legislature should take the lead in providing for evaluation of statewide boards of higher education. He discusses the responsibilities of state boards, and their political and administrative skills. (Author/PG)

Reports a study of state budgeting for higher education that reveals some reasons for the gap between theoretical concepts of productivity improvement and state and institutional practices. Includes discussion of state-level implementation of productivity concepts, constraints on institutional decision makers, and problems in the application of…

The role of institutional research and the relationships between institutional researchers and state agencies from the perspective of state agency staff is reviewed. The statutory and pragmatic roles and responsibilities of institutions, state higher education agencies, and legislative and executive agencies are considered. (MLW)

The future promises to be a difficult time for state planning and coordination, when evaluation must take into account the ways in which state agencies relate to and deal with the contexts of which they are a part. The political context is one of the most important of these. (Author/PG)

The growth of statewide coordinating boards now requires their formal periodic assessment. Reviews cautions and complexities in evaluating statewide boards, evaluation of product and process, and suggested criteria for evaluating statewide boards. (Editor/PG)

Evaluative principles and organizational guidelines that large business organizations have found to be successful may be helpful in the organizational evaluation and possible adaptation of statewide systems of coordination in postsecondary education. (Author/PG)

Criteria for evaluation of coordinating agencies should include the sensitivity of their procedures for consulting the coordinated institutions, and the extent to which they encourage voluntary interinstitutional cooperation. (Editor/PG)

Discusses the ideas presented in this volume on statewide coordination, relates them to other evaluation efforts, and describes how best they can be implemented. (Editor/PG)

Institutional administrators and research specialists must help improve and implement accountability measures if institutions are to retain academic autonomy. Current trends point to increased pressure for public accountability of higher education in the future. (MLW)

Minnesota's experience in involving its private colleges in coordination offers an example of one important criterion of statewide board effectiveness. (Editor/PG)

Describes planning problems posed by competing state agencies and introduction of new federal programs along with college program and enrollment changes. Suggests ways both state and institutions can help solve planning problems. (JT)

Ideas and experiences to improve the art of influence with state agencies are provided. College presidents and institutional research officers were interviewed. The role of state agencies' future issues that may affect campus and state agency relationships are examined. (MLW)

Coordinating boards are necessarily oriented toward state government, while statewide governing boards are oriented toward institutions. These two different types of boards must have correspondingly different characteristics. (Editor/PG)