Documenting P-20 Progress

While states are making progress on aligning K-12 expectations with those for entering postsecondary and the workplace, the majority of education systems across the nation face another major challenge - accounting for results. Few states have P-20 tracking mechanisms that offer data and accountability systems that measure students’ success. If alignment efforts are to be considered effective, state leaders should collect and use longitudinal data that indicate improvements in student preparation, placement, retention, and timely completion of program or degree. There are promising developments on this front.

• The Data Quality Campaign (DQC) is a national, collaborative effort to encourage and support state policymakers to improve the collection, availability, and use of high-quality education data, and to implement state longitudinal data systems to improve student achievement. Annually, the DQC tracks each state’s progress in implementing a longitudinal data system that includes ten essential elements that would allow (among other benefits) K-12 and postsecondary systems to match student records. View your state’s progress.
• In Kentucky, every high school receives detailed feedback annually on how its graduates are performing in the public postsecondary institutions. High school leaders, faculty and counselors learn how many of their students went to college, how well prepared they were, their major and whether or not they were academically successful through their first year. See a sample Kentucky High School Feedback Report.
• The 20 postsecondary systems participating in the Access to Success Initiative are aiming to improve overall student success, and to close by at least half the gaps in both college-going and college completion that separate low-income and minority students from others. This requires the development of strategies for collecting data on student success across the K-12 and postsecondary divide. Collectively, these participating systems educate more than two million undergraduates nationwide and represent approximately one-third of the low-income and minority students attending four-year public colleges and universities in the U.S. Therefore, what these systems do and whether they succeed matters both to their respective states and to the country as a whole.