By Dr. Rudy Ruiz, Director, READY Institute, The Universities at Shady Grove
Reading time: Two minutes
What is the return on investment for a university education? Current and prospective learners, as well as the broader community, want a clear picture of the value of postsecondary education and training.
State longitudinal data systems (SLDS) are increasingly helping answer this question. One strong example, with a particularly informative regional higher education use case, is Maryland. The Data Quality Campaign recently released a “Funding What Matters”
brief, which highlighted Maryland’s diversified approach to funding its SLDS, ensuring long-term sustainability and flexibility. For making good use of the data system, Maryland was also recently recognized with an “Invest in What Works State Standard of Excellence” Gold Certification from Results for America.
So, how are higher education leaders taking advantage of a longitudinal data system like this? One exciting use case comes out of the Universities at Shady Grove (USG), a regional higher education center in Montgomery County (MD) that offers industry-driven
undergraduate and graduate degrees and certificates from nine of the 12 University System of Maryland institutions. As recently highlighted by Forbes,
USG provides a 2+2 pathway: students complete two years at a community college, then transfer to a top public university on the USG campus—saving as much as $95,000 and often graduating debt-free.
This year, USG has ramped up the work of its READY Institute, what Strada Education President and CEO Stephen Moret described as “a really visionary and impactful effort that - with sustained support
- is really going to help ensure a system-level response to equitable pathways for learners that also meets the workforce talent needs of employers.”
The READY Institute draws on data from the MLDS, as well as a host of additional databases, to make public Education-to-Employment dashboards. These dashboards, developed in partnership with
USG learners and graduates, are informed by ongoing conversations with regional employers. The READY dashboards give insights on in-demand skills, along with education, employment, and earnings outcomes, in high-demand industry sectors. The USG team
is also actively engaging with stakeholders to provide program-specific resources to help users make best use of the data, as a precursor for highly personalized tools for navigating the rapidly changing workforce landscape.
Their empowering approach is demonstrated in this new video, created to increase awareness and use of the data, featuring recent graduate Lulua Shahmalak. Shahmalak is continuing to build
out the dashboards, now as a USG success story and team member. This work is already helping add a regional and state perspective to accepted national benchmarks including those of the Georgetown Center on Education and the Workforce. National College
Attainment Network (NCAN) members and other stakeholders in the college access and attainment field know that connecting students with a career following postsecondary attainment is critical. The thoughtful, applied use of data helps to make those
connections, and READY is demonstrating how in a way that other institutions and states can follow.
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