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SEE THE MENU BELOW |
The National Center for Education Statistics has reports, articles, and incredible amounts of data. Some are accessible in tables, others are archives that can be downloaded into your computer in a variety of forms. Also included in this Web site are links through the University of Michigan Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR). The ICPSR has become the repository for several National Center for Education Statistics archives.
One of my students is analyzing NCES data,
so I can tell you nearly first hand how helpful they are: they will send
you data CDs, answer questions about the data, provide detailed information
about the data (often on the data CD).
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Conduct customized searches to locate NCES publications and data products. Once located, browse the content of publications or download files. The search feature (pulled up by this page) lets you go into detail on topic, type of product and date. It is so overwhelming that you will need a day or so to get used to all the available information.
It also helps if you have a working hypothesis about what you want to find out.
USE THESE LINKS BELOW TO QUICKLY ACCESS INFORMATION ABOUT A PARTICULAR ARCHIVE
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This program of the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) was established to study the educational, vocational, and personal development of young people beginning with their elementary or high school years, and following them over time (panel study) as they begin to take on adult roles and responsibilities. Here are just three major studies in the program:
"This descriptive report describes the educational attainment, employment outcomes, and family formation of the 1980 sophomore class in 1992, ten years after most of the students in that cohort graduated from high school. The report begins with an essay that explores in some detail the relationships between characteristics of the 1980 sophomores, their patterns of enrollment in postsecondary education, their postsecondary expectations, and their patterns of educational attainment in 1992. The compendium of tables that follows this essay provides summary data on the family status, employment outcomes, voting behavior, and activities of the 1980 sophomore class in 1992, as well as additional information about their educational experiences not included in the essay. Each of the four sections of the compendium is prefaced by a series of bullets that highlight the findings of the section. This format was chosen because it illustrates both the level of detail that can be achieved in an analysis that uses the HS&B Fourth Follow-up data as well as the broad scope of the information in these files."
Data collection continues to this day!
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The Data Analysis System (DAS, sometimes called SDA) is a Windows software application that provides public access to NCES survey data (as well as many other datasets; it's called "lPoll" at the Roper Center and "SDA" on other sites). With the DAS, users can generate tables of percentages, means, or correlation coefficients simply by choosing the DAS variables (based on survey questionnaire items) that they would like to appear in a table and indicating what function should be used. Users specify the information they would like to appear in a table by creating a table parameter file (TPF) and sending the TPF to the NCES DAS Web site. The Web site will process the TPF and generate the table in the form of a PRN file. The PRN file provides the table numbers (usually percentages of students) and the corresponding standard errors that have been calculated taking into account the complex sampling procedures used in the NCES surveys.
This is a WONDERFUL program; I used it
in Introductory Statistics (EDF 5400) for several years. It is incredibly
fast, has a great online tutorial (don't try to use the program without
it), and students love it. It should not be frightening for anyone who
has has our Introductory Statistics course. It is much easier to learn
than SPSS.
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When you try to access some interesting data sets you might see: "Due to our confidentiality legislation, you will need to obtain (or amend) an NCES restricted data license if you want to access all raw data from some surveys (that is, the original files that contain the data for each case or record separately.)"
Data licenses are often necessary if
you wish to work with the individual record file data using a United States
federal archive. For example, there is an amazing dataset from Chicago
that follows many students over time. Licensure is not quite as big a deal
as it seems. The Federal Agency wants to make sure that you are a legitimate
researcher. There is a form to fill out that you sign, your major professor
signs, and typically your department chair or head signs. You may also
need an attorney at the FSU Office of Research to sign. Search the site
of the data you are interested in to find the contact person who will send
you the licensure form and find out what information you need to provide..
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The Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), established as the core postsecondary education data collection program for NCES, is a system of surveys designed to collect data from all primary providers of postsecondary education. IPEDS is a single, comprehensive system designed to encompass all institutions and educational organizations whose primary purpose is to provide postsecondary education. The IPEDS system is built around a series of interrelated surveys to collect institution-level data in such areas as enrollments, program completions, faculty, staff, and finances.
In more recent years, the IPEDS data collection has become entirely web-based. The IPEDS Web-Based Data collection system allows institutions to provide NCES with the required statistical data, replacing the paper survey forms that were used in the past.
The Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) Peer Analysis System is a tool designed to enable a user to easily compare a postsecondary institution of the user’s choice to a group of peer institutions, also selected by the user. This is done by generating reports using selected IPEDS variables of interest.
This site front page also contains tools on how to analyze and use the data.
Researchers and practitioners in higher
education, this is THE site for you!
Have a relative considering college,
check out this site!
Want to know more about a particular
higher education institution, this is the place!
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What an accomplishment! The "Third" International Mathematics and Science Study of 1995 encompassed 42 different countries. It used several methods: "test," essay, observations of teachers and students to assess both what students in several different grades have learned and how they have learned it.
The repeat study in 1999 (often called TIMSS-R for "Repeat") encompassed 38 countires.
Now the series has continued and TIMSS now stands for Trends in Mathematics and Science Studies.
TIMSS just keeps getting better and better. This site is a must-see for
anyone interested in science or math education, in public understanding
of science, and other fields.
Many reports, questionnaires, and other
specifics about data collection are either available online or you may
order them (also online).
(Some of the older TIMSS data archives
are also available on ICPSR, see below.)
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"ICPSR" is short for the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research at the University of Michigan.
The ICPSR archive is much, much more than "political" or "social" data and this link is one example.
ICPSR has many education archives, some
of them international. That's mostly what you pull up at this link.
Some are "raw data", some are tables.
If you're interested, set aside an entire
afternoon to explore!
ICPSR requires that the person accessing actual data must be from a "member institution." That's FSU so you'll need to access from a university computer to be recognized.
(I've tried accessing data from one of
the FSU "distance" portals, but so far that doesn't work; so far you need
to be on campus.)
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December 5 2017
This page was built with
Netscape Composer.
Susan Carol Losh
