OKAIRP March 26, 2010

1. OKAIRPMarch 26, 2010 Changes in UDS

2. WHAT WE ARE DOING • When I was a young hippie, my friends and I, college students in the late Sixties and early Seventies, sought change---change in society, in politics, change in the universities. • We studied Piaget and Montessori and A.S. Neill’s Summerhill School. We studied the pedagogical systems of foreign countries and sometimes advocated their ways. We believed in education. For a time, we shared the visions of American reformers since the foundation. • Those who believe in the power of government to effect positive change—and I stipulate that educators do believe this---want those who make policy to be informed by the best data available. • Our task---we who keep the records and report the facts---is to provide those data as well, as reliably and consistently, as we possibly can. This is a worthwhile challenge.

3. EVOLVING STANDARDS • From the first U.S. Census, established in the Constitution, the effort to base public policy on accurate data has carried down to this day. When Herman Hollerith built his punched-card tabulating system to record 1890 Census responses, he created a standard in applied technology that lasted over 80 years. Punched cards, data tapes and floppy discs have come and gone, but the nature of demographic and educational data has endured. • Oklahoma’s Unitized Data System was created in the mid-1970s as the second state-level unitary student data system in U.S. higher education. Its first collection, in 1976, used the best technology of its time: mainframe computers, COBOL programs on punched cards and magnetic data tape. Record formats were based on the 80-column standard of the punched card. Data were encoded using a minimum of bytes to save costly storage space.

4. EVOLVING STANDARDS • The UDS code sets of 1976 were the standards of that day---HEGIS codes to describe fields of study, FICE codes to label institutions, ethnic codes used by the Census Bureau. Data tapes were delivered by U.S. mail or hand-carried by couriers. Some of the smallest institutions submitted data on hand-written paper record forms. • All of that has changed.

5. EVOLVING STANDARDS • By 1995, punched cards had seen their day. UDS record formats were changed from 80 to 200 columns. The number of record types decreased from 10 to 6. • The type of information being collected remained much the same. • The information industry moved forward. Mainframes yielded to client-server systems, flat file datasets were supplanted first by flat databases, then by relational databases. Data transfer was accomplished electronically by ftp and sftp. Object-oriented programming languages predominated in commercial data shops. XML became the standard for educational data exchange. Web-based data marts replaced hardcopy report printing. National code sets for educational data changed.

6. EVOLVING STANDARDS • Behind the scenes, UDS adapted and adopted many of these changes. Though most of the data elements collected since the early 1980s have not changed significantly, an accumulated need to update methods and formats must now be answered.

7. THE NEEDED CHANGES • Update Code Sets • Update Formats • More Automation • Modern Reports • Timeliness • Financial Aid • Participation in Larger Data Worlds

8. CODE SETS • HEGIS  CIP • FICE  UNITID

9. FORMATS • Full Name • Full Birth Date • Join Enrollment and Course Descriptions • Extra Space for Course and Section Numbers • Campus ID Number • Department Name • Revise Professional Staff Reporting • Separate Degree Reporting • XML

10. AUTOMATION • Under consideration is a software product that would import UDS data files via a web interface, apply business rules and return edit reports in moments. The revision and resubmission process would continue until the file was clean and signed off by the institution. • In theory, it would then be finished and usable for published reports.

11. MODERN REPORTS • Remember the days when end users were grateful and a little impressed to receive a massive binder containing a report in all caps on continuous green bar paper? • Those were good days, but they are no more. • Under consideration is a front end for UDS data using BI. Web-based aggregate reports would be generated from the relational database that contains UDS data and updated automatically or on demand.

12. TIMELINESS • Under increased calls from all quarters for more timely data, we tried a plan to collect a census-date version of UDS with a view to replacing the Preliminary Enrollment Report. It proved to be unwieldy and not complete enough to serve the purpose. • A policy adopted by the State Regents last year and implemented with the recent collection of Fall 2009 end-of-term data has improved timeliness by curtailing lengthy rounds of editing with a finite window for UDS submissions to be final and approved by institutions. • Following the IPEDS practice, we will accept revisions to the data after one year. Alternately, the institution may request a needed revision through the State Board of Regents.

13. FINANCIAL AID • Noel-Levitz and the Financial Aid Data Collection

14. PARTICIPATION IN LARGER DATA WORLDS • UDS data are used to report to national organizations and databases: • IPEDS, SREB, CSRDE, ATD. • We link a file of graduates to the OESC database for an important Employment Outcomes Report. • P-20: Nationwide, states are creating longitudinal databases linking pre-kindergarten to elementary to secondary to higher education and workforce data. Oklahoma is working on this as well. UDS data are essential to this system.

15. LET’S LOOK AT THE REVISED LAYOUTS • Record S: Student • Record E: Enrollment and Course • Record M: Multiples of Course • Record D: Degree

22. AVE ATQUE VALE • UDS is an organic, living being. It doesn’t belong to the State Regents; it’s a shared creation of the institutions. It takes a village to support it and train it. We know, from the many conversations we have with you, our ongoing discussion about this project, how dedicated you are and how deeply you care about doing it right. • We’ve listened to you, asked for your ideas and concerns through a focus group, and applied many of your contributions to the revisions we’re making now and planning for the future. • Through all of this, let’s remember that the game is worth the candle. We are supporting the policymakers and informing the public. This is the foundation for improvement, and this is our contribution to it. We’re striving for a better world. • On behalf of the agency, the Chancellor, our departmental staff and ourselves, we thank you for all your good work.