Dissertation prospectus

I’ve attached a copy of my dissertation prospectus, which is a general overview of my dissertation proposal. It’s just a quick two-page overview of my dissertation topic. I haven’t spent much time on this blog describing what my research questions are, data sources, methods, or policy relevance of my study.

So, in the next few posts I’ll try making more of an effort of describing why this research interests me, why it matters in the “big picture,” and how it can potentially add value to what we know within this small little world of higher ed policy.

Download file Hillman_Prospectus (pdf). Click again on next page.

Europe bound…

At the end of August, Ashley and I are going to travel to Lithuania where I’m going to present some of my dissertation research at an academic conference.

The conference is sponsored by the European Association of Institutional Research, where professors, researchers, and policy analysts from all over Europe get together to discuss higher ed issues. The conference focuses on European topics, but there is always a handful of US professors and researchers who attend to share their work.

I thought my dissertation work might be really relevant to this crowd because many EU countries are moving towards higher ed funding models that are similar to what we have in the US. So, here’s an abstract to my paper that I will be presenting:

“This study examines “tuition discounting” trends at public colleges in the U.S. It utilizes multilevel modeling to identify the effect state-level factors have on institutional spending on need-based and merit-based tuition discounts. It also examines the underlying micro-economic concepts of tuition discounting and provides empirical evidence of the cost drivers associated with discounting. As colleges become more reliant on tuition as a primary source of revenue, these findings will hold important policy implications related to college access, affordability, and enrollment management.”

The EAIR committee chair wants me to focus more on the ethics behind tuition discounting, which is something that I could probably talk about for hours! But I only have 30 minutes, so I better keep it brief!
Ash and I will get to do some exploring while we’re there, and we’re really excited about meeting new people on our trip. So, where the heck is Lithuania anyways?

Dissertation presentation

Here it is in all its glory. Still working through some kinks and figuring out exactly what methods I will be using. BUT, with any luck my final dissertation will look a little something like this presentation. I’m presenting this in class tomorrow, so hopefully I’ll get some good feedback from my ed policy peers.

To download the ppt presentation:  Dissertation Presentation

Homebrew

One of my goals for 2009 was to make some homebrew. So, on January 1st I started my first batch of beer from scratch. Eventually I’ll put up a post (with a video!) of the entire process start to finish…but that won’t happen for a while. My first bottles are almost ready, so yesterday I spent a few hours making a label/logo to stick on these bottles. I have some strange infatuation with sasquatch, no I don’t believe he’s real, I just like the folklore/fantasy that goes behind the story. You know what I mean? And I think it makes for a good beer mascot. The name of my homebrew is “Bungalow Brew” and this first recipe is a holiday ale (heavy stuff…should be about 9% alcohol…yikes). I’m also working on another batch of India Pale Ale that is fermenting in a carboy as we speak. Here’s the logo I put together yesterday using some old crusty crayons and some computer graphics…

R Project

I’m trying to figure out what kind of statistical method I will use for my dissertation. I’ve got it narrowed down to two options: panel analysis or hierarchical linear modeling. I’m leaning towards HLM, and will eventually put up a post that explains some of this in more detail. But, I just came across a resource that other folks might find handy: R statistical software. Click on that link and you can download the software for free. This package is supposed to be really useful for HLM, but I haven’t used it yet so I really don’t know how useful it’s going to be. But I’ve seen other researchers use it in their analysis, so I assume it can’t be all bad. I’m hoping that this will help me with some data visualization tools where I can present the data in a way that is pleasing to the eye, intuitive to non-statistical audiences, and useful to understanding the data. Anyway, if you’re working on your dissertation and stumble upon this post I’d recommend downloading R and taking a test drive. Sample screenshot:

Default movie trailer

Although I’d like to see a Michael Moore style documentery showing the political shenanigans going on behind the scene with the banking industry and politician’s pocketbooks, this film should still be a good contribution to raising awareness about the corrupt system that we currently have.

DEFAULT – The Student Loan Documentary from Default on Vimeo.

Data adventures

In the world of research, there are few tasks more glamorous than digging for data.  If the “d” word hasn’t put you to sleep yet, read on.  Seriously, the hunt for data is just like an Indiana Jones adventure.  Oh yeah, I mean action, adventure, the whole shabang.  Well, maybe there’s not quite as much punching, daredevil moves, car chases, wild animals, or exotic exploits…but other than that it’s pretty much the same thing.  Yeah, um, at least I tell myself that so it makes the research a bit more fun!

Over the past year I’ve been on a hunt for state-level data on higher ed finance, college participation, and economic indicators.  I’ve explored the depths of the world wide web, emailed and called people in far away lands, and have devoted countless hours staring at the depths of my computer monitor’s soul.  If this isn’t what makes for an Indiana Jones adventure, then I don’t know what does.  Are you buying it?  Can you see the movie now?  Indiana Jones and the Search for the Lost Data File.  Blockbuster hit written all over it!  Oh  yeah. 

Ok, I digress.  I do have a point to this blog.  I want to share an awesome data resource with folks who might be on similar “data hunts.”  It’s not easy hunting down the right info from the most legitimate source, so here’s a link provided by Lexis Nexis statistical data center.  If you have access to the LN site, you can dig around here and get state-level data ranging from things like new housing starts, number of drug arrests per capita, bankruptcies, amount of protein in the food supply,  air quality index, unemployment rates, control of political parties, election results…and of course education data.  The list goes on and on.  If you’re a researcher interested in state-level economic, education, political, social, or environmental data this should be the first stop on your research journey.  I wish I had known about it sooner!

Oh yeah, and you can even print out charts and graphs like the ones below:

Higher ed and President Obama

I caught this NPR clip (here) earlier this week discussing how President Obama might address some higher education issues. A couple of news articles covering the same topic can be found here and here and the best one is here.

Perceptions of elitism

I like to think that I’m committed to educational opportunity and equality. That everybody should have a real chance at pursuing life goals with as few barriers as possible. I like to think that I’m committed to a cause of social justice, that equality of opportunity is the heart of any successful democracy. BUT, sometimes I step back and think “what are colleges creating?” I’m committed to getting more folks to college, but for what? A picture says a thousand words. Yeah, it’ s a bit unfair because for every “elitist” college grad I’ve met, I’ve also met about 20 “non-elitist” college grads. And I can point out a lot of non-college grads who match the elitist profile. The knife cuts both ways. But the food for thought that this picture makes my mind chew on is that colleges have a lot of ground to make up in terms of redefining higher education’s role in society. Colleges could do much more in terms of preparing students to be world citizens, to be engaged citizens, and to work towards improving the human condition.

Unemployment and educational opportunity

A new report from researchers at the National Bureau of Economic Research show that welfare reform of the 1990’s has decreased (rather than increased) college participation rates for low-income mothers. This study gives a perfect example of how counter-intuitive some of our national social policies are impacting individuals. Investing in “human capital” is the most successful way to grow an economy in the long-run, but reform efforts are actually inhibiting indivuals from investing in human capital. That makes no sense to me. Look, unemployment claims have been skyrocketing during the current economic recession…yet, there’s no strategic plan that is getting unemployed folks to pursue formal training or credentialling.

What if the feds provided incentives for unemployed workers to enroll in college while they’re laid off? Or what if the feds counted college enrollment as a “job” so that welfare recipients would have an incentive to transition from welfare to “work”?  Currently, neither of these options are in play. Instead, we’re missing opportunity after opportunity to invest in human capital and it’s only going to hurt us more in the long-run. We’re living in an era where our youngsters are less educated than our adults and other countries are zipping past us in terms of college attainment rates. Tragedy of the commons or the road to serfdom? I’m not sure which, but neither is a rosy scenario for our future.