Price-induced substitution of faculty in academe: Does mission make a difference?

In an earlier paper Tuckman and Chang demonstrated that college faculty were substitutable and that differences in faculty salaries influenced the distribution of faculty by rank and sex. This paper uses a similar methodology to explore the question of whether institutions of high education with different missions have different substitution patterns and price elasticities. Our main conclusion is that price-related substitution does exist at each of the four types of colleges in our sample. However, the observed price effects are small and there is little evidence that any one college type is consistently more price responsive than any other.     

Community Colleges and Labor Market Conditions: How Does Enrollment Demand Change Relative to Local Unemployment Rates?

This study uses fixed-effects panel data techniques to estimate the elasticity of community college enrollment demand relative to local unemployment rates. The findings suggest that community college enrollment demand is counter-cyclical to changes in the labor market, as enrollments rise during periods of weak economic conditions. Using national data for the years 1990 through 2009, we find that a one percentage-point change in unemployment is associated with 1.1–3.3 % increases in enrollment demand. We disaggregate the analysis by total full-time and part-time enrollment, concluding that high levels of unemployment are also associated with greater demand for full-time attendance. Additionally, enrollments are slightly more responsive to unemployment in metropolitan (rather than micropolitan) areas. Informed by enrollment demand theory, our analysis provides an update to the “unemployment elasticity” literature and could aid in current enrollment planning, economic development, and public policy efforts to educate students on the margin between college and work.     

Evaluating college campus closings for the 1980s: A case application of an optimization model

Institutional administrators, faculty, state planners, and legislatures have little analytical basis available to help them cope with the expected excess higher education capacity of the 1980s. Without objective criteria, state planners and legislatures are likely to propose across-the-board reductions even if it were preferable to close some institutions and expand others. This study is a case application of an optimization model to two community colleges in northern Minnesota. Using estimated enrollment demand functions and readily available data on size, quality, and costs, this model is designed to assist policymakers in identifying overbuilt institutions and programs that should be closed. The state's objective in the model is to satisfy specified proportions of enrollment demand with a minimum expenditure of state funds.     

Exploring the Relationship between State Financial Aid Policy and Postsecondary Enrollment Choices: A Focus on Income and Race Differences

This study explores the relationship between state financial aid policies and postsecondary enrollment for high school graduates (or equivalent diploma holders). Utilizing an event history modeling for a nationally representative sample from the National Education Longitudinal Study (NELS:88/2000) in addition to state-level policy variables, this study examined how state aid policies differentially affect students’ postsecondary enrollment choices depending on their family income and race/ethnicity between the years 1992 through 2000. The findings demonstrate that there is a clear and consistent gap in college enrollment for students who are from different income and race/ethnic groups, and that changes in state financial aid policy are significantly related with the type of institutions a student attends across income and racial groups. The study findings have important implications for state aid policy as well as future research on the role of public financial aid policy in college choice of students from different income and racial/ethnic backgrounds.     

Examination of Factors that Predict Academic Adjustment and Success of Community College Transfer Students in STEM at 4-Year Institutions

ABSTRACT

There are a limited number of individuals who possess the skills to fulfill the workforce demand in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) in the United States. Therefore, community colleges and 4-year institutions must be able to identify academic and social factors that impact students’ participation in the areas of STEM. These institutions must also explore the possibility that these factors contribute to the high rate of students switching out of STEM fields. This study’s purpose was to develop a better understanding of the perceptions of community college transfer students who continue at a 4-year institution to determine academic and social factors that influenced their academic success in STEM. To collect the quantitative data, the Laanan-Transfer Students’ Questionnaire was utilized. The results of this study reveal that Academic Adjustment was predicted by father’s highest level of education, interaction with faculty at the community college and university, and perception as a transfer student at the university. The cumulative grade point average (GPA), was predicted by the highest level of education of the father, associate degree obtained at the community college, community college transfer GPA, general courses from the community college, transfer credit hours, and university course learning. Overall, the findings indicate that community colleges and 4-year institutions should encourage students to be connecting more in class and after class—not only with their peers, but also with faculty. Findings also suggest that students should become more involved academically and socially to enhance their academic and social adjustment at a 4-year institution.     

高考录取分数的经济学分析

本文运用经济学中的供求关系和价格弹性理论,分析高等院校录取分数与招生人数和报考人数之间的关系,以及相关的供给弹性和需求弹性特点,为高考考生合理填报志愿提供更有价值的参考。     

澳大利亚高等教育教学资格证书项目研究

21世纪以来澳大利亚各大学学生人数急剧增加,来源、资质多样化,而与之并行的作为学术职业的大学教师却存在教师老龄化趋势,大量聘任兼职教师和新教师等问题,这给澳大利亚大学教师发展带来挑战。各大学相继设立教师发展制度促进教师发展,其中高等教育教育教学资格证书项目具有显著的特色和效果,该项目自20世纪80年代在澳大利亚各大学相继设立起来,在实施过程中通过明确发展教学学术的目标以及各大学联合实施项目的方式,对澳大利亚大学教师发展特别是教学学术的发展起到一定的促进作用。澳大利亚高等教育教学资格证书项目对我国建立有效的大学教师发展制度具有一定的启示作用。     

Enrollment Management with Academic Portfolio Strategies:

This paper presnts a data based marketing model of effective enrollment management based on the relationships between changes in the macro environment, changes in target market student preferences, changes in college marketing mix, and changes in enrollment. An enrollment pay off matrix illustrates how institutions have been able to offset, enhance, or neutralize the potential enrollment effects of changes in the job market for college graduates through appropriate changes in academic portfolio strategies focused on curriculum mix and admissions selectivity.     

ACTIONS TAKEN BY PUBLIC TWO‐YEAR COLLEGE ADMINISTRATORS TO COPE WITH AND RESPOND TO ENROLLMENT DECLINE

Due to changing environmental conditions arising in the past ten to fifteen years, many community colleges for the first time in their relatively short history have experienced enrollment decline. The purposes of this study were to determine how community colleges coped with and responded to enrollment decline, and to determine the effectiveness of these actions in reducing, halting, or turning around the decline. The survey revealed that the majority of the respondents coped with enrollment declines by reducing the number of staff/ administrators, and support personnel, reducing the number of part‐time faculty members, and by redesigning the curriculum. Actions taken by administrators included: an increased emphasis on recruiting and retaining students, offering courses at times more convenient to students, and up‐dating equipment needs of vocational‐technical programs. A number of the actions taken by college administrators helped the institutions to cope with and respond to the decline, while others exacerbated the problem leading to further decline.     

The demand for higher education facing an individual institution

The purpose of this paper is to provide an estimate of the elasticity and cros-selasticities of demand for higher education facing an individual institution. The utility which a high school graduate derives from each educational option open to him is assumed to be a stochastic function of the attributes of that option. For certain types of utility functions the maximization of utility results in the logit probability model. This model is used to analyze the choices made by a sample of high school graduates in Hawaii. Estimates of the price elasticity and the cross-price elasticities of demand for enrollment at the University of Hawaii are obtained. It is found that the demand is quite inelastic with respect to both tuition and total cost of education. These estimates imply that changes in tuition will not affect enrollment appreciably.The authors wish to express their appreciation to Arthur S. Goldberger, H. Laurence Miller, and Pan A. Yotopoulos for their comments on earlier drafts of the paper.     

The impact of community college attendance on baccalaureate attainment

Community colleges are seen as contradictory institutions. Supporters contend that community colleges increase baccalaureate attainment by providing access to higher education for students who would otherwise not attend college, while critics argue that these institutions decrease baccalaureate attainment for students who would otherwise attend a 4-year institution. Using the National Education Longitudinal Study, this article advances the literature on the impact of community colleges on baccalaureate attainment by estimating new models that allow controlling for pathways of enrollment while using different measures of educational expectations and correcting for college choice. Findings suggest that community colleges significantly reduce the probability of attaining a bachelor’s degree, as compared to 4-year institutions, an effect that remains after having taken into account non-traditional enrollment pathways, educational expectations, and self-selection into 2-year and 4-year institutions.An earlier version of this paper was presented at the November 2004 Annual Meeting of the Association for the Study of Higher Education.     

ATTRITION AND RETENTION AMONG ACCOUNTING MAJORS IN COMMUNITY COLLEGES: PROBLEMS AND POSSIBLE REMEDIATION

Accounting programs nationwide are reporting declines in enrollment and the demand for new accountants continues unabated. Given this current crisis in accounting education, attention needs to be given to recruitment and retention issues. This study used a Delphi procedure to sample the accounting department chairpersons in one state's community college system regarding four questions: What initially attracts community college students to accounting?; What are the predictors of success for community college students who choose accounting for majors?; What are the major problems students encounter in completing accounting programs and What recommendations do these chairpersons have for reducing attrition among community college accounting majors? Conclusions and recommendations are presented for community college counselors, administrators, and accounting faculty.     

College applicants' attitudes and enrollment decisions

One potentially useful multivariate procedure somewhat overlooked in admissions marketing efforts is a linear compensatory model presented by Cook and Zallocco (1983). This model defines an individual's attitude about a particular college or university as the importance the individual attaches to a specific attribute of the school, and the belief that the institution under consideration possesses that attribute. In this study we extend the model by investigating the importance of applicants' attitudes about competitor institutions, and by controlling for demographic and ability factors that may affect attitudes. Our research demonstrates that attitudes have a significant, positive relationship to enrollment decisions. As well, we incorporate an attitude difference measure that contrasts applicants' attitudes about one institution compared to admissions competitors. Addition of this variable to the prediction equation substantially improved our ability to forecast an applicant's matriculation decision.An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Association for Institutional Research 1989 Annual Forum.     

Strategies for Increasing Faculty Involvement in Institutional or Program Assessment

This narrative research study was conducted to explore the experiences of full-time community college faculty members involved in student learning outcomes assessment. Prior research documented the need for more community college faculty involvement with assessment at the program and institutional levels (Grunwald & Peterson, 2003; Kinzie, 2010; Nunley, Bers, & Manning, 2011); however, little research had been published about faculty experiences with assessment at these levels. This study adds to the body of literature about community college faculty participation with assessment by sharing the perspectives of faculty members who had participated with either program or institutional assessment on their campus. One-hour semi-structured interviews with nine participants at three different 2-year institutions recognized for their assessment processes provided the data for the study. The size of this study was limited to nine participants so that an in-depth exploration of each participant’s experience with assessment could be conducted. The shared experiences of the participants in this study revealed that faculty involvement with assessment beyond the course level was primarily influenced by faculty perception of assessment being valued as a tool for institutional improvement. Three indicators of the value placed on assessment by these institutions were that they: (a) allocated resources (time and training) for assessment, (b) clearly articulated the goals of assessment at their institution, and (c) demonstrated how assessment results were used in institutional decision-making. This study also revealed that faculty members’ prior experience working with assessment and individual skills or abilities also influenced decisions to become involved with assessment.     

A Review of: “Student Success in College: Creating Conditions that Matter”

Scholarship matters. It allows faculty to fulfill the responsibilities of their three academic citizenships--in their institutions, in their disciplines, and in higher education in general. Current standards for community college faculty scholarship, however, have excluded faculty from exercising academic citizenship outside of their institutions. The sector claim to a unique teaching mission has been used to exempt or exclude community college faculty from the scholarly obligations and responsibilities understood elsewhere in higher education. The absence of generally accepted norms for scholarly production and validation at most community colleges continues to set them apart from other institutions, including those also serving non-traditional open admissions students. By discouraging externally validated scholarship, community colleges deny their faculty an appropriate voice in higher education and deny the rest of higher education the important voice of community college faculty. By encouraging scholarship that meets the tests of external scrutiny, community colleges can provide their faculty with legitimate higher education citizenship beyond the institution.     

我国师范生招生现状、困境及路径研究

教育是国家兴旺之源,教师是教育发展之本。当今时代,教师数量已得到极大满足,质量亟须提升。提高师范生生源质量是保证高质量职前教师的首要环节。通过对当前师范生招生规模、招生机构、招生标准进行调查,我们发现,存在师范生招生供给与教师需求不平衡、高水平综合性大学参与师范生招生的积极性不高、生源质量参差不齐、招生选拔标准单一等问题。为解决师范生招生困境,应严格招生计划,调整招生规模;改革招生机构,提高培养水平;完善招生标准,改善招生办法,多管齐下改善师范生招生现状,提高生源质量。     

The Effect of Florida’s Bright Futures Program on College Enrollment and Degree Production: An Aggregated-Level Analysis

In this study, we investigate the impact of the Bright Futures Scholarship Program on college enrollment and degree production in Florida by using IPEDS enrollment, migration, and completion data. Results suggest large and significant enrollment effects at Florida’s public 4- and 2-year institutions, for both full-time and part-time enrollment. This large growth is at least in part due to reduced out-migration of Florida’s resident students attending out-of-state institutions. Thus the net effect is lower than the enrollment growth in Florida. Finally, our results indicate that the effect of Bright Futures on degree production is lower than that on enrollment. This aggregated-level analysis provides an important baseline for our future research on the effect of Bright Futures on students’ college attendance, choice, financial aid renewal, persistence, and graduation by using detailed individual-level data.     

COMMUNITY COLLEGE FACULTY: MAKING THE PARADIGM SHIFT

The author looks at contemporary research and surveys on community college faculty, administration, and students and diagnoses problems and obstacles for the shift from a goal of expanded access in the 1960s and 1970s to the 1990's goal of the community college: teaching and learning excellence. First the current state of teaching and teachers in the community college is examined. Problems are illustrated such as lack of support for new teachers in their vital first years and the many and growing responsibilities of faculty that take away from teaching. The article then identifies and defines three major challenges for the next decade: (1) facilitating and addressing the needs of a wider range of student ability and mastery; (2) conquering the high and accepted attrition rate; and (3) dealing with the differing and often contradicting perceptions of students, faculty, and administration. This particular disparity, or this "gap," among student, teacher, and administrator is discussed in detail. Aside from these three important challenges, however, the greatest challenge for community college faculty in the 1990s is stated as the diversity of student academic credentials and maturity. Several conditions are also cited, which seem to put two-year college faculty at risk. Factors such as increased enrollment, lack of funding, limited facilities and equipment, and lack of faculty involvement in change efforts. Finally, the author looks to research by Honeycutt in a search for solutions to the above challenges. Honeycutt suggests several guidelines that might help to minimize teachers at risk and maximize faculty motivation. If the shift is to be made successfully, suggests the author, then faculty, the administrator, and the student will have to collaboratively explore and adapt suggestions such as those by Honeycutt and pay close attention to, and try to eliminate, the gap that divides them.     

Texas Hold ‘Em: An Exploration of the Divergent Perspectives of Texas’s Campus Carry Law

One of the most pressing concerns on college campuses today is student safety. To date, nine states have passed Campus Carry legislation and more states may follow. Texas was the eighth state to pass Campus Carry legislation. Specifically, in the 2015 Legislative session, the Texas Legislature voted to allow License to Carry (LTC) holders to carry concealed weapons on college and university campuses. This law, Senate Bill 11 (SB 11), took effect in the fall 2016 at four-year universities and, a year later, took effect on two-year college campuses across Texas. At the heart of this debate, are questions that will affect college campuses across this nation: will this law make colleges safer, or more dangerous and how practical is it to allow or prevent guns on campus? This article employed a case study approach to explore the perspectives held by faculty, staff and students at a Texas community college, which is currently implementing this new law. While the vast majority of Higher Education institutions opposed this new law, its passage in the Texas legislature was swift. At the onset of this study, the researcher speculated that the Campus Carry Law would be vigorously opposed by the faculty, staff and students, but surprisingly this research revealed dramatically different perspectives held by the stakeholders mostly centered around one issue: perceptions of safety. This research also seeks to outline policy considerations for institutions in states with similar pending legislation.     

基于时间序列模型的福建省高考录取率预测

高中毕业生数和普通高等教育招生数是影响高考录取率的2个重要因素。分析福建省小学、初中、高中各阶段的毕业率和升学率以及普通高等教育招生数,用时间序列方法分别建立合适的数学模型,进而预测高中毕业生人数和普通高等教育招生人数,推测出高考录取率的短期发展趋势。预测结果表明,2014—2015年福建省高考录取率可能逼近100%。