The preschool landscape is complex, consisting of several publicly funded programs supported by federal, state, and local funds. Included in this landscape is Head Start, a critical early childhood education (ECE) program that serves--in every state and territory--young children in families with incomes at or below the federal poverty line,…

The effective use of data plays a critical role throughout the policy process -- from accurately capturing populations being served to monitoring and measuring implementation and allocation of resources. In order for data to be used in a manner that supports evidence-based decision-making there is a need for education leaders and policymakers to…

Institutional staff such as enrollment managers, business officers, and institutional researchers are often asked to predict enrollments. Developing any predictive model can be intimidating, particularly when there is no textbook to follow. This paper provides a practical framework for generating enrollment projection options and for evaluating…

This country note presents the results of an analysis of Slovenia undertaken within the Labour Market Relevance and Outcomes of Higher Education Partnership Initiative project. The project was implemented by the OECD with the support of the European Commission with the aim of helping policy makers and higher education institutions enhance the…

In recent years we have developed a data analytics pipeline using artificial neural networks to predict prospective student matriculation for university admissions using very limited demographic data. Predictions are generated at the earliest stages of the admissions process and successfully inform recruiting and admissions staff about the…

The National Student Clearinghouse (NSC) has available for research a large data warehouse of enrollment and graduation information from 1993 to the present for nearly all postsecondary students in the United States. In this most recent academic year, 18 million currently enrolled students alone were added to the database. Some of the following…

This report is the support document accompanying "An analysis of 'micro-credentials' in VET," which examines subject-bundle enrolments in Australia's vocational education and training (VET) system in 2019. This support document is a technical discussion of how the raw data were extracted and transformed for analytical purposes and it…

Forecasting the enrollments of new students in bachelor's systems became an urgent desire in the majority of higher education institutions. It represents an important stage in the process of making strategic decisions for new course's accreditation and optimization of resources. To gain a deep view of the educational forecasting context, the most…

Administrators of distance learning courses and programs are faced with various data needs related to a range of issues; from enrollment tracking to faculty development to cost and revenue analysis. This paper will explore a proposed common data set for online program administrators and strategies for implementation. The framework offered for…

The collection of data by government authorities has a complex history. In Australia, this began with the establishment of British government settlements as a way to account for fiscal viability and social prospects. As the colonies became self-governing entities, the collection of social and economic data increased in importance, and included…

One ethnoracial reporting category perplexes higher education researchers: "race and ethnicity unknown." Using the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), we constructed a 28-year panel of 4,401 institutions. We find that the for-profit sector ranges from 5% to 18% "race unknown" students. In addition, almost…

The purpose of this paper is to identify and explain the best practice of using "big data" reports to help distance learning administrators better understand their own programs and represent them to stakeholders. The authors examine five reports: (1) the number and percentage of graduates from the main campus who also take classes at the…

The Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI) is required by RCW 28A.250.040 to report annually on online learning. This report uses data extracted from the Comprehensive Education Data and Research System (CEDARS). Key findings from the 2022-2023 school year include: (1) More students accessed online courses and more schools and…

Over the last two years the Midwestern Higher Education Compact (MHEC) staff conducted a thorough program review to determine the current relevance and value of the Midwest Student Exchange Program (MSEP). This culminated in the report "Student Reciprocity Programs and MSEP in the 21st Century" (ED627191) which utilized historical MHEC…

Distance education enrollments increased for the fourteenth straight year, growing faster than they have for the past several years. From 2002 to 2012 both distance and overall enrollments grew annually, but since 2012 distance growth has continued its steady increase in an environment that saw overall enrollments decline for four straight years…