Center for Studies in Higher Education 

About: Center for Studies in Higher Education is an academic journal. The journal publishes majorly in the area(s): Higher education & Academic achievement. Over the lifetime, 287 publications have been published receiving 4292 citations.

Validity of High-School Grades in Predicting Student Success beyond the Freshman Year: High-School Record vs. Standardized Tests as Indicators of Four-Year College Outcomes. Research & Occasional Paper Series: CSHE.6.07.

Abstract: High-school grades are often viewed as an unreliable criterion for college admissions, owing to differences in grading standards across high schools, while standardized tests are seen as methodologically rigorous, providing a more uniform and valid yardstick for assessing student ability and achievement. The present study challenges that conventional view. The study finds that high-school grade point average (HSGPA) is consistently the best predictor not only of freshman grades in college, the outcome indicator most often employed in predictive-validity studies, but of four-year college outcomes as well. A previous study, UC and the SAT (Geiser with Studley, 2003), demonstrated that HSGPA in college-preparatory courses was the best predictor of freshman grades for a sample of almost 80,000 students admitted to the University of California. Because freshman grades provide only a short-term indicator of college performance, the present study tracked four-year college outcomes, including cumulative college grades and graduation, for the same sample in order to examine the relative contribution of high-school record and standardized tests in predicting longer-term college performance. Key findings are: (1) HSGPA is consistently the strongest predictor of four-year college outcomes for all academic disciplines, campuses and freshman cohorts in the UC sample; (2) surprisingly, the predictive weight associated with HSGPA increases after the freshman year, accounting for a greater proportion of variance in cumulative fourth-year than first-year college grades; and (3) as an admissions criterion, HSGPA has less adverse impact than standardized tests on disadvantaged and underrepresented minority students. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implications of these findings for admissions policy and argues for greater emphasis on the high-school record, and a corresponding de-emphasis on standardized tests, in college admissions.

The Educational Benefits of Sustaining Cross-Racial Interaction among Undergraduates

Abstract: This study examined whether or not students who either had higher levels of cross-racial interaction during college or had same-institution peers with higher average levels of this type of interaction tend to report significantly larger developmental gains than their counterparts. Unlike previous quantitative studies that tested cross-racial interaction using single-level linear models, this study more accurately models the structure of multilevel data by applying Hierarchical Linear Modeling (HLM). The general pattern of findings suggests that higher individual levels of cross-racial interaction have positive effects on students' openness to diversity, cognitive development, and self-confidence. The results also show that even though a student’s own level of cross-racial interaction is a more direct and powerful way to realize developmental gains, simply being in an environment where other students are interacting frequently also contributes to students’ self-reported development.

Assessing the Future Landscape of Scholarly Communication: An Exploration of Faculty Values and Needs in Seven Disciplines - Executive Summary

Abstract: Assessing the Future Landscape of Scholarly Communication: An Exploration of Faculty Values and Needs in Seven Disciplines EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Authors: Diane Harley, Sophia Krzys Acord, Sarah Earl-Novell, Shannon Lawrence, C. Judson King January 2010 The proper citation for this publication is: Harley, Diane, Acord, Sophia Krzys, Earl-Novell, Sarah, Lawrence, Shannon, & King, C. Judson. (2010). Assessing the Future Landscape of Scholarly Communication: An Exploration of Faculty Values and Needs in Seven Disciplines. UC Berkeley: Center for Studies in Higher Education. Retrieved from: http://escholarship.org/uc/cshe_fsc Center for Studies in Higher Education 771 Evans Hall #4650 University of California Berkeley CA 94720-4650 The Future of Scholarly Communication Project website: http://cshe.berkeley.edu/research/scholarlycommunication © 2005–2010, Center for Studies in Higher Education, UC Berkeley

Assessing the future landscape of scholarly communication: an exploration of faculty values and needs in seven disciplines

Abstract: Despite the increase in open access publishing peer-reviewed journals still hold sway in many academic disciplines according to this US study. While many studies have addressed specific issues like the costs of launching academic journals and the finances of university presses, there has not yet been a broad-scale, comprehensive analysis focusing on how the university and its various stakeholders, most notably faculty, value traditional and emerging forms of scholarly communication. The research focuses on understanding faculty needs and practices for in-progress scholarly communication as well as archival publication. Among the goals is providing a broader understanding of the full array of activities related to the scholarly communication lifecycle in order to enable the accurate assessment of the academy’s future communication and publication landscape. The following are among the questions driving the work: • What will scholars in various core disciplines want to do in their research and with their research results, and what new forms of communication do or do not support those needs? • How will scholars want to disseminate and receive input on their work at various stages of the scholarly communication lifecycle? • What are the emerging trends in research and publication practices? • What is the scope and depth of pent-up demand for new models of communication in various sectors/disciplines? • How do institutions and other stakeholders support these faculty needs, if at all? We suggest that more innovation does and will occur first during in-progress communication than in final, archival publication. One can foresee a scenario where useful and effective innovations in in-progress communication may eventually serve to drive improvements in final, archival publication. It is therefore worthwhile to gain deeper insight into the needs, motives, and new capabilities within in-progress communication as well as final, archival publication. We describe here our results based on the responses of 160 interviewees across 45, mostly elite, research institutions in seven selected academic fields: archaeology, astrophysics, biology, economics, history, music, and political science. The report is divided into eight chapters, which include a document synthesizing our methods and research results plus seven detailed disciplinary case studies.

The Role of Advanced Placement and Honors Courses in College Admissions. Research & Occasional Paper Series: CSHE.4.04.

Abstract: This study examines the role of Advanced Placement (AP) and other honors-level courses as a criterion for admission at a leading public university, the University of California, and finds that the number of AP and honors courses taken in high school bears little or no relationship to students’ later performance in college. AP is increasingly emphasized as a factor in admissions, particularly at selective colleges and universities. But while student performance on AP examinations is strongly related to college performance, merely taking AP or other honors-level courses in high school is not a valid indicator of the likelihood that students will perform well in college. These findings suggest that institutions may need to reconsider the use of AP as a criterion in “high stakes†admissions, particularly given the marked disparity in access to AP and honors courses among disadvantaged and underrepresented minority students.