University of California President Janet Napolitano said in a statement she supports the U.S. Department of Education’s new framework for college ratings Wednesday, though she thinks the system is too simplistic and can improve in many areas.
The rating system, authorized by President Barack Obama, seeks to help students and families select the best college or university for them by analyzing accessibility and affordability, among other factors. The Department of Education took public comments and invited the UC to comment on the draft framework.
Napolitano said in the statement she agrees with the department’s decision to rely mainly on data from existing systems such as the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System, or IPEDS. To add new requirements would increase redundancy and unnecessarily burden institutions, Napolitano said.
However, Napolitano suggested that the department not rely on the IPEDS way of calculating completion rates because it does not take transfer students into account, just first-time, full-time students. Nearly 30 percent of the UC’s student body is composed of transfers, she said in the statement.
Additionally, Napolitano said in the statement she thinks the department should create a metric that measures the graduation rate of Pell Grant recipients to see how the institutions are supporting them.
Napolitano also said in the statement she thinks private and public schools, as well as research-intensive and for-profit institutions, should be separately grouped. She said she thinks having a more detailed classification system would provide a clearer picture of how each university performs compared to its peer institutions.
For measuring labor market success, Napolitano said in the statement she thinks looking at short-term earnings of an institution’s alumni is insufficient. She said the rating system can be improved by also taking into account factors that can affect employment and earnings, such as the population that institutions serve and the proximity of the school to high-paying industries.
She also suggested in the statement that a mechanism in the ratings system be created to identify and sanction poor-performing institutions that have high loan default rates.
The Department of Education plans to release its rating system by the 2015-2016 academic year, according to its website.
Compiled by Edward Pedroza, Bruin contributor.