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- Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
- Kategorie: Bildung
- Serie: J-B IR Single Issue Institutional Research
- Sprache: Englisch
All around the world, postsecondary institutions are facing competitive environments, declining resources, and changing societal needs. Institutions are affected by globalization, state and local government needs, economic restructuring, information technology, and student and staff mobility. Institutional researchers have a critical role to play in addressing these issues. In this volume, we have embedded the practice of IR as experienced globally. We brought together a discussion that is delivered from multiple perspectives, but fundamentally one that draws from the collaborative efforts of practitioners across borders. By embedding notions of globalization that affect IR, we can engage readers in broad discussions on where we are coming from and where we are heading. This is the 157th volume of this Jossey-Bass quarterly report series. Always timely and comprehensive, New Directions for Institutional Research provides planners and administrators in all types of academic institutions with guidelines in such areas as resource coordination, information analysis, program evaluation, and institutional management.
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Seitenzahl: 204
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2013
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Table of Contents
Title page
Copyright page
About AIR
Editors' Notes
Chapter 1: Institutional Research in Light of Internationalization, Growth, and Competition
Introduction
Internationalization as an Institutional Imperative
Growth and Expansion of Higher Education
Growth and Diversity of Enrollments
Growth in Higher Education Providers
Expansion of Curricula
Commercialization of Curricula
Additional Mission: Economic Growth and Development
Rising Costs in Higher Education
Costs, Return on Investment, and Accountability
The Nature of Competition in Higher Education
Competition for Students
Competition for Government Support
Summary
Chapter 2: Institutional Research in Emerging Countries of Southern Africa, Latin America, and the Middle East and North Africa: Global Frameworks and Local Practices
Introduction
Origin and Need for IR in Emerging Countries
Quality Assurance and Institutional Research
The Global and the Local in IR Practices
Knowledge and Skills in IR
The Future of IR in Emerging Countries
Chapter 3: Challenges in Developing Data Collection Systems in a Rapidly Evolving Higher Education Environment
National and Federal Higher Education Data Systems in the United States
Australian Higher Education Data Collections
South African Higher Education Data Collections
Developing a Census of European Higher Education Institutions: The EUMIDA Project
The HESA Benchmarking Project in the United Kingdom
Conclusions and Implications
Chapter 4: The Evolution and Practice of Institutional Research
Introduction
Definitions and Practice
Institutional Research as a Profession
Some Further Considerations
Summary
Chapter 5: Institutional Research in the Future: Challenges Within Higher Education and the Need for Excellence in Professional Practice
Introduction
The Historical Role of IR in Higher Education
Place of IR Within Higher Education
IR and a New Environment
The Future Skills of IR Professionals
Conclusion
Index
OTHER TITLES AVAILABLE IN THE NEW DIRECTIONS FOR INSTITUTIONAL RESEARCH SERIES
Global Issues in Institutional Research
Angel Calderon and Karen L. Webber (eds.)
New Directions for Institutional Research, no. 157
Paul D. Umbach, Editor-in-Chief
Copyright © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc., A Wiley Company
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New Directions for Institutional Research (ISSN 0271-0579, electronic ISSN 1536-075X) is part of The Jossey-Bass Higher and Adult Education Series and is published quarterly by Wiley Subscription Services, Inc., A Wiley Company, at Jossey-Bass, One Montgomery Street, Suite 1200, San Francisco, California 94104-4594 (publication number USPS 098-830). Periodicals Postage Paid at San Francisco, California, and at additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to New Directions for Institutional Research, Jossey-Bass, One Montgomery Street, Suite 1200, San Francisco, California 94104-4594.
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The Association for Institutional Research was created in 1966 to benefit, assist, and advance research leading to improved understanding, planning, and operation of institutions of higher education. Publication policy is set by its Publications Committee.
Publications Committee
Ex-officio Members of the Publications Committee
John Muffo (Editor, Assessment in the Disciplines), Ohio Board of Regents
John C. Smart (Editor, Research in Higher Education), University of Memphis
Richard D. Howard (Editor, Resources in Institutional Research), University of Minnesota
Paul D. Umbach (Editor, New Directions for Institutional Research), North Carolina State University
Marne K. Einarson (Editor, AIR Electronic Newsletter), Cornell University
Gerald W. McLaughlin (Editor, AIR Professional File/IR Applications), DePaul University
Richard J. Kroc II (Chair, Forum Publications Committee), University of Arizona
Sharron L. Ronco (Chair, Best Visual Presentation Committee), Florida Atlantic University
Randy Swing (Staff Liaison)
For information about the Association for Institutional Research, write to the following address:
AIR Executive Office
1435 E. Piedmont Drive
Suite 211
Tallahassee, FL 32308-7955
(850) 385-4155
http://airweb.org
Editors' Notes
At nearly every turn in our daily lives, we see increasing evidence of globalization. From postsecondary enrollment to the location of high-status employment opportunities, we see economic transactions, material goods, and intellectual knowledge being shared across continents. Tertiary education, too, is rapidly undertaking its educational mission globally. Over the past two decades, tertiary education policy has undergone significant transformation. Because we know that human capital plays a critical role in the global economy, postsecondary education is seen by officials in many countries as a key to economic development (Dill & Van Vught, 2010). Most developed countries have adopted policies for, or considered how to move toward, greatly expanded higher education systems. Developing and emerging countries are reforming their national education systems, and this transformation is rapidly bringing greater competiveness but also evenness to the landscape of higher education worldwide.
Globalized higher education produces an even greater need for the decision support function of institutional research; however, it needs to be debated in what form, shape, or orientation it should occur. We agree with Yorke (2004) that as postsecondary education expands (or perhaps becomes more marketized), and deeper knowledge of the institution is needed to better compete for students and funding, the institutional research (IR) function has become much more critical. The advent of other IR associations across the world (including European AIR, Australasian AIR, Middle East and Northern Africa AIR, HEIR, Dutch AIR, and others) confirm the need for expanding knowledge and practice in IR.
All around the globe, tertiary education institutions are increasingly facing competitive environments, declining resources, and changing societal needs. Factors that are influencing these changes include globalization, the changing role of the state, economic restructuring, information technology, and student and staff mobility.
The “Europeanization” of the higher education space is continuing on the continent, although it is taking longer than originally conceived. Similar developments are occurring in other regions of the world. In Latin America and the Caribbean, there are initiatives aimed at higher education integration and harmonization, and for the promotion of increased flows of student and scholars participating in academic exchanges. More recently, leaders of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) agreed that strengthening collaboration among APEC economies is crucial for facilitation of the work on specific policies, including those relating to quality assurance, accreditation, cross-border exchange, and data collection (APEC, 2012). The creation and harmonization of common educational spaces can only gather impetus as tertiary education develops further in other world regions.
Universities from developing and emerging countries in Asia, Latin America, and elsewhere are also challenging the stronghold standing of many universities in developed countries as they are progressively improving in the numerous world university rankings. The emergence of global institutions operating across multijurisdictions will test the viability of existing institutional models, but also the increased access to tertiary education across the globe will forge new ways for operating in years to come.
Over the past 40 years and all around the world, the number of students enrolled in tertiary education has increased dramatically. This rapid increase in participation is expected to remain unabated in coming years. Parts of the world such as Asia and the Pacific and Latin America are experiencing tremendous growth in the higher education enterprise. The movement to encourage higher levels of educational participation and attainment for their citizens will require these countries to consider decision support mechanisms that can assist in delivering effective and efficient postsecondary education. All of these changes will have a significant impact on the nature and practice of institutional research.
Adaptation to these new environmental conditions requires institutional research practitioners who can provide data, scholarly thought, and perhaps suggestions on how to best address these challenges.
Although challenged by severe funding restrictions, competition for students and faculty, and decreased public confidence, postsecondary education in the United States is still revered by those in other countries. The fabric of the United States' structure and system of education (or variants of it) has been used as a model in other countries. In a globalized tertiary education environment, greater pressures are shaping the viability of institutions as well as the currency of existing business models aimed at delivering all forms of education; these go beyond the realm of one geographical region.
Issues of postsecondary access, accountability, data collection and management, contestability of markets and funding, institutional relevance, new and emerging modes of delivery, and student expectations, among many others, are important and central issues to all those who perform IR functions. Many of us around the world are facing these issues. In some instances we are addressing them in similar ways. However, because the current status of higher education is not consistent across the world, we also see examples of differences in how these issues are addressed. We deem appropriate to embed a global practice of institutional research from the location of our daily activities.
In this NDIR volume, we seek to discuss contemporary thinking and practices of institutional research from around the world. As opposed to highlighting chapters for individual country-specific practice, we seek to embed the practice of IR as experienced globally. We also seek to bring together a volume that is global from multiple perspectives but fundamentally one that draws from the collaborative efforts of practitioners across borders. By embedding notions of globalization that affect IR, we can engage readers in broad discussions on where we are coming from and where we are heading. Key issues such as access, institutional accountability, globalization and marketization of education, quality assurance, and educational policy priorities as well as development of national and multinational higher education data systems (including benchmarking and rankings) are discussed throughout this monograph.
The idea of this monograph emerged as a result of our participation at the Fourth U.K. and Ireland Institutional Research Conference, hosted by Kingston University in London. We first discussed the idea of collaboration on an international study of faculty productivity but identified the need of a global primer on institutional research. Editor-in-Chief Paul D. Umbach and guest associate editor for this issue Tricia Seifert fully supported the idea of this volume on global IR from the moment they learned about the project.
From the outset we set ourselves the challenge of bringing together a monograph that would not be country specific but rather bring together the shared experience of IR practice across multiple countries. To make this goal attainable, we thought it required that the chosen leading experts would be spread across world regions and who would collectively engage in the exchange of ideas, knowledge, and experience to focus on the chosen themes. We acknowledge that so much can be said about the practice of institutional research (whether or not it is called as such in your neck of the woods), we aim to make salient few important dimensions that can be used to discuss the nature, practice, and future of IR. These have been the focus of discussion at the forums of the various IR associations and are likely to be debated with greater force in coming years.
We were fortunate to have the contribution of leading experts in the field. These experts found the time in their busy schedules to engage in a collaboration that went beyond the mere exchange of ideas via email, spanning multiple time zones over several months, but fundamentally they reached consensus on a story to tell that we can all share together. In this monograph we have embedded plurality of professional practice and a cross-pollination of concept and ideas for the endeavors of institutional research.
In moving forward in the debate on the future of IR, we encourage practitioners to ponder the role, nature, and skill sets required for the practice of IR in light of the fundamental transformation we are witnessing in tertiary education. There is a significant body of literature undertaken by those early pioneers and from our contemporary colleagues that provide invaluable insights into the variety of functions and roles that IR practitioners perform to support the institution's mission. How does IR fit into the 21st century in light of globalization and rapid technological change? Does IR matter to the education institution of the future? What are the defining roles and distinctiveness that IR offers to the sustainability of the education services sector? Is there a future for the IR professional in supporting, shaping, and influencing decision making? These are some of the questions that we deem pertinent to debate more broadly.
We would like to express our gratitude to Steve May, Marty Cronje, Steve Woodfield, Kate Dracup-Jones, Robin Middlehurst, Mike Hill, and Helena Lim, who made possible the 2011 conference at Kingston University. We would also like to acknowledge the input received from Raj Sharma, Dawn Terkla (Tufts University), and Anne Marie Delaney (Babson College). We thank Anne Sidner at the University of Georgia's Institute of Higher Education for her help with manuscript preparation, and we thank the Association for Institutional Research and Jossey-Bass for sponsoring the NDIR series. We believe it provides valuable and timely information to IR professionals and all individuals who are interested in issues related to better institutional management.
Angel Calderon
Karen L. Webber
Editors
References
Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC). (2012, September 8–9). Leader's declaration. Annex D. Promoting cross-border education cooperation. Retrieved from www.apec.org/Press/NewsReleases/2012/∼/link.aspx?_id=52C168E4D92346B698EF7830EA311205&_z=z
Dill, D. D., & Van Vught, F. A. (2010). National innovation and the academic enterprise. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Yorke, M. (2004). Institutional research and its relevance to the performance of higher education institutions. Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management, 26(2), 141–152.
1
Institutional Research in Light of Internationalization, Growth, and Competition
Barrett J. Taylor, Karen L. Webber, Gerrie J. Jacobs
Globalization, growth, and competition are challenges faced by many postsecondary institutions across the world. Institutional researchers have a prominent role to play in examining the issues related to these challenges and alerting campus leaders to the impact they may have on the institution and higher education in general.
Introduction
While individuals in each country or part of the world face unique issues, many challenges facing higher education today are similar across the world. The great majority of higher education systems have grown in recent decades, enrolling far more students than they did in prior years and expanding their activities into new spheres such as economic development. Pressures associated with growth bring higher education officials face to face with the need for heightened transparency and accountability. Because growth in scope often brings rising costs, campus officials also face concerns about student access and greater affordability. Globalization compounds these challenges by facilitating growth in student enrollment, changes in the curriculum, and competition from expanded educational providers.
In this chapter, we outline broad trends related to internationalization, growth, and competition in higher education. Higher education officials face myriad and complex issues, and institutional research (IR) officials can greatly assist with efforts to meet these challenges. We therefore leaven our discussion of broad trends with suggestions for ways that IR officers can help their institutions respond effectively to these challenges.
Internationalization as an Institutional Imperative
The factors discussed earlier have prompted postsecondary officials to discuss and then choose which institutional goals will receive attention and resources. Nearly all higher education institutions (HEIs) are progressively engaged in international activities. International engagement now defines quality higher education. The goals of internationalization are, in the words of the International Association of Universities (IAU, 2012), “… continuously evolving, ranging from educating global citizens, building capacity for research, to generating income from international student tuition fees and the quest to enhance institutional prestige” (p. 2).
With reference to institutional prestige, and with the increasing impact of international higher education ranking systems, there is growing emphasis on internationalization in higher education institutions. Incorporating international offerings for students and faculty talent for knowledge production are increasingly considered important indicators/criteria in the majority of ranking surveys. Shin and Toutkoushian (2011) note there is a promotion of internationalization in higher education institutions in non-English-speaking countries, because “… policymakers are sensitive to global rankings” (pp. 10–11). Increasingly, HEI officials around the world seek to attract highly recognized and honored inter¬national scholars and students. Such competitions offer the allure of improved position in rankings, growing financial resources, and expansion of the HEI's international scholarship network.
Institutional researchers have a prominent role to play in alerting campus leaders to the impact (negative and positive) rankings might have on the strategic direction, effectiveness (mission attainment), and/or culture of an institution. Potentially negative side effects include homogenization, or an underemphasis of diversity in respect to various institutional properties and offerings. Mission drift, or the dedicated pursuit of a single-minded concentration on particular activities (such as research outputs)—to the detriment of the institution's original reason(s) for existence—also might occur. The risks should be regularly monitored and appropriately communicated by the IR and Planning offices. Regular institutional effectiveness reporting, which forms part of an institution's accountability responsibilities and should be publicly shared and followed up internally with the necessary urgency, is another important IR role that should not be neglected.
Growth and Expansion of Higher Education
Across the world, colleges and universities grew dramatically over the 20th century. Trow (1984) characterized this growth as the transition from “elite” to “mass” higher education. In Trow's formulation, the traditional system of higher education provided services to a small number of wealthy students. A mass system, by contrast, enrolls at least 40% of a country's student-age population in the pursuit of some sort of degree or certificate. For example, the United States' tertiary education entry rates have risen from 43% in 2000 to 65% in 2007; the United Kingdom's rate rose from 47% to 55%, and the Czech Republic rates for tertiary entry rose from 25% to 54% during the 2000–2007 time period (OECD Factbook, 2010).
According to the Human Resource Development Minister of India, Kapil Sibal, the number of higher education institutions in India will increase over the next decade to effect a substantial growth in the country's higher education participation rate (of people between the ages of 18 and 24 years) from 15% (in 2011) to 20% (by 2020). India is already experiencing an “explosion” of students who have obtained higher education access over the past four decades, with headcount enrollments growing by a factor of six since the early 1970s to 15 million by 2007. Similarly, South Africa has increased its participation rate by more than 40%, and China has experienced a dramatic increase in degree earners, from approximately 800,000 in 1998 to more than five million in 2008 (Faust, 2012).
These examples show that mass higher education continues and increasingly extends beyond national borders. An unprecedented number of students—more than three million in 2009—are studying outside the borders of their home countries (Calderon, 2010), and there is an international academic labor market, with scholars and researchers routinely crossing borders for jobs. Marginson and Rhoades (2002) call on scholars of higher education to recognize that a constellation of international, national, and local forces shape universities. Students and financial resources flow from one nation to another, and ideas are transmitted internationally through highly cited journals. These patterns of growth and internationalization do not hold in all national contexts, yet they represent realities that are common to a wide range of higher education systems (Meyer, Ramirez, Frank, & Schofer, 2006). In the following section, we outline four ways in which higher education has become both larger and more diverse. While each national context remains unique, patterns of growth and the challenges that they pose for institutional researchers prove common across many different national contexts.
Growth and Diversity of Enrollments
Trow's (1984) concept of “massification” implies one of the most important axes of growth for higher education. Enrollments have increased across a variety of national contexts. Globally, more than one fourth of the traditional college-aged cohort was enrolled in a postsecondary education program of some sort in 2007. To be sure, this enrollment increase is not distributed evenly across every national context. “Mature” systems such as the United States, Japan, and western Europe became “massified” much earlier than did developing systems such as those found in sub-Saharan Africa. Nonetheless, the phenomenon of enrollment growth is common across systems even if it occurs on different scales and in different ways for each national context (Altbach, Reisberg, & Rumbley, 2009).
During the second half of the 20th century, enrollments grew not only in raw numbers, but also in the diversity of student bodies. In the United States, social movements transformed higher education, opening enrollment opportunities for previously excluded groups such as students of color and women. These transformative social movements facilitated profound changes in the demographics of U.S. higher education, creating racial, ethnic, and gender diversity in what had previously been a relatively homogenous group of students (Astin, 1998; Rojas, 2012). Other national systems experienced similar changes due to decolonization movements that recast metropolitan universities or developed new institutions in light of the aims of independent nations (Altbach, 2006).
For example, the South African higher education sector experienced a substantial increase in overall student enrollments in the nation's 23 public HEIs from 1996 to 2009. According to information from Higher Education South Africa (HESA, 2011), general student head counts rose from 589,900 to 837,635 (an increase of 42.2%, or 3.4% average annual growth—with the prediction that approximately 935,000 students will enroll in 2013, which implies that the total expected increase could be close to 60% in a period of just 17 years). Female student head counts increased from 282,770 to 477,450 (from 48% to 57% of the total student enrollments) and Black student enrollments increased from 312,222 to 527,701. These increases are indicative of a growth in the country's higher education participation rate from 14% in 1996 to more than 17% in 2009.
