Dive Brief:
- A U.S. Department of Education official announced this week that the department is considering two systems for college ratings to achieve parallel goals.
- The Chronicle of Higher Education reports one system would be designed for consumers and offer raw metrics, while the other would be for policy makers and researchers, featuring adjusted metrics based on student and institutional characteristics.
- The second system would be used for accountability, but critics expect the two systems to create problems if an institution does very well on one and very poorly on the other, according to the article.
Dive Insight:
The Education Department has set out to create its own system of college ratings to hold institutions accountable. The federal rankings could make other systems irrelevant, including U.S. News and World Report’s much-anticipated lists and the Times Higher Education’s World University Rankings. The Education Department came under fire for trying to get too much out of a single ranking system, according to The Chronicle, and its new plan to create two parallel systems is seen as a solution by some and a disaster by others. The department is expected to release an early version of its rating plan this spring or summer.