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Policy Analysis and Research

This year WICHE published the sixth edition of Knocking at the College Door: Projections of High School Graduates by State, Income, and Race/Ethnicity, 1988-2018. This report looks at both historical and projected trends in elementary and secondary enrollments and graduation rates over three decades for the 50 states and the District of Columbia. The goal of Knocking is to increase understanding of these trends, providing policymakers and educators with the data they’ll need to make informed decisions about the effect of changing demographics on higher education. In this edition, for the first time, family income level was examined along with race/ethnicity, powerfully supplementing WICHE’s extensive databases.

Finance is a critical issue for our member states today, as well as for students. One Policy initiative, Changing Direction: Integrating Higher Education Financial Aid and Financing Policy, focuses on aligning policy dealing with financial aid, financing, and appropriations. Funded by Lumina Foundation for Education, this project has supported the restructuring of these policies and practices to maximize participation, access, and success for all students, especially those from low-income families. This work assists states in evaluating the way they generate and sustain revenues for higher education and how this affects issues such as access, delivery, and quality. This June, WICHE cosponsored a national meeting in Seattle, Changing Direction: Aligning Finance Policies to Increase Access and Success, with the American Council on Education, the State Higher Education Executive Officers, and the National Conference of State Legislatures. This year, funding support extended the scope of the Changing Direction initiative to examine student retention and the impact of revenue and expenditure constraints on the future viability of higher education.

Another major Policy endeavor this year: our work with the Pathways to College Network, an alliance of private and corporate foundations, nonprofits, educational institutions, and the U.S. Department of Education. Pathways’ goal is to improve access to and success in higher education for disadvantaged students. The Pathways Network – which includes researchers, policy analysts, educators, K-12 administrators, government, business, foundations, and community organizations – seeks to identify the best ways of putting disadvantaged students on the path to college. To support this effort, WICHE has developed an online searchable policy inventory, SPIDO (State Policy Inventory Database Online). In addition, WICHE serves on the executive committee to oversee the project’s five major components and directs the project’s policy component.

A continuing Policy initiative is the Western Consortium for Accelerated Learning Opportunities (WCALO), funded by a grant from the U.S. Department of Education’s Advanced Placement Incentive Program. A partnership whose nine members are Arizona, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Oregon, South Dakota, and Utah, WCALO’s goal is to increase the number of low-income and rural students succeeding in accelerated-learning courses. States participate in the consortium in a variety of ways, including: supporting students from low-income families with fee reimbursement for Advanced Placement (AP) and International Baccalaureate (IB) exams; providing professional development for teachers, administrators, and counselors; subsidizing online accelerated-learning courses; and participating in the consortium’s network of state education agency and state higher education executive office representatives.

Through our Ford Foundation project Expanding Engagement: Public Policy to Meet State and Regional Needs, we continued to work with selected states on the collision between demand, access, and financial constraints. The generally weak state economies coupled with increased demand for higher education has made this a top priority. Providing targeted technical assistance to individual states has been a key strategy for this project, as is creating a community of support by assembling such leaders as the governor, speaker of the house, president of the senate, state higher education executive officer, and prominent business or tribal leaders. We are also utilizing state roundtables, multistate conferences, and publications to promote discussion and action among policymakers, as well as involving members of WICHE's Legislative Advisory Committee to work with lawmakers and policymakers. The project has become the basis for policymaker discussions and a legislative agenda in support of statewide accountability goals and indicators aimed at meeting vital state public policy priorities. This year, under the auspices of this project, WICHE assisted with the California Higher Education Accountability Project as a member of both its analytic team and its advisory group. We also partnered with WCET to convene a regional forum in early October in Salt Lake City on the theme Weathering the Perfect Storm: Information Technology in a Limited-Resource Environment. (A synthesis of the policy discussions is available in the February 2004 Policy Exchanges bulletin at www.wiche.edu/policy/Exchanges.)

The Policy Analysis and Research unit also worked on an important issue concerning tuition for the military. The Department of the Army took the lead for all branches of the military on a national campaign to encourage states to provide in-state tuition rates at state-supported colleges and universities for military personnel, their spouses, and dependents. A key concern was over "continuity," or continued availability of the in-state rate for spouses and dependents if the enlisted person is reassigned to another state. To help inform this effort among the Western states, WICHE collected baseline information on policies and practices and also monitored national activity.

The Policy unit has received funding from the Ford Foundation to look at four workforce areas in depth: nursing, information technology, teacher education, and faculty. The grant supports activities such as roundtables, policy forums, and research, as well as the WICHE Fellows and a post-doc WCET position. This year, briefing papers on selected workforce issues, such as nursing, faculty, and the IT workforce, were issued; some of these were produced by WICHE Fellows supported by our Ford grant.

Throughout the year, Policy Analysis and Research has published its short report series, Policy Insights, covering a wide range of higher ed topics, while the Policy Alert and Stat Alert provide weekly e-mail notices on new policy- and data-related reports. We also publish an annual Tuition and Fees report with detailed data on all public institutions in the West, as well as a regional fact book that provides a wealth of data on access, affordability, finance, faculty, technology and workforce issues.

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