Tracking students to other colleges & universities
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Tracking CU-Boulder applicants, graduates, and transfers-out to other US
colleges and universities using National Student Clearinghouse Student
Tracker: Background, methods, and cautions
Lou McClelland, CU-Boulder Planning, Budget, and Analysis (PBA), May 2008
Each year, many applicants for admission to CU-Boulder enroll at other colleges and
universities. CU-Boulder graduates go on to graduate school at other colleges and
universities. And some CU-Boulder students transfer elsewhere.
In spring 2008, CU-Boulder began using data from the Student Tracker system of the
National Student Clearinghouse to determine where these students enrolled.
The Clearinghouse (http://www.studentclearinghouse.org/) is a non-profit organization
whose primary functions include

Allowing colleges and universities to report enrollment status of individual students to
lenders and the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS)

Acting on behalf of participating colleges and universities to verify enrollment and
degree status of individual students in response to requests from employers, other
colleges and universities, and others.
CU-Boulder participates in all Clearinghouse components by regularly submitting
individual-student data on enrollment and degrees to the Clearinghouse.
This participation allows PBA to use the Student Tracker facility of the Clearinghouse
free of charge. The general procedure:

CU-Boulder PBA sends a file with names and other pertinent data of applicants,
graduates, former students, an entering cohort, or other selected group of students.
Each file specifies a search start date.

A few days later, PBA downloads the return file and extracts information of interest
about each student in the initial file.
The Clearinghouse returns the following information about each student

Enrollment in each term found, with the name of the college or university where
enrolled; institutional characteristics including state, control, and, 2- or 4-year; start
and end dates for the term, enrollment status (full, half, withdrew, etc.), and
sometimes student level and major

Degrees: College or university state, name, public/private, 2- or 4-year, specific
degree (e.g., BS, BA, MS), major, and degree date

Both enrollment and degrees are for dates following the specified search start date.
This information is returned along with the student’s indentifying information, allowing
PBA to match Clearinghouse information to any other student characteristics already on
file at CU-Boulder.
Limitations of Clearinghouse data

Enrollment information generally includes nothing on student level or major, making it
impossible to distinguish graduate, undergraduate, and non-degree enrollments.
This situation should improve over the next few years.
PBA: Lou.McClelland@colorado.edu -- D:\687319786.doc -- 2/5/2016 10:15:14 PM –
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Tracking students to other colleges & universities
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A portion of submitted students are returned with no Clearinghouse information
appended – These are labeled “no match.” For example, 16% of fall 2007 applicants
who did not enroll at UCB were returned with no information.
Cases with no matching enrollment records returned result from many different
causes, which we cannot differentiate for an individual student:

The student didn’t enroll anywhere before the date on which Clearinghouse
records were checked.

The student enrolled. Here there are four possibilities for failure to match:

The personal information we submitted for the student did not match that on
file for the student at the Clearinghouse.

The school does not participate in Clearinghouse.

As of spring 2008 Clearinghouse member schools represent 91% of
national college enrollment. However, some schools important to CUBoulder do not participate:

AAU’s: Indiana, MIT, Texas. All are “in the works,” they say.

Colorado: Colorado College.

From prior work, estimate CC at about 25% of the number for DU,
Texas at 3 x Texas A&M, and Indiana at 4 x Purdue.

The student put a FRPA block on his information. This is called a “student
block.”

This is generally under 1% but sometimes as much as 20% of all cases
for a school (U of Washington is unusually high).

The school sends enrollment information to Clearinghouse but does not allow
its release in Student Tracker. This is called a “school block.”

Example: U of Arizona, which blocks 100%.

From prior work, estimate U of A at about 50% of the number for ASU.
Cases with no matching degree records returned may result from any of the above
reasons. In addition, 14 AAU’s and many other schools send enrollment but not
degree information to Clearinghouse. While the Clearinghouse handles over 90% of
all US enrollments, it handles only 68% of all degrees.
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Therefore even Clearinghouse data provide only a floor or minimum count of the
number of students who have graduated.
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