Currently, the Virginia state Senate is reviewing a bill that would require colleges and universities to list “consumer information” on their websites. Consumer information includes average tuition and fee increases over the past 10 years, as well as graduation and retention rates and budgeting information.
According to The Daily Progress, this bill is part of a larger trend of requiring universities to disclose information that could affect high school students’ college application and enrollment processes. This trend and this bill are necessary steps toward greater transparency in the college application process.
This information has by no means been inaccessible to prospective students: the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia collects these data and posts it online. But few people know about SCHEV, and increasing visibility has no obvious downsides. By requiring colleges to display this information prominently on their websites, prospective students will be able to access relevant information much more easily. By seeing trends like tuition increases, prospective students will be able to anticipate the cost of their overall educations, and not just the cost of that upcoming year. By examining graduation and retention rates, they may be able to determine whether the school they are researching is the right one for them. For example, the University’s downward trend in enrollment of African-American students is likely important information for a prospective African-American student to have.
Accessible budgeting information can also reveal the priorities of a given institution — if money is allocated more toward athletics or academics compared to peer institutions, this may sway a student’s decision.
This bill, of course, does not cover all the information students may need when making these life-changing decisions. U.S. Sen. Mark R. Warner, D-Virginia, has demonstrated support for a law that would make loan debt, earnings metrics and employment data available as well. The need for knowledge of these three data points is obvious.
Additionally, when pushing for transparency from colleges and universities, lawmakers should make sure to seek out input from parents and students. While we can guess as to what information will be relevant to a given family, the best layout of such information can only be ascertained from surveying a large sample of parents and students.
The virtue of compiling these data on an individual level — as opposed to the U.S. Department of Education’s current plan, which is to rate schools given various criteria and compare them — is that families and students will be able to assess each school for themselves. Comparing schools with different interests and focuses may prove difficult, but making their information accessible to a wider audience will allow people to evaluate these data and make informed decisions.
While the legislature should pass this bill, there is some virtue to the idea of pursuing consumer tests moving forward. Increasing transparency is a laudable goal, and this bill will be one step out of many that may fulfill that goal. As the state pursues further options for making this information more accessible, it should reach out to the consumers themselves to better shape its policies.
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