Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

Panel: Postsecondary Instructors and Graduate School

(Education)

Over the past 15 years more post-secondary students continue to matriculate in graduate school and earn graduate degrees. Despite this, post-secondary education research does not often speak to post-baccalaureate or graduate studies. This panel focuses on the use of local, state, and national administrative and survey data to further our knowledge on post-baccalaureate education policy. The first paper provides policymakers with insight on how potential cost saving measures that would increase the number of non-tenure track law school instructors by examining the efficacy of non-tenure track instructors relative to tenure-track instructors with regards to law students' academic and labor market outcomes. This paper illustrates how novel post-baccalaureate administrative data can be used to improve policy decisions. The second paper analyzes Texas Higher Education administrative data to increase our understanding of the transition between Undergraduate Major and Graduate Major. Preliminary results show that students transition to equally-technically or less-technical Graduate Majors. This study is one of the first to use administrative data beyond a specific institution or discipline in post-baccalaureate education research. These papers exemplify how the use of rich local and state level administrative data can be used in new ways to enhance our understanding of graduate studies. The third paper applies a novel measure of distributional change to national survey data in order to examine differences in gender convergence among graduate degrees that were affected by national legislation barring gender discrimination in admissions. Together, these papers demonstrate the importance and usefulness of novel data and measurement in the study of post-baccalaureate education policy. The session organizer, chair, and discussant have extensive experience with the use of administrative and survey data in policy relevant research, which will enhance feedback and discussion on novel uses of data in researching and informing post-baccalaureate education policy.