In anticipation of the debate over a proposed new federal ratings system for colleges, two analysts with the American Enterprise Institute have crunched the data to highlight what can be measured today about colleges’ success in achieving the ratings’ goals of improving affordability, quality, and access to students from the lowest socioeconomic classes, all at the same time.
Their conclusion: "Very few institutions are terrible on all three marks," but very few appear to have broken the "iron triangle"—the concept that any change in one of the goals will have an impact on the others. In fact, according to their analysis, only 19 four-year colleges have managed to perform well across all three of the measures. (Four are campuses of the California State University system, and three are part of the City University of New York.)
Read more at The Chronicle of Higher Education: http://chronicle.com/article/Analysts-Map-Some-of-the/144551