Improving the quality of nondegree credentials is an all-hands on deck, everybody-grab-a-bucket mission. In this series, we spotlight some of the quality influencers who have undertaken the quality improvement mission—and none are more vital than state system leaders. They have the resources and convening power to collect quality data at scale, analyze it, and act on it.
But that doesn’t mean states find it easy to step into the role of quality influencers. On the contrary, it’s complex and difficult. That’s why we decided to talk to data gurus in two states currently working on ambitious projects to build new data capacity at their community and technical colleges.
Chris Tingle of the Tennessee Board of Regents and Karmen Smith of the South Carolina Technical College System are on the cutting edge—they might say the bleeding edge—of building data capacity on noncredit education. Both serve as research partners in the State Noncredit Data Project (SNDP), a multi-state initiative
led by the Education and Employment Research Center, to examine noncredit data collected by state agencies and systems, and to assist states in analyzing their data. Last year, the initiative released studies on five states’ noncredit data systems from the second phase of the project. Tingle and Smith were invaluable partners in exploring the data systems in their states and active in the related learning community for state policymakers.
Tingle and Smith agreed to talk to us more in-depth about their experiences expanding the noncredit data their states track and analyze. We wanted to know what drives them, how they went about planning their initiatives, what they’ve learned, and what they’re planning next. We also talked about a recently-revised toolkit—the Noncredit Data Taxonomy 2.0—and what it means to them.
Why states want to expand noncredit data capacity. Both Tingle and Smith said their work is, in many ways, a response to policymakers, who want to see evidence that noncredit education meets their state’s economic needs and provides a return on public investment. Smith felt a heightened level of expectation due to a recent boost in funding from the South Carolina state legislature.
“With more money comes more accountability,” she says. “That prompted us to collect more data, because the money has to be accounted for, and we needed to tell our story better.”
How states plan their data capacity expansions. Community colleges are locally managed in both states. That means the state agency needs to build consensus around a plan. Tingle described a process of interviewing stakeholders to learn and document their priorities, asking questions like: “Why does this matter to institutions? What do they get from providing us with consistent, reliable information?”
“We have to make a case for why this information is beneficial to the institution,” Tingle says. “When you require somebody to do something and they don’t want to do it, it falls apart pretty quick.”
What states learn along the way. While Tennessee and South Carolina have collected noncredit data for years, both are still in the early stages of their initiatives to improve and expand data collection. They’ve already scored some wins, though. Tingle described developing consistent definitions, replacing more ad hoc terms that varied from one agency or institution to another. Smith was excited about bringing the rigorous system used to classify for-credit programs of study to their noncredit programs. This change enables her office to develop statewide program inventories, using CIP codes, that they can share with policymakers in an accessible way.
“We say, ‘this is how many students went through a welding program this year, and these are the employment outcomes,’” Smith says. “It helps us to organize and filter the data we have.”
Where these states go next. Tennessee and South Carolina are still in the process of deciding their game plans. Tingle identified three priorities for his state: Matching noncredit programs to labor records, understanding which credentials are industry recognized, and tracking students from the noncredit to the for-credit space. South Carolina also is interested in building new capacity to track how students who obtain nondegree credentials move into the labor market.
An analytical tool that both Smith and Tingle regularly turn to is the Noncredit Data Taxonomy, now in its second iteration. The State Noncredit Data Project developed the taxonomy to organize all the data points states collect on noncredit education and provide a guide looking to develop or expand their noncredit data. The taxonomy is structured around four broad categories: purpose and design, outcomes, enrollment and demographics, and finance and policy.
Noncredit Data Taxonomy 2.0
Tingle used the taxonomy to help organize work groups, such as one with deep expertise in outcomes and another on enrollment, that would collaborate on developing more standardized definitions for noncredit data reporting.
What’s truly remarkable about the efforts of South Carolina and Tennessee is that they are developing momentum for change without any dedicated funding for data enhancement from their states. They would, however, welcome such funding and use it to expand and speed up their work. Even small increments of additional funding for building data capacity could put wind in the sails of people like Tingle, Smith, and their counterparts in many other states.
Tom Hilliard is a consultant and former research engagement manager at the Education and Employment Research Center at Rutgers University’s School of Management and Labor Relations, which focuses on better understanding how education intersects with the labor market. Mark D’Amico is Professor of Higher Education at University of North Carolina at Charlotte and co-principal investigator of the State Noncredit Data Project.