Data
Delta Project Data
The Delta Project has organized data on operating spending and revenues into aggregate measures of costs per student and costs per degree/certificate produced, organized into Carnegie classifications separating public and private nonprofit institutions.
Overview
Delta Measures of costs per student, student and subsidy shares,
and production costs
The Delta Project has organized data on operating spending and revenues into aggregate measures of costs per student and costs per degree/certificate produced, organized into Carnegie classifications separating public and private nonprofit institutions. These measures can be developed with existing information, to allow evaluation of changes over time, and to put information into context through comparison with patterns in other states or sectors. They are likely to be most relevant to state policy makers who need to make decisions about issues such as funding adequacy, student tuition policies, and the relative cost effectiveness of existing investment patterns. The measures are
- Full Educational Costs per FTE Student: this is an estimate of the full educational cost per student enrolled, without regard to the level of instruction or discipline. It is calculated per FTE student enrolled by summing together spending on instruction and student services with the instruction-related share of other education and general expenses. (See the issue brief, Who Pays for Higher Education? Changing Patterns in Cost, Price and Subsidies (PDF) for more detail on these and the other measures.)
- The student share of costs (discounted): the percentage of full costs that are paid, on average, from net student tuition revenues. Net tuition revenue is equal to gross tuition revenue minus institutional grant aid (scholarships and fellowships and discounts).
- Average Subsidy portion of costs: the difference between full educational costs and net tuition revenue per FTE student; this is the average dollar amount of full educational costs that is covered by institutional resources (endowment or state funding) per FTE student.
- Aggregate Educational Spending/Student Completions: an estimate of total educational costs per completion, as contrasted to costs per student enrolled. It is calculated by summing full educational costs for all students for a year, and dividing that by all degrees and certificates awarded in that year. Much as the average cost per student figure does not distinguish between costs by level of student or discipline, the spending/completions figure does not distinguish between what is spent for different types of degrees and certificates awarded. “Completions” includes all degrees, certificates, diplomas or other formal awards granted by an institution in a year, whether the student initially enrolled in that institution as a freshman or a junior, and without regard to the number of years the student was enrolled before attaining the completion.
- Percent of Completions per 100 FTE Students: indicates how many completions (including degrees, certificates, and other formal awards) were produced for every 100 FTE students enrolled in the course of the academic year. This metric is not the same as the cohort graduation rate (which was not available prior to 1997).
See the national and regional data for public and private nonprofit institutions, as well as state level data for public institutions.