In a blog post last month, I used newly-available data from the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Federal Student Aid to look at the amount of student loan dollars in income-driven repayment plans by amount of debt. In that post, I showed that students with more debt were far more likely to use IDR […]
Robert Kelchen
Robert Kelchen, a professor of education at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, is the Data Editor of the Washington Monthly College Guide.
Robert is on Bluesky @robertkelchen.com.
Posted inEducation, Higher Education
Who Uses Income-Driven Repayment Plans?
Over the last two years, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Federal Student Aid has quietly released additional data on the federal government’s portfolio of nearly $1.4 trillion in student loans. I was on the FSA website today looking up the most recent data on Public Service Loan Forgiveness employment certification forms (up to […]
Posted inEducation, Higher Education
The 2017 “Not Top Ten” List in Higher Education
Yesterday, I unveiled my fifth annual list of the top ten events in American higher education in 2017. Now it’s time for the annual list of the “not top ten” events—which are a mix of puzzling decisions and epic fails that leave most of us wondering what people were thinking. Enjoy the list—and send along […]
Posted inEducation, Higher Education
The 2017 Higher Education Top Ten List
It’s safe to say that 2017 has been one of the most fascinating years in the realm of higher education policy in a long while. With the Trump administration seeking to reverse many Obama-era policies and both states and the private sector taking bold actions, there has been no shortage of high-impact events over the […]
Posted inEducation, Higher Education
Key Takeaways from the House Higher Education Act Reauthorization Bill
Majority Republicans on the U.S. House Committee on Education and the Workforce unveiled their draft legislation today to reauthorize the Higher Education Act—the most important piece of legislation affecting American higher education. The Promoting Real Opportunity, Success, and Prosperity through Education Reform (PROSPER) Act checks in at a hefty 542 pages and touches many important […]
Posted inEducation, Higher Education
Downloadable Dataset of Pell Recipient Graduation Rates
Earlier this week, my blog post summarizing new data on Pell Grant recipients’ graduation rates at four-year colleges was released through the Brookings Institution’s Brown Center Chalkboard blog. I have since received several questions about the data and requests for detailed data for specific colleges, showing the interest within the higher education community for better […]
Posted inEducation, Higher Education
New Data on Long-Term Student Loan Default Rates
In recent years, more data have come out on how well students are able to manage repaying their loans beyond the three-year window currently used for federal accountability purposes (via cohort default rates). A great 2015 paper by Adam Looney and Constantine Yannelis used tax records merged with data from the National Student Loan Data […]
Posted inEducation, Higher Education
Examining Trends in Student Loan Repayment Rates
It’s been a good week for higher education data nerds. The Department of Education released updated student loan cohort default rates on Wednesday afternoon (see my summary here), followed by an update to the massive College Scorecard dataset on Thursday morning. This is the third update to the Scorecard, with this year’s update also featuring […]
Posted inEducation, Higher Education
A Peek Inside the New IPEDS Outcome Measures Dataset
Much of higher education policy focuses on “traditional” college students—those who started college at age 18 after getting dropped off in the family station wagon or minivan, enrolled full-time, and stayed at that institution until graduation. Yet although this is how many policymakers and academics experienced college (I’m no exception), this represents a minority of […]
Posted inEducation, Higher Education
Comments on the Trump Higher Education Budget Proposal
The Trump administration released its first full budget proposal for Fiscal Year 2018 today, and it is safe to say that it represents a sharp break from the Obama administration’s budget proposals. The proposed discretionary budget for the Department of Education is about $69 billion, $10 billion less than the Fiscal Year 2017 budget. Below, […]
