Postsecondary Tuition, Fees and Degrees

Between 2009-10 and 2011-12, the average tuition and required fees at 4-year public institutions (after adjusting for inflation) increased more for in-state students (9 percent increase) than for out-of-state students (6 percent increase). During that same time period, 4-year nonprofit institutions increased overall at 4 percent . However, for-profit institutions reported no increase. Findings are from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) fall 2011 data collection, which included three survey components: institutional characteristics for 2011-12 -- such as degrees offered, type of program, application information, and tuition and other costs; the number and type of degrees conferred from July 2010 through June 2011; and 12-month enrollment data for the 2010-11 academic year.
Other findings include:

• In 2011-12, of the 7,398 Title IV institutions in the United States and other jurisdictions, 3,053 were classified as 4-year institutions, 2,332 were 2-year institutions, and the remaining 2,013 were less-than-2-year institutions.

• Institutions reported a 12-month unduplicated headcount enrollment totaling about 29.5 million individual students. Of these, roughly 25.6 million were undergraduates and approximately 3.9 million were graduate students.

• Of the roughly 3.6 million degrees institutions reported conferring, about 2.9 million were awarded by 4-year institutions and approximately 650,000 were awarded by 2-year institutions.

You have read this article with the title . You can bookmark this page URL http://universosportinguista.blogspot.com/2012/07/postsecondary-tuition-fees-and-degrees.html. Thanks!

Want to Get Teens Interested in Math and Science? Target Their Parents

Increasing the number of students interested in science, technology, engineering, and math – otherwise known as the STEM disciplines – is considered to be vital to national competitiveness in the global economy and to the development of a strong 21st century workforce. But the pipeline leading toward STEM careers begins leaking in high school, when students choose not to take advanced courses in science and math.

Experts in research and policy have examined different ways to enhance and promote STEM education, but most of these efforts are focused within the four walls of the classroom. A new study published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, goes beyond the classroom to examine the unique role that parents can play in promoting students’ STEM motivation.

“Our focus for this project was different from our previous work,” says lead author Judith Harackiewicz, of the University of Wisconsin. “In classes, we try to promote students’ motivation and performance in that class, but with families, our goal is to promote choices about which courses to take.”

Because many math and science classes are not required, especially in the last two years of high school, student enrollment may be a more fundamentally important issue than student motivation.

Harackiewicz and her colleagues Christopher Rozek and Janet Hyde of the University of Wisconsin, and Chris Hulleman of James Madison University, hypothesized that parents could play an instrumental role in helping to boost STEM enrollment.

The researchers decided to test this hypothesis with an intervention that involved 181 U.S. high school students and their parents who were part of the longitudinal Wisconsin Study of Families and Work. The intervention spanned the students’ 10th, 11th, and 12th grade years of high school. This longitudinal project was funded by the National Science Foundation.

In October of 10th grade, the researchers mailed some parents a glossy brochure that provided information about the importance of math and science in daily life and for various careers. In January of 11th grade, they mailed the same parents another brochure that emphasized the same overall themes and included information for a dedicated website called “Choices Ahead.” The website featured links to resources about STEM fields and careers and included interviews with college students about the importance of the math and science courses they took in high school. In spring of 11th grade, they asked the parents to complete an online questionnaire to evaluate the Choices Ahead website, which helped to ensure that the parents visited the site.

Parents in the control group did not receive any of these materials. In the summer following 12th grade, all families – adolescents and parents – completed a final questionnaire about their interactions with the brochures and the website and their perceived utility of math and science courses. Information about the STEM classes that the students took was obtained through self-report and high school transcripts.

The results suggest that the intervention had a noticeable effect on the courses that the students enrolled in: students whose parents received all the materials as part of the experimental group took more science and math classes in the last two years of high school. The effect amounted to roughly an extra semester of advanced math or science, including courses such as algebra II, trigonometry, pre-calculus, calculus, statistics, chemistry, and physics.

Mothers in the intervention group viewed math and science courses as more useful than did mothers in the control group. And students with parents in the intervention group had more conversations with their parents about course choices, educational plans, and the importance of math and science during 12th grade. These two factors – having a mother who values STEM and having more conversations about STEM – seemed to enhance students’ own perceptions of the usefulness of STEM courses.

The researchers were surprised by just how effective their modest intervention was. “It’s well known that children of more educated parents take more math and science courses in high school. The effect of our intervention was just as strong as the parent education effect,” explains Harackiewicz.

These findings provide evidence that interventions with parents could be a useful tool for boosting enrollment in STEM courses and could help to close gaps in student enrollment that result from differences in parental education.

“Although some people question whether parents wield any influence, we think of parents as an untapped resource,” says Harackiewicz. “This study shows that it is possible to help parents help their teens make academic choices that will prepare them for the future.”

You have read this article with the title . You can bookmark this page URL http://universosportinguista.blogspot.com/2012/07/want-to-get-teens-interested-in-math.html. Thanks!

Pittsburgh Principal Incentive Program Working Well

In 2007, the Pittsburgh Public Schools (PPS) received funding from the U.S. Department of Education to implement reforms designed to improve school leadership in the district.

A major component of these reforms was the Pittsburgh Principal Incentive Program (PPIP). PPIP provided principals with support, such as professional development focused on leadership, feedback and coaching from their supervisors, and directed professional growth projects focusing on a topic of the principal's choice.

The program also provided two types of monetary compensation: (1) an annual opportunity for a permanent salary increase of up to $2,000 based primarily on a rubric measuring practices in several areas and (2) an annual bonus of up to $10,000 based primarily on student achievement growth. The bonuses included premiums for growth by previously low-performing students and at schools with high concentrations of disadvantaged students, which were intended to reduce the achievement gap between disadvantaged and other students.
RAND researchers evaluated the implementation and outcomes of PPIP from 2007–2008 through 2010–2011. They used surveys, conducted focus groups, interviewed key district and school staff, reviewed program documentation, and analyzed administrative data from PPS.

Here are the key findings from Rand’s report, Improving School Leadership Through Support, Evaluation, and Incentives: The Pittsburgh Principal Incentive Program:

• Most principals reported that PPIP contributed to their professional growth.
• Principals reported improving their leadership practices during the program.
• Principals' scores on performance measures remained steady over time, with most scores at the higher end of the scale.
• Student achievement increased during the program.
• But because Pittsburgh was implementing multiple, well-integrated reforms at the same time, it is impossible to attribute any changes directly to PPIP.
•

You have read this article with the title . You can bookmark this page URL http://universosportinguista.blogspot.com/2012/07/pittsburgh-principal-incentive-program.html. Thanks!