The value of microcomputer modeling tools and spreadsheets to help college institutional researchers analyze proposed capital projects is discussed, along with strengths and weaknesses of different software packages. Capital budgeting is the analysis that supports decisions about the allocation and commitment of funds to long-term capital…

Comparison of federal need-analysis formulas for student financial aid in 1992-93 and 1993-94 focused on elimination of home/farm equity from calculations, parent contributions, and Pell Grant awards. Results suggest higher unmet need and lower Pell Grant awards, and imply that the most needy students may lose gift assistance to more affluent…

The Missouri School Profile System is composed of six profiles drawn from pre-existing databases, with the data organized in a manner useful to school districts for comparison purposes and returned to school districts for their use. Use of such a system should reduce or eliminate the need for special school district studies of finance or pupil…

Reports of a 1974 study that examined the influence of dormitory residency on student leisure activities, especially student activism. Using questionnaires from 760 University of Hong Kong resident and nonresident undergraduates, demonstrates that living in dormitories increased likelihood of becoming activist through increasing social interaction…

A discussion of new technologies and strategies for monitoring college student progress identifies four stages of developing information systems: (1) problem definition and systems specification; (2) data extraction and synthesis; (3) data analysis; and (4) dissemination. Some trends in use of data sources, analysis types, tracking capabilities,…

We queried Florida elementary teachers about how they perceived their principals' professional and personal inviting leadership behaviors during a time when many teachers and principals felt a lot of pressure due to test-based accountability. Despite the pressure, teachers reported that their principals demonstrated fairly high levels of inviting…

Tuition Assistance (TA) is a military-sponsored program that reimburses military members for 75% of the tuition costs of college classes while on active duty in the hope of making military service more attractive to young people and encouraging them to remain in the military. TA's effectiveness was examined by using two models--a bivariate probit…

This self-study guide is intended to help in understanding issues of ethnicity in special education in the context of increasing interest by the federal Office for Civil Rights in the overrepresentation of minority students, especially black students, in special education classes. Part 1 provides a brief overview of the topic of disproportionate…

This guide is intended for local- and state-level vocational education administrators, planners, and evaluators who are responsible for making program planning and evaluation findings and decisions geared toward increasing program relevance. The method differs from more traditional approaches in its heavy reliance upon the selection and…

The rationale for high school dropout reduction programs rests mainly on evidence that graduates are more successful than dropouts in the labor market. It is not evident, however, whether this difference is attributable to the diploma itself or to underlying characteristics that affect both graduation and labor market success. This paper estimates…

The Community College Student Experiences Questionnaire (CCSEQ) is an instrument designed to determine how community college students spend their time and what quality of effort they put into learning. Specifically, the content of the questionnaire focuses on four elements: who students are and why they are at the college; how extensively and…

This research study reports the results of an attempt to build a model of individual differences in undergraduate student development based on factor analysis of a wide range of students' beliefs and behaviors. An 127-item inventory named the Dakota Inventory of Student Orientations was administered to 738 male and female undergraduate students in…

This study examined whether replacing race-based affirmative action admissions programs in higher education institutions with class-based programs would continue to assist minorities yet have the added benefit of helping poor and working class whites. Three National Center for Education Statistics longitudinal databases were examined to assess the…

This report offers a series of transcript-based portraits of traditional-age community college students. As of 2001, students under the age of 22 constituted 42 percent of all credit-seeking students in community colleges and those under the age of 24 constituted nearly three-fourths of first-time community college students. As the baby-boom echo…

This study explores data envelopment analysis (DEA) as a tool for assessing and benchmarking the performance of public research universities. Using of national databases such as those conducted by the National Science Foundation and the National Center for Education Statistics, DEA analysis was conducted of the research and instructional outcomes…