Digital Learning in 'Inside Higher Ed' This Week

Inside Higher Ed published numerous articles of potential interest to "Inside Digital Learning" readers this week. They included:

• As lawmakers debate expanding Pell Grant eligibility to short-term programs, a new report from the Rutgers University School of Management and Labor Relations urged more efforts to collect data on the outcomes of current short-term programs. The report finds that no states collect comprehensive data on nondegree credentials. Most of the work done to assess the quality of short-term credentials so far has focused on for-credit credentials at public institutions. And many of those evaluations have been limited to labor market outcomes only.
• Earning a nondegree credential of any kind was associated with a five-to-15-percentage-point increase in the likelihood of employment for adults, according to an analysis funded by Lumina Foundation and coordinated by DVP-Praxis Ltd. The report, which controlled for a wide range of potential confounding factors, examined administrative data on certificates, industry certifications and other credentials awarded by 49 community colleges in eight states.
• The leaders of 12 community college systems urged House and Senate lawmakers this week to pass an update to the Higher Education Act that includes priorities for two-year institutions, including the JOBS Act, which would expand Pell Grant eligibility to short-term training programs, and the College Transparency Act, which would establish a national student-level data system to track outcomes at the college and program level.