BILL REQ. #:  S-3987.1 

Read first time 01/29/14.   Referred to Committee on Higher Education.

     AN ACT Relating to the dashboard for four-year institutions of higher education; amending RCW 28B.77.090; and creating a new section.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:

NEW SECTION.  Sec. 1   The legislature finds that the data available on the statewide public four-year dashboard displayed by the office of financial management is useful to prospective students and their families when making decisions about which institutions of higher education to apply to and ultimately attend. Therefore, the legislature intends for the four-year institutions of higher education and the office of financial management to provide data about branch campuses in addition to main campuses in order to better serve the public.

Sec. 2   RCW 28B.77.090 and 2013 c 23 s 60 are each amended to read as follows:
     (1) An accountability monitoring and reporting system is established as part of a continuing effort to make meaningful and substantial progress towards the achievement of long-term performance goals in higher education.
     (2) To provide consistent, easily understood data among the public four-year institutions of higher education within Washington and in other states, the following data must be reported to the education data center annually by December 1st, and at a minimum include data recommended by a national organization representing state chief executives. The education data center in consultation with the council may change the data requirements to be consistent with best practices across the country. This data must, to the maximum extent possible, be disaggregated by race and ethnicity, gender, state and county of origin, age, and socioeconomic status, and include the following for the four-year institutions of higher education:
     (a) Bachelor's degrees awarded;
     (b) Graduate and professional degrees awarded;
     (c) Graduation rates: The number and percentage of students who graduate within four years for bachelor's degrees and within the extended time, which is six years for bachelor's degrees;
     (d) Transfer rates: The annual number and percentage of students who transfer from a two-year to a four-year institution of higher education;
     (e) Time and credits to degree: The average length of time in years and average number of credits that graduating students took to earn a bachelor's degree;
     (f) Enrollment in remedial education: The number and percentage of entering first-time undergraduate students who place into and enroll in remedial mathematics, English, or both;
     (g) Success beyond remedial education: The number and percentage of entering first-time undergraduate students who complete entry college-level math and English courses within the first two consecutive academic years;
     (h) Credit accumulation: The number and percentage of first-time undergraduate students completing two quarters or one semester worth of credit during their first academic year;
     (i) Retention rates: The number and percentage of entering undergraduate students who enroll consecutively from fall-to-spring and fall-to-fall at an institution of higher education;
     (j) Course completion: The percentage of credit hours completed out of those attempted during an academic year;
     (k) Program participation and degree completion rates in bachelor and advanced degree programs in the sciences, which includes agriculture and natural resources, biology and biomedical sciences, computer and information sciences, engineering and engineering technologies, health professions and clinical sciences, mathematics and statistics, and physical sciences and science technologies, including participation and degree completion rates for students from traditionally underrepresented populations;
     (l) Annual enrollment: Annual unduplicated number of students enrolled over a twelve-month period at institutions of higher education including by student level;
     (m) Annual first-time enrollment: Total first-time students enrolled in a four-year institution of higher education;
     (n) Completion ratio: Annual ratio of undergraduate and graduate degrees and certificates, of at least one year in expected length, awarded per one hundred full-time equivalent undergraduate students at the state level;
     (o) Market penetration: Annual ratio of undergraduate and graduate degrees and certificates, of at least one year in program length, awarded relative to the state's population age eighteen to twenty-four years old with a high school diploma;
     (p) Student debt load: Median three-year distribution of debt load, excluding private loans or debts incurred before coming to the institution;
     (q) Data related to enrollment, completion rates, participation rates, and debt load shall be disaggregated for students in the following income brackets to the maximum extent possible:
     (i) Up to seventy percent of the median family income;
     (ii) Between seventy-one percent and one hundred twenty-five percent of the median family income; and
     (iii) Above one hundred twenty-five percent of the median family income; and
     (r) Yearly percentage increases in the average cost of undergraduate instruction.
     (3) Four-year institutions of higher education must count all students when collecting data, not only first-time, full-time first-year students.
     (4)(a) In conjunction with the office of financial management, all four-year institutions of higher education including branch campuses established under chapter 28B.45 RCW, must display the data described in subsection (2) of this section in a uniform dashboard format on the office of financial management's web site no later than December 1, 2011, ((and)) for main campuses and December 1, 2014, for branch campuses. The web site must be updated thereafter annually by December 1st. To the maximum extent possible, the information must be viewable by race and ethnicity, gender, state and county of origin, age, and socioeconomic status. The information may be tailored to meet the needs of various target audiences such as students, researchers, and the general public.
     (b) When data suppression is necessary to protect student privacy, the education data center shall avoid redacting data to the maximum extent possible, using alternatives such as combining data groupings or using the percentage of students in place of the specific number of students.
     (5) The council shall use performance data from the education data center for the purposes of strategic planning, to report on progress toward achieving statewide goals, and to develop priorities proposed in the ten-year plan for higher education.