The Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges (ACCJC) has launched a new return-on-investment (ROI) metric and dashboards to help students, policymakers and institutional leaders explore trends in student outcomes among the commission’s institutional members, which are primarily California community colleges.
The Student Achievement Dashboards pull from three data sources: institutionally reported annual data, federally reported IPEDS data and a new ROI metric developed in partnership with the College Futures Foundation. The metric uses a Price-to-Earnings Premium (PEP) model to assess how long it takes students to recoup their educational investment by examining the relationship between net costs and earnings premiums, according to ACCJC.
ACCJC provides this example, using American River College, one of California’s largest community colleges: Learners pay $4,628 in out-of-pocket costs each year, or $9,256 total to earn an associate degree in two years. Former students earn $40,162 per year — $7,686 more than the typical California high school graduate — after attending. Using these additional earnings of $7,686 annually, graduates can recoup their $9,256 in net costs in 1.2 years.
While there are many ways to measure ROI, ACCJC says this straightforward approach helps learners make decisions on college based on economic returns.
“Understanding this payback timeframe is essential for learners making decisions that will impact their financial futures for decades,” according to the commission.
The dashboard provides college-specific information on enrollment, completion and post-completion and IPEDS outcomes, including graduation and transfer rates.
The new tools follow the release of ACCJC’s recent white paper, “Navigating the Value Landscape for Accreditation,” which explores federal, state and private efforts to define and measure the value of higher education.
ACCJC is the sole U.S. Education Department-authorized institutional accreditor specializing in institutions that award two-year degrees as their primary mission.
