A Complete Guide to Common College Completion Metrics

The National Governor's Association has put out this report titled, A Complete Guide to Common College Completion Metrics that is worth reading.

Read in tandem with this press release:

NGA News Release
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contacts:
Jodi Omear, 617-217-8055
Erin Munley, 617-217-8056

NEW NGA CHAIR UNVEILS COLLEGE COMPLETION INITIATIVE
West Virginia Governor Joe Manchin III Assumes NGA Chairmanship

BOSTON, MASS.—West Virginia Gov. Joe Manchin III officially became chair of the National Governors Association (NGA) during the closing plenary session of the NGA Annual Meeting today. Nebraska Gov. Dave Heineman was named NGA Vice Chair.

Gov. Manchin announced his chair’s initiative, Complete to Compete, which focuses on increasing the number of students in the United States who complete college degrees and certificates and improving the productivity of the country’s higher education institutions.

“The nation has fallen from first to twelfth in the world in the number of students who complete degrees. Now, we’re faced with a generation of students that is projected to have lower educational attainment than their parents,” said Gov. Manchin.

“This slide continues at a time when the economy demands more educated workers and Americans increasingly look to higher education as the path to economic success,” continued Gov. Manchin. “My initiative will bring together governors, higher education executive officers, campus leaders and corporate CEOs to make marked improvements in college completion and productivity and get our country back on track to produce a successful workforce for the future.”

In addition to raising awareness about the need to increase college completion and productivity, Complete to Compete aims to create a set of common higher education completion and productivity measures that governors and higher education leaders can utilize to monitor state progress and compare performance to other states and between institutions. A report, Complete to Compete: Common College Completion Metrics, was released during the session. It will be followed in the coming weeks by a technical guide for states.

The initiative will also:
- Develop a series of best practices and a list of policy actions governors can take to achieve increased college completion;
- Provide support to states to design policies and programs that increase college completion and improve higher education productivity and serve as models for other states around the country; and
- Hold a learning institute for governors’ senior advisors in education, workforce and economic development focusing on successful state strategies to graduate more students and meet workforce demands.
- Also during the closing plenary session, attendees heard about the deficit and U.S. outstanding debt challenges facing the nation, as well as the charge the President gave to former Senator Alan K. Simpson and Erskine Bowles, co-chairs of the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility.

The session closed with governors hearing final thoughts on NGA committee reports and considering proposed NGA policies. The nation’s governors will reconvene in Washington, D.C., February 26-28 for the 2011 NGA Winter Meeting. For more information, visit www.nga.org.

For more information on the 2010-2011 Chair’s Initiative, visit www.nga.org/ci. 

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Founded in 1908, the National Governors Association (NGA) is the collective voice of the nation’s governors and one of Washington, D.C.’s, most respected public policy organizations. Its members are the governors of the 50 states, three territories and two commonwealths. NGA provides governors and their senior staff members with services that range from representing states on Capitol Hill and before the Administration on key federal issues to developing and implementing innovative solutions to public policy challenges through the NGA Center for Best Practices. For more information, visit www.nga.org.