College Portrait Offers Valuable Insight

The Voluntary System of Accountability will help prospective students and their families in the college selection process through College Portrait, a five-page Web reporting template participating colleges and universities use to report information to the public.

The College Portrait reporting template is organized into three primary sections: consumer information, student experiences and perceptions, and student learning outcomes.

Consumer Section

Institutions provide costs of attendance, degree offerings, student characteristics, graduation rates, and postgraduate plans. This information is used to create a college cost calculator that helps students and families more accurately estimate the cost of attending a particular institution. A student success and progress rate chart tracks a college’s prospective, current, and former students through their entire collegiate experience. This feedback helps colleges improve their enrollment, retention, and graduation rates.

Student Experiences and Perceptions Section

Students’ opinions about group learning, active learning, experiences with diverse groups of people and ideas, overall satisfaction, institutional commitment to learning and success, and interaction with faculty and staff offer insight into the college experience at a particular institution.

Student Learning Outcomes Section

Institutions describe how they evaluate student learning and provide links to institution-specific outcomes data, such as results of program assessments and professional licensure exams, and instruments that measure student learning gains in critical thinking (including analytic reasoning) and written communication. The information provides evidence of learning gains between the freshman and senior years.

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