Call for Proposals:
Measuring the Effectiveness of Student Aid (MESA)
The Measuring the Effectiveness of Student Aid (MESA) project is a multi-year program
of research managed by the Educational Policy Institute and the Queen’s University
School of Policy Studies on behalf of the Canada Millennium Scholarship Foundation.
More details on MESA are available at www.mesa-project.org.
MESA is issuing a call for proposals for researchers interested in empirical analysis of
factors related to access to post-secondary education and persistence to completion in
Canada, especially but not exclusively those relating to financial factors. Proposals may
use any available source of data, but it is anticipated that most proposals will involve the
following four Statistics Canada data sets, due to their strong PSE focus.
The Post-Secondary Education Participation Survey (PEPS). This nationwide survey of
5,000 youth aged 17-24 was undertaken in early 2002 and deals with high school
experiences, Post-Secondary Education (PSE) financing, PSE intentions, student loan
awareness and socioeconomic status. Roughly two-thirds of the sample has some kind of
PSE experience (i.e. either they are currently or have been previously enrolled in PSE).
The Youth in Transition Survey Cohort A (YITS-A). This national longitudinal study of
30,000 youth aged 15 began in the year 2000. The 2000 wave includes interviews with
students and parents, as well as each individual student’s results on the OECD’s
Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) exam (for more details on
PISA, go to www.pisa.oecd.org). Students were re-interviewed in 2002, 2004 and 2006
at the ages of 17, 19 and 21 with respect to their educational and labour market
experiences. It is therefore an excellent source of data with respect to first-time access to
post-secondary education and with the release of Cycle IV (the most recent survey) due
later this year, persistence as well.
The Youth in Transition Survey Cohort B (YITS-B). This longitudinal study of 23,000
youth aged 18-20 in 2000 focuses on labour market and educational experiences.
Students were re-interviewed in 2002 (aged 20-22), 2004 (aged 22-24) and 2006 (aged
24-26 – scheduled for release later this year), thus providing a very good resource for
studying access to PSE and especially issues related to retention, persistence and
completion.
The National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth (NLSCY) is a long-term study of
Canadian children that follows their development and well-being from birth to early
adulthood. The NLSCY began in 1994 and is conducted by Statistics Canada and
sponsored by Human Resources and Social Development Canada (HRSDC). The study
is designed to collect information about factors influencing a child's social, emotional and
behavioural development and to monitor the impact of these factors on the child's
development over time. Cycle 6 of the NLSCY contains about 3,000 respondents who
are between the ages of 18 and 21, all of whom have completed problem solving
exercises (at age 16-17), as well as literacy (age 18-19) and numeracy (age 20-21)
assessments. NLSCY represents an excellent source of data for use in looking at access to
PSE.
More details on each of these datasets, geared specifically for MESA users, are available
at http://mesa-project.org/datasets.html.
Applications will be judged by an expert committee comprised of academics based at the
School of Policy Studies at Queen’s University. Proposals will be judged on their
scholarly merit, policy relevance and their fit with the priorities of the MESA project (i.e.
access to PSE and subsequent persistence). From eight to ten proposals are expected to be
selected this year as a result of this process.
Projects must also be approved through the regular SSHRC/RDC approval process,
though MESA staff will be available to assist in processing the necessary documentation
in an expeditious manner.
Successful applicants will also have access at no cost to two Research Assistants (RAs)
based at Statistics Canada who are able to work directly with the files named above.
These RAs, who will be working full-time with the YITS, PEPS and NLSCY datasets
over the coming year, will provide researchers with an important resource given the
complex nature of the three datasets. They will be available to process data from the
three Statistics Canada databases on a shared basis among the successful applicants,
under the direction of the project’s Research Director, Dr. Ross Finnie. We urge
successful applicants to make to make the greatest possible use of these Research
Assistants as their knowledge and experience can significantly speed up the process of
data analysis. Experiences from the first round of projects were extremely positive in
terms of the benefits they derived from using this RA assistance, this including their
answering questions about the data, helping set up extracted/selected samples, or carrying
out the actual analysis.
Stipends of $10,000 to $20,000 are available for successful projects. The amount of the
stipend awarded will depend on the nature of the project and will be determined by the
adjudication committee at the time that projects are awarded. The budget can be used for
any purposes deemed appropriate by the researchers to carry out the project, including an
honorarium for the author(s).
Successful applicants will be required to present the committee with regular update
reports throughout the fall and winter, including a draft paper outline by the end of
February. A full paper must be completed by August 2008; authors will also be required
to present a draft paper at a special conference/colloquium to be organized by MESA
Project partners and sponsors in May/June 2008. MESA will own the rights to the
published paper, but author(s) will be given the right to publish in other venues.
Parties interested in making electronic or paper-based submissions to the MESA project
can find:
- copies of this RFP at http://www.mesa-project.org/pdf/RFP-August17.doc; and
-
application forms at http://www.mesa-project.org/pdf/proposal.doc.
The deadline for submissions is October 5th, 2007. We expect that applicants will be
notified as to the success of their proposals by about October 31st, 2007.
Inquiries with respect to the YITS and PEPS datasets should be directed to Theresa Qiu
at qhanqing@yahoo.com. Inquiries with respect to the application process or the MESA
project
in
general
should
be
directed
to
Miriam
Kramer
at
mkramer@educationalpolicy.org, tel. +1 416 848 0215 or the EPI office at 20 Maud
Street, Suite 207, Toronto Ontario, M5V 2M5.