If you like data, then today’s your day. The College Board has released two reports, both full of data pertaining to college completion. The first, "The College Completion Agenda: 2010 Progress Report," comes from the College Board’s Commission on Access, Admissions and Success in Higher Education, which measures state-by-state progress on 10 recommendations for raising the percentage of adults with an associate degree or higher to 55 percent by 2025.

One of those recommendations is to “clarify and simplify the admission process,” a task that sounds easy but isn’t. What’s simple for one applicant is complicated for another; it all depends on many variables, such as family income, that define admissions know-how.

Technology has helped "streamline" the admissions process, the report says. As of 2008, 73.4 percent of four-year colleges allow students to apply online, up from 38 percent in 20...

The sky is always falling somewhere, and right now it’s crashing down on the world of admissions. At least that’s how some of the field’s long-term observers describe the impact of looming demographic changes on college enrollments.

In short, the number of high-school graduates is expected to decline gradually until 2015, when the growing Hispanic and Asian populations will start pushing it to new highs, according to estimates from the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education. Although this is not news to anyone in admissions, the implications of this shift continue to spark  discussion–and worry–among those who recruit and evaluate college applicants.

A new white paper, “The End of Higher Education Enrollment as We Know It,” offers a glimpse of future enrollment challenges. It was written by Greg Perfetto, vice president for research and development at Admissions Lab (formerly ...

Test-optional policies come in many flavors.

This fall, all students who apply to American University by November 1 will not have to submit an ACT or SAT score. Last year, for the first time, the university offered the option only to students who applied under the university’s early-decision plan, which had a November 15 deadline.

The move, announced this week, is part of American’s ongoing review of its testing requirements. Officials there are trying to determine how a full-fledged test-optional policy might affect the university’s applicant pool—and change its evaluation process.

Last fall, American received 538 early-decision applications (a 33-percent increase over the previous year), and 191 of those students did not submit test scores. Over all, the university saw a 48-percent increase in early-decision applications from nonwhite applicants. In turn, early offers to such students...

Colleges are quick to post certain kinds of data on their Web sites, such as the number of admission applications received, the SAT scores of incoming freshmen, and favorable rankings by U.S. News & World Report.

The same isn’t true of more meaningful numbers, however. A report released on Tuesday by the National Institute for Learning Outcomes Assessment found that most colleges don't fully reveal what they do to assess learning outcomes on their campuses. The report was based on a national study of the information published online by 725 two- and four-year institutions.  

"Institutions have more student-learning-outcomes assessment activities under way than they report on their Web sites," write the report's authors. They note that descriptions of those activities don't appear on many admission home pages—the very portals designed for consumers.

The report concludes that colleges...