Fact or Fiction? Common Misperceptions about Federal Higher Education Data Collections

Accurate, reliable data are critical to understanding how all students fare in our higher education system. But there are questions and misperceptions about how federal education data are collected, what makes federal data unique, and whether federal data could easily be replicated.

Federal lawmakers are negotiating funding levels for the Institute of Education Sciences (IES)—the backbone of our nation’s higher education data infrastructure. Funding IES data collections is essential for ensuring students and families can make informed decisions, and policymakers and researchers have the information necessary to understand the experiences of today’s students. High-quality federal data makes informed decisions possible.

Here’s a closer look at what’s fact and what’s fiction about our federal higher education data collections.

Fact or Fiction? States or private entities could easily reproduce federally produced data.

Fiction. Only the federal government has the legal authority to require data reporting from all colleges that receive Title IV federal student aid, which allows federal data to be more comprehensive than other data sources. For example, the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), housed within the Institute of Education Sciences (IES), manages the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) – a set of annual surveys that provide essential data on over 6,000 colleges and universities, including the amount and type of financial aid students receive as well as enrollment, completion, and other student outcomes. Because all colleges receiving Title IV federal student aid are required to submit data to IPEDS, response rates are about 100%. And only the federal government, not states, can link data shared by colleges and students with other federal data, like earnings, federal loan borrowing amounts, and FAFSA data to offer a more complete picture of students’ experiences and outcomes.

Fact or Fiction? The federal government makes its education data publicly available.

Fact. Because of its public transparency charge, the Department of Education makes large volumes of data available to the public. Students, families, researchers, institutions, and policymakers can easily access education data for free through tools and resources like the College Scorecard, DataLab, IPEDS data tools, and other dashboards and reports. DataLab is a secure, web-based platform that allows users to create custom analyses using data collected by NCES, such as the National Postsecondary Student Aid Study (NPSAS) and Beginning Postsecondary Students longitudinal study (BPS), as well as browse ready-built data tables. And through restricted-use data licenses, qualified researchers can access IES data that are more detailed than public-use files. Each of these datasets and tools enable researchers, policymakers, and institutions to better understand and improve postsecondary outcomes. Unlike the federal government, private data collections often charge a fee to access their data and state data systems can be difficult to access.

Fact or Fiction? If states “stitch together” the data they collect from colleges with data other states collect, they can replicate the data developed by the federal government.

Fiction. “Stitching together” existing state systems cannot match the comprehensiveness of data collected by the federal government. While some states have statewide longitudinal data systems (SLDSs), they vary widely in quality and scope, as well as in definitions and technical specifications. SLDSs often exclude data about private institutions and cannot track outcomes if a student moves to another state. Additionally, SLDSs lack crucial data that is only available from federal agencies, such as information on student borrowing and repayment from the National Student Loan Data System. These limitations make SLDSs less complete than federal data. In contrast, federal data reporting requirements standardize data collection practices across all institutions for elements like net price and graduation rates, making it easier for colleges, college systems, and states to benchmark their performance, identify best practices, and ensure access to accurate and actionable information. States vary in their data governance policies, and it would be immensely challenging to address the governance protocols required for all 50 states to share data with each other.

Fact or Fiction? After a researcher is granted access to restricted-use data held by the National Center for Education Statistics, they can publish their analysis without any further Institute of Education Sciences review.

Fiction. Researchers who meet security requirements to gain access to restricted-use data from NCES, such as privacy-protected student-level data, can conduct more detailed and complex analyses. Restricted-use data also provide access to additional data files that can be linked to other data sources and allow much more sophisticated and more flexible data analysis. But to meet privacy and security requirements, researchers must submit these analyses to IES for review before publishing the data. This review protects student privacy and helps ensure analyses accurately represent the data. Typically, that review has taken five to ten business days. But those reviews are now taking many months, due to the staffing reductions at IES.

Read more of IHEP’s “The Case for IES Postsecondary Studies and Resources” series.