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Sector Spotlight
Report Release: Reforming Teacher Pensions for a Changing Work Force
New Education Sector report examines teacher pensions and details the problems facing current state pension programs.
Sport or Not? A Question for the Courts
Senior Policy Analyst Elena Silva interviewed by the New York Times on Title IX.
Teachers Unions as Agents of Reform
Brad Jupp, an architect of Denver's landmark performance-based teacher pay system, ProComp, is an outspoken advocate of both labor organizing and quality education for disadvantaged kids. In this interview, Jupp talks about ProComp, his views on teacher unionism, and the future of the teaching profession.
Education Sector Welcomes Three New Board Members
Education Sector's board of directors names three prominent leaders in the fields of education and journalism to the board: David W. Breneman, Richard Lee Colvin, and Peter McWalters.
For-profit colleges: Do they shortchange students?
Policy Director Kevin Carey comments on a recent Senate HELP Committee hearing on for-profit colleges.
Issues
Undergraduate Education
Research and public policy designed to increase student learning and graduation for undergraduates while reducing college costs.
Best of Undergraduate Education
The Course of Innovation: Using Technology to Transform Higher Education
The National Center for Academic Transformation has helped a number of colleges redesign courses to both improve student learning and save costs. With higher education facing its worst fiscal environment in a generation, it would seem that all institutions would adopt these proven reforms. But this is not the case. In this new report, Policy Analyst Ben Miller highlights successful redesign models as well as the barriers to innovation in higher education.
A 'Race to the Top'
In this column for The Chronicle of Higher Education, Kevin Carey lays out five ideas for a Race to the Top in higher education.
Lowering Student Loan Default Rates
In this new Education Sector report, co-authors Erin Dillon and Robin V. Smiles discuss the growing problem of students defaulting on their student loans. Based on the experiences of a small group of Texas HBCUs and a new statistical analysis of cohort default rates, they argue that institutions play a significant role in helping students avoid default.
The 411 on Cohort Default Rates
In this presentation, Policy Analyst Ben Miller explains the ins and outs of cohort default rates and why the new rates have important implications for students, parents, and schools.
States of Crises
In a Newsweek online exclusive, Education Sector's Kevin Carey argues California's problems with skyrocketing college tuition are a sign of things to come nationwide.
Community Colleges: To Thine Own Self Be True
In Newsweek, Education Sector's Kevin Carey argues that community colleges should embrace their calling to provide job training and low-cost, high-quality teaching to a diverse range of student, rather than run away from it.
College for $99 a Month
The next generation of online education could be great for students and catastrophic for universities, argues Kevin Carey in The Washington Monthly.
A Different Kind of College Ranking
Education Sector's Kevin Carey teams up with The Washington Monthly to deliver the the magazine's annual college guide.
ES Review: Selections From 2008 and 2009
From measuring 21st century skills to plotting school choice, the third edition of the ES Review brings together, in one setting, some of our best work from 2008 and 2009.
Ready to Assemble: Grading State Higher Education Accountability Systems
States need strong higher education systems, now more than ever. In a new Education Sector report, Chad Aldeman and Kevin Carey rate the effectiveness of every state's higher education accountability system in 21 categories, ranging from how well states measure student learning outcomes to how well states link accountability information to funding. Learn how your state measures up.
Ready to Assemble: A Model State Higher Education Accountability System
Today's colleges and universities are plagued by a host of problems: low graduation rates, high tuition rates, and poor student performance. But higher education has few incentives to address these problems. Thus, policymakers who want to fix the problems of American higher education need to create stronger accountability systems. In this new Education Sector report, Kevin Carey and Chad Aldeman describe the current state of the art in state higher education accountability and provide a set of guidelines for designing a model system.
Transformation 101
In an article for The Washington Monthly, Kevin Carey asks: If technology is driving down the cost of teaching undergraduates, then why are tuition bills going up?
Graduation Rate Watch
College graduation rates for minority students are often shockingly low. And most institutions have significantly lower graduation rates for black students than for white students. But, as Research and Policy Manager Kevin Carey documents in a new Education Sector report, these high-failure rates are not inevitable: Some institutions are graduating black students at a higher rate than white students.
America's Best Community Colleges
Education Sector's Kevin Carey teams up with The Washington Monthly to deliver the first-ever "community college rankings," part of the magazine's third annual College Rankings package.
College Rankings Reformed
Every year, students and parents eagerly scour the new college rankings. But those rankings may be misleading them about the "best" colleges and universities. New data and technology offer an opportunity to really measure how well colleges and universities are preparing their undergraduate students.
More about Undergraduate Education
Related Materials
"Tuition is the new health care."
This provocative observation from Paul Glastris was just one small part of the Education Sector and Washington Monthly event, "A New Era in Higher Education Reform?" Learn more about this event and listen to the podcast.
Erin Dillon explains the how TFA service is caluculated in Washington Monthly's college rankings.
Research and Reports
Rising to the Challenge: Hispanic College Graduation Rates as a National Priority
This report from Education Sector's Kevin Carey, along with AEI's Mark Schneider, and Andrew P. Kelly, reveals that far too many four-year colleges and universities graduate less than half of their Hispanic students.
False Fronts? Behind Higher Education's Voluntary Accountability Systems
Public online databases are defining the contours of higher education accountability today. But serious design flaws undermine their utility, argue Andrew P. Kelly and Chad Aldeman in this new report from the American Enterprise Institute and Education Sector.
This report from Education Sector's Kevin Carey, along with AEI's Frederick M. Hess, Mark Schneider, and Andrew P. Kelly, spotlights the dramatic variation in graduation rates across 1,300 of the nation's colleges and universities.
ES Review: Selections From 2007
From the promise of virtual schooling to the plight of Sallie Mae, the second edition of the ES Review brings together, in one setting, some of our best work from 2007.
Leading Lady: Sallie Mae and the Origins of Today's Student Loan Controversy
Over the past 40 years, the student loan industry has evolved from a relatively small, government-sponsored program into an $85-billion-a-year industry with thousands of lenders and industry-related companies. But, in recent months, the industry—and its biggest player Sallie Mae—have been at the center of controversy and calls for reform.
Eight for 2008: Education Ideas for the Next President
Education Sector offers eight education ideas for our next president. These are pragmatic solutions to real problems that both parties can support.
Analysis and Perspectives
Why Do You Think They're Called For-Profit Colleges?
In his latest column for The Chronicle of Higher Education, Kevin Carey explains the nature of for-profit colleges and the challenges policymakers face when regulating them.
In the May 2010 edition of Career College Central, a trade publication for for-profit institutions, Senior Policy Analyst Erin Dillon and Editor Robin Smiles share specific strategies that these schools can take to help their students avoid default.
In his latest Chronicle column, Kevin Carey explores institutional branding in higher education. There needs to be a better way of signaling quality in the higher education market, he argues.
In The New Republic, Kevin Carey argues that while the recent student loan reforms are a victory for the Obama administration, a real opportunity was missed in helping more students graduate from college.
Despite Years of Credits, Still No Degree
How do you earn six years of college credit yet fail to acquire a four-year degree? Kevin Carey explains in his latest column for The Chronicle of Higher Education.
NCAA Should Bar Low Graduation Rate Schools From March Madness
Beneath the glam and glitz of "March Madness" lies a problem the NCAA would rather leave unnoticed: the dismal classroom performance of its student athletes. It's time the NCAA acknowledges—and corrects—this problem, argues Policy Analyst Ben Miller in U.S. News & World Report.
"Just how bad does a college have to be to lose accreditation?" asks Kevin Carey in an article for The Washington Monthly.
How I Aced College—and Why I Now Regret It
In his latest column for The Chronicle of Higher Education Kevin Carey explains how made it through college without much effort. In the end, both students and colleges share responsibility for undergraduate learning.
'Teacher U': A New Model in Employer-Led Higher Education
In his latest column for The Chronicle of Higher Education, Policy Director Kevin Carey highlights Hunter College as a model for how universities can work with employers to combine the best of what academic research and hands-on practice have to offer.
In the winter 2010 issue of Democracy: A Journal of Ideas, Policy Director Kevin Carey reflects on legacy of the late Claiborne Pell and the college grant program that bears his name.
Education Legacy: Schools Must Improve Under McDonnell
In an opinion piece for the Richmond-Times Dispatch, Education Sector's Andrew Rotherham argues that among the many challenges Governor-elect Bob McDonnell will face in Virginia, education reform is a key place where McDonnell could make meaningful change happen.
The City Where Diploma Dreams Go to Die
Given the wave of recent news reports about Chicago State University's declining enrollment, corrupt finances, and risk of a revoked accreditation, Policy Director Kevin Carey asks in his latest column for The Chronicle of Higher Education, "does Chicago have the worst public higher-education system in America?"
Often, students with the greatest educational need attend institutions with the least resources. In response, argues Kevin Carey, elite universities must be more generous in the years ahead with respect to funding, transfer, and how many students they can serve.
From 1990 to 2008, Harvard University's endowment grew by $30 billion. What was that money spent on? Kevin Carey explains in his latest column for The Chronicle of Higher Education.
Drowning in Debt: The Emerging Student Loan Crisis
In this Chart You Can Trust, Erin Dillon and Kevin Carey find college students are borrowing more and taking on riskier forms of debt than ever before. The consequences for students, they say, could be catastrophic.
On Accountability, Achieving President Obama's College Completion Goal
In Diverse Issues in Higher Education, Kevin Carey argues higher education institutions must answer the call to see more students through to graduation.
Stanford, Duke, Rice, ... and Gates?
In The Chronicle of Higher Education, Kevin Carey floats the idea of a "Gates University."
In an op-ed for The Atlantic, Education Sector's Thomas Toch argues for better public information on the quality of undergraduate learning and suggests President Obama's stimulus package could help leverage the change.
Introducing a Remedial Program That Actually Works
Remediation is the no man's land of American education, argues Kevin Carey in his latest column for the Chronicle of Higher Education. But Carey introduces readers to a remedial program that actually works.
College Savings Plans: a Bad Gamble
In a recent column for The Chronicle, Policy Director Kevin Carey calls attention to the tens of thousands of families that have suddenly lost a great deal of money they put away to pay for college.
What Colleges Can Learn From Newspapers' Decline
Newspapers are losing to the Internet. The same may be true for universities. To survive and prosper, universities need to integrate technology and teaching in a way that improves the learning experience while simultaneously passing the savings on to students.
Switch Admissions to a Single Lottery
At many institutions, admissions is a far more random process than colleges would like students to believe, argues Education Sector's Chad Aldeman in Newsday.
Blocking Public Comparisons Obstructs Knowledge, Too
In a recent commentary for The Chronicle, Kevin Carey explains that public comparisons of student learning results are too valuable for higher education institutions to ignore.
What American Colleges Can Learn From the Finns
In The Chronicle of Higher Education, Kevin Carey talks about his recent trip to Finland and what he learned about their higher education system.
Invite the Utes to the White House
The President traditionally invites the national championship college football team to the White House for a ceremony and photo op. But this year there is disagreement over who the national champion should be. The controversy leaves President-elect Obama with a smart political play to make: Invite the Utah team for a White House visit, too.
Kevin Carey reviews the book "A Great Idea," for The Washington Monthly.
No One Rises to Low Expectations
How do expectations and student outcomes match up in higher education? Kevin Carey explains in The Chronicle of Higher Education.
In this column, Kevin Carey draws comparisons between the challenges urban K–12 public schools and universities face in serving at-risk students. Like K–12, urban higher education must step up to help these students earn degrees.
The Best of American Oppportunity
At Cato Unbound, Education Sector's Kevin Carey argues for better bachelor's degrees for students.
Colleges Should Stand Up to the Entertainment Industry
In this column, Kevin Carey challenges Hollywood's attempts to thwart music piracy on college campuses.
Community Colleges' Commitment to Teaching
Education Sector's Thomas Toch discusses the unique positioning of community colleges as institutions of learning. This talk was delivered to the faculty and staff of the College of Lake County in Illinois.
What's Wrong With Boasting About CLA Scores?
Colleges that can demonstrate achievement in student learning after their students are first enrolled should be recognized, not condemned, for doing so, argues Kevin Carey in his latest column for Inside Higher Ed.
Kevin Carey reflects on Charles Murray's new book, Real Education, about the history of American higher education.
Higher education needs more concrete evidence about what works in teaching, writes Kevin Carey in his latest column for Inside Higher Ed.
In this column, Kevin Carey explores the growth in student loan borrowing and its consequences.
In this column, Kevin Carey argues the college credit transfer "system" is chaotic, inefficient, and difficult on students. The key to fixing the problem is offering incentives that keep students' best interests in mind.
What if students could have investors pay their college bills in return for a set percentage of their future income? Education Sector's Kevin Carey and Frederick Hess from the American Enterprise Institute explain.
What's Missing From 'Open' Courses
In this column, Kevin Carey wonders why he and others who enjoy the free online courses offered by many top universities can't get a grade for their work.
In this column, Kevin Carey explores the controversy around the proposed federal "unit record" database.
In this column, Kevin Carey sees flaws in the increasingly international business of rating colleges—but also sees legitimate reasons for the comparisons.
The Equity Gap in State Funding
In this column for Inside Higher Ed, Kevin Carey wonders why K–12 financing systems that favor wealthier districts end up in court, but higher education financing systems aren't similarly scrutinized.
Low graduation rates exist for all students—especially poor and minority students. If colleges really wanted to graduate more low-income and minority students, they would treat them more like big-time athletes, argues Andrew J. Rotherham for USA Today.
In the Los Angeles Times, Education Sector's Kevin Carey and Lindsey Luebchow from the New America Foundation argue amid the spectacle that is "March Madness," far too many student athletes don't graduate from college.
We Need to Sever the Iron Bond Between Price and the Perceived Quality of Colleges
In The Chronicle of Higher Education, Kevin Carey explains that the college-cost crisis is fundamentally not about a lack of money—it's about a lack of information.
College Access and Social Class: The A.J. Soprano Factor
Higher education is more likely to open its doors for low-achievers with high family incomes than high-achieving students of modest means.
Deal or No Deal? How Higher Education Shortchanges Unprepared Students
Higher education spends a disproportionate share of its resources on students who enter college best prepared to succeed. But new research questions whether that's the best way to get the best return on our public investment in higher education.
In Defense of College Rankings
While some college rankings are based on flawed measures, college rankings in general are not nearly as bad as people believe, Research and Policy Manager Kevin Carey tells those attending the Association for the Study of Higher Education's annual meeting.
Make Universities Accountable for What Matters
When it comes to their most important mission—helping students learn—American colleges and universities are badly underperforming and overpriced. The solution to this problem isn't less government involvement, but a stronger role in accountability.
Truth Without Action: The Myth of Higher-Education Accountability
Real accountability systems require truth and action. Gathering information is the "truth" part of the equation; doing something about that information is the "action." In higher education, the latter step is often ignored, argues Kevin Carey in an article for Change magazine.
Hidden Details: A Closer Look at Student Loan Default Rates
Policy Analyst Erin Dillon reveals that the U.S. Department of Education's reporting of overall student loan default rates masks much higher default rates for specific groups of students.
Rankings Help Community Colleges and Their Students
In Inside Higher Ed, Kevin Carey explains how comprehensive community college rankings can help students make better choices about their undergraduate education—perhaps looking beyond the nearest college to an institution more likely to help them succeed.
Cascadia Community College outperforms every other community college in the nation—and many four-year colleges—in using innovative, research-proven teaching methods to help undergraduates learn. This in-depth profile shows that if Cascadia can do it, anyone can. Unfortunately, many more prestigious colleges don't want to.
College Rankings: Higher Education's Battle Royal
Schools may boycott U.S. News' influential college rankings, but that doesn't absolve their obligation to provide information on how well they educate their students, argue Thomas Toch and Kevin Carey.
Student Borrowers Tired of Being Gamed by the System
In USA Today, Erin Dillon weighs in on Sallie Mae and the steps being taken to increase oversight of the student loan industry.
Reality Check: Tracking Grads Beyond High School
A growing number of state governments have the information to fill one of NCLB's voids: holding high schools accountable for their students' success in college.
Our public schools are failing, warn Andrew J. Rotherham and Jason Kamras in Democracy. To save them, we must invest in our teachers.
Identity Crisis: Sorting the Good from the Bad in Teacher Prep
Teacher education programs have been subject to harsh criticism of late, but states have been slow to identify those programs that need help.
It's not that hard to get into a good college. Kevin Carey explains in The American Prospect.
In The Washington Post, Thomas Toch and Kevin Carey argue for better ways to gauge the quality of teaching and learning in America's colleges.
Acing These Finals, But Falling Short of Graduation
In The Washington Post, Kevin Carey and Lindsey Luebchow fill out their brackets for "March Graduation Rate Madness."
The Race to Attract International Students
U.S. dominance as the top destination for foreign college students is being threatened. Sept. 11 is one reason. But there are others.
Tuition Discounts: Small Colleges Haggle for Top Students
College seems to be getting more expensive every year, with published tuitions routinely growing at twice the rate of inflation or more. But the "sticker price" is a lot higher than what most students actually pay at a growing number of colleges, particularly small private colleges.
Man in Motion: Gridiron Book Spins an Education Tale
Michael Lewis set out to write a book about football. He ended up writing one of the best education books of the year.
America's Best Colleges? (forum transcript and audio)
Read the transcript and listen to audio from the discussion among leading federal policymakers and higher education experts about reforming college and university rankings.
Kevin Carey reviews "The Price of Admission," an important new book by journalist Daniel Golden that shows how the nation's top colleges have instituted admissions polices that favor wealth and privilege.
The No. 1 Graduate School of Education?
For the past 20 years, a relatively unknown university in Florida, Nova Southeastern, has granted more doctoral degrees in education than any other university in the nation. But even as Nova in recent years has ramped up its output to unprecedented levels, new online competitors are gaining ground.
Expanding Higher Education Information
Kevin Carey provides testimony to the U.S. Department of Education's Commission on the Future of Higher Education.
Influential voices allege that a college education may no longer be a pathway to equal opportunity. Such claims deny decades of evidence.
The New Measurements Elite Colleges Don't Want You to See
Education Sector's policy and research manager Kevin Carey explores new ways to measure the performance of colleges and universities–and why many higher education institutions want to keep that information out of the public eye. The report is the cover story of the latest edition of The Washington Monthly and part of the magazine's annual college rankings package.
In USA Today, Sara Mead explains why Californians should be more concerned about racial and class gaps in college enrollment than gender imbalances on college campuses.
Women now make up the majority of entering college freshmen. This is an uncomfortably uneven split for many colleges and universities, where gender is becoming the newest determining factor in admissions decisions.
For some high school graduates this spring, the deciding factor in figuring the price of higher education is not calculating the cost of college tuition against scholarships or loans. It's immigration status.
Colleges Earn Mixed Grades with Urban Students
New research shows that some colleges and universities are far more successful than others in helping top urban students earn degrees.
Jal Mehta reviews two new books on higher education reform from longtime university presidents Derek Bok of Harvard and Harold Shapiro of Princeton.
In the New York Daily News, Kevin Carey writes that we must change the nature of the teaching profession to recruit the best and the brightest.
Community College Confidential
"All this diversity adds up to statistics like this one: There are six times as many Hispanic students in Miami Dade (Community) College in Florida than in the entire Ivy League."
The Black-White College Literacy Gap
While discussions of the black-white achievement gap have traditionally focused on K–12 education, a recent study of college student literacy found that gaps in higher education are just as large—and may actually grow larger by the time students finish college.
The annual college-admissions tournament is in full swing and for most students, the hard part of college isn't getting in—it's getting out.
"Education Should Be a Rich Symphony"
The late Ted Sizer was one of American education's most influential thinkers. In 2006, Education Sector's Andrew Rotherham got a chance to sit down with Sizer to discuss school reform, instruction and curriculum, the standards movement, No Child Left Behind, school choice, high school reform, higher education, and what he considered to be his unfinished work.
High Schools Failing to Prepare Many College-Bound Students for Science Careers
High schools are systematically failing to prepare large numbers of college-bound students to succeed in higher education, particularly in science and math. Unless this changes, recent calls to improve the nation's international standing in science will likely come to naught.
Colleges Giving More Financial Aid to Wealthy Students
With an eye on the bottom line, colleges and universities are using a growing portion of their financial aid dollars to recruit high-income students instead of students who need the most help.
Profiles
Policy Analyst
Policy Director
Policy Analyst
Senior Policy Analyst
Director, Hechinger Institute on Education & Media
Assistant Professor of Religion, Boston University
Research Associate Professor of Public Affairs, Daniel J. Evans School of Public Affairs, University of Washington
Consultant
Director of Education Policy Studies, American Enterprise Institute
Director, Center on Reinventing Public Education, Daniel J. Evans School of Public Affairs, University of Washington
Professor of Public Policy, Richard and Rhoda Goldman School of Public Policy, University of California, Berkeley
Professor of Education, Stanford University
Research Associate Professor, University of Washington's College of Education and Senior Fellow, Center on Reinventing Public Education
Columnist, Sacramento Bee