Introduction

Measuring Up 2000: The State-by-State Report Card for Higher Education

INTRODUCTION
By Patrick M. Callan

The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education is an independent, nonprofit, nonpartisan organization. It was established in 1998 to stimulate effective public policy through research, analysis and more inclusive and robust public conversation about higher education's role in American society. Supported by philanthropic foundations, the National Center is not affiliated with any institution of higher education or government agency.

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.	"For most Americans, college is no longer one of many routes to middle-class life, but a requirement for employment that makes such a life possible."	.
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At the National Center's inception, its founding Board of Directors and staff found that two key concepts emerged from extensive formal and informal discussions with leaders from government, business, education, and the nonprofit sector. First, the quality of life of Americans and the civic and economic future of the country depend more than ever before on the availability and effectiveness of education and training after high school. For most Americans, college is no longer one of many routes to middle-class life, but a requirement for employment that makes such a life possible. Between 1977 and 1997, the average income of high school graduates decreased by 4% in real dollars, while the income advantage associated with having a college degree instead of only a high school diploma increased by 28%. For communities, for the states, and for the nation, the complexity of modern life—a new global economy, the information age—requires ever-increasing levels of knowledge and skills. The world marketplace is transformed almost daily by technological change, and Americans are increasingly being expected to pursue ongoing training. The fact is that our country cannot sustain prosperity in the 21st century or maintain and enhance its democratic values and institutions without an educated citizenry.

Second, although powerful global economic and technological forces drive the demand for more and better education, America's response—in contrast to that of other major industrial nations—must be found primarily in our institutions, communities and states. Within our federal system, the public policy responsibility for education lies principally with the states. States largely determine who is prepared and qualified for college by their control of public schools. States provide most of the direct financial support to—and oversight of—public colleges and universities, and give significant direct and indirect support to private ones through student financial aid, tax exemptions and, in some instances, direct appropriations. States determine the organizational structures of public higher education, can shape the relationships between higher education and the public schools, and can encourage coordination between public and private higher education. Federal initiatives are significant, but only the states have the means and the broad responsibility for ensuring opportunity for education, training and retraining beyond high school. Currently:

· Seventy-eight percent of American college students are enrolled in public colleges and universities, institutions created by and financially dependent on state governments.

· States provide 46% of the financial support for public colleges and universities and approximately 29% of the total support for all public and private colleges.

· State and local appropriations for higher education exceed $57 billion.

· States' financial aid for students at public and private colleges and universities exceeds $3 billion annually.

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.	"The growing importance of higher education imposes ever-greater responsibility on the states than in the past."	.
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States are enriched by their investments in higher education, and those with highly educated populations reap extensive economic, cultural and civic benefits.

The growing importance of higher education imposes ever-greater responsibility on the states than in the past. They must ensure that the nation's gateways to success-our colleges and universities and postsecondary training centers-are increasingly accessible to all motivated Americans who can benefit from college opportunity. In this report card and elsewhere, the National Center defines higher education as education and training beyond high school, including two- and four-year, public and private, and nonprofit and for-profit institutions.

I cannot emphasize too strongly my belief that these two core concepts will overarch virtually all public policy discussions and decisions during the next several decades:

· Higher education has become virtually the only gateway to fully participate in our nation's prosperous economic and civic life.

· The states have the primary responsibility for public policy in education.

These concepts led the National Center to this first state-by-state report card. They suggested the importance of evaluating and comparing higher education performance among and between the states, for—despite numerous rankings and comparisons—state policy leaders lack a critical tool. Useful comparative measures of state performance in higher education are few and narrow, and none gives either state policymakers or the general public the impetus and information needed to improve public policies. We and others in the field of higher education policy are frequently asked, "How does my state compare with others in higher education?" and "How do the opportunities we provide compare with those available to residents in other states?" Our answers have been inadequate. Students, workers and families who are considering options for college can examine a wide range of institutional rankings and comparisons. And there are studies that evaluate and compare the status and progress of higher education among nations. But not even the best information about individual institutions or national performance can adequately address these questions for states.

Measuring Up 2000 offers systematic state-by-state comparisons of performance to the residents of each state, particularly to those responsible for forming public policy. In this first edition, we focus on education and training beyond high school and through the bachelor's degree. These are the functions of higher education in which state responsibilities and resources are most deeply vested, and for which systematic methods for comparison and evaluation are least adequate.

Our path to Measuring Up 2000 led the National Center's Board, staff and advisors through careful examination of several comparative studies of state performance in other areas—public school education, the condition of children, fiscal management of the public sector, and state participation in the new economy. The most effective ones, we concluded, shared a number of characteristics:

· They placed primary or exclusive emphasis on results, outcomes and performance, rather than measuring effort or progress.

· They relied heavily on quantitative measures or indicators, rather than only on the opinions or judgements of the authors or sponsors.

· They were prepared by independent organizations not connected directly to the providers of public services or the responsible state policymakers.

· They presented, interpreted and distributed findings to a broad public audience that included, but was not limited to, specialists, professionals and policymakers.

· They were repeated at regular intervals to monitor progress or regression.

· They began with the most reliable, timely and relevant information available, and worked to refine and improve data and methodology in each successive edition.

The National Center has sought to incorporate these characteristics in Measuring Up 2000. As David Breneman describes in his essay, this report is the culmination of a two-and-a-half-year process. Measuring Up 2000 is, we believe, a major step toward more effective state educational policy, but it is only the first step. We hope that national and state efforts will create more powerful measures of educational performance than are now available—measures needed for sustained efforts to improve higher education in each state. The National Center is committed to this goal, and to at least two further editions of Measuring Up, in 2002 and 2004.

The six graded categories—preparation, participation, affordability, completion, benefits and learnin—provide a state policy framework for education and training through the bachelor's degree. Each cluster represents aspects of education over which states exercise substantial policy influence. And for each cluster, with the exception of student learning, there are sufficient data to compare performance across states. Grades in each category are derived by benchmarking all states against those that perform best in that category. The "A" through "F" grades, therefore, evaluate each state against a "real world" standard that has been achieved by the highest performers. This grading methodology was selected over others that were considered, such as setting an arbitrary standard or grading on the curve. Hence, both the methodology and the title of Measuring Up were chosen to encourage high, but demonstrably achievable, levels of performance.

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.	"Measuring Up 2000 will, we hope, encourage states to be explicit about often-vague goals and priorities."	.
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It is, of course, the prerogative and responsibility of every state to define its aspirations, and to set its goals in each performance category. Measuring Up 2000 will, we hope, encourage states to be explicit about often-vague goals and priorities. We urge them to use state-specific data to augment the comparative analysis offered here, and to target education policy, funding and accountability on improvement of performance. Better information is not an end in itself. The purpose of information, evaluation and comparison is constructive change and improvement on a state-by-state basis.

There is ample evidence that states are moving toward a more proactive policy posture in higher education. As they do, it is our hope that Measuring Up 2000 will encourage them to define problems and choices by first assessing the educational conditions of the people of the state. Crucial questions include: "How well are state residents prepared for education and training beyond high school?" "What proportion of them enroll in and complete programs?" A state policy or budget approach that focuses exclusively on the needs, aspirations and efficiencies of institutions is unlikely to reach the broader questions of who is being served and who is not.

An obvious premise of Measuring Up 2000 is that policy conversations about higher education should begin with issues of precollegiate preparation. From the state perspective, the quality of higher education depends heavily on the extent to which its elementary and secondary system equips its young residents for college-level learning. A challenge for state policy leaders, as well as for educators, is to view the entire education system from the perspective of those who must negotiate its levels and structures. For students, the continuum of learning should be the central reality, not organizational boxes that divide education for purposes of administration, policy, funding, accountability and regulation. Many cultures and attitudes that undergird the divided—sometimes fragmented—structures are residuals of an earlier era when the student who progressed from high school to college was the exception rather than, as now, the rule. These structures and divisions may still have utility, but our times call for greater emphasis on the educational continuum—what happens in elementary, middle and high school is directly relevant to the quality of higher education. Similarly, the quality of the public schools cannot be isolated from that of higher education.

A second premise of Measuring Up 2000 is that state performance in higher education depends on the contributions of all the diverse higher education institutions in the state—public and private, two- and four-year, academic and vocational-technical, campus-based and distance-based, nonprofit and for-profit. Whatever the array of colleges and other institutions, all are part of the picture of state performance painted by Measuring Up 2000. Whatever the array, states have policy approaches that can encourage institutional performance to improve state performance. Such approaches can range from direct appropriations to student financial assistance to contracts, and all deserve consideration.

This first state-by-state report card on American higher education poses a set of policy issues about the development of human talent that are crucial to the success of the states and nation. These issues are formulated at the state level, where primary public policy responsibility for education is lodged. They reflect the economic and civic conditions of the early twenty-first century. We would like readers to find both hope and challenge in Measuring Up 2000—hope because the document reflects the great accomplishments of the last half-century, and challenge because great gaps in opportunity and educational achievement remain with us, gaps that all too often are related to geography and to family and individual wealth and income.