Keeping Track of Students

The past couple of weeks we've read about different aspects of students, attrition, retention...I haven't posted about it because I've actually spent quite some time talking over higher education and students with one of our admissions officers, the one and only Luke Morgan. Luke is finishing his masters in higher education at Western Kentucky so we've processed together quite a bit (I think I have great ideas for his thesis...I'm not so sure he agrees). My thoughts are actually revolving around how we track students, and how we use that information. I should be working on IPEDS spring data collection right now. We are asked to report freshman-to-sophomore retention, 100%, 150%, and 200% completions, degrees. Our financial aid and business offices also report data during these times. The data that is reported through IPEDS goes into the NCES databases to be searched by anyone. It also gets reported with the submission of every FAFSA. Every person that submits a FAFSA sees retention and graduation data for the institution selected. The federal government is lagging far behind the realities of higher education:

• The government only collects data on first-time, full-time students. Transfers are aggregated by male/female full and part-time students and then ignored. First time, half-time students are included in the FTIAC cohort. A retention rate is the percentage of the FTIAC cohort that returns for its second year of college at your institution. A graduation rate is the percentage of the FTIAC cohort that completes in 100% of the time to degree (four years for a four-year degree).
• Transfer students are a lost entity. Half of our incoming classes for the last two years have been transfer students. They count nowhere and for nothing.
• The assumption is that retention and graduation rates reflect something of the quality of the institution. 

Why is the federal government not tracking transfer students? Why isn't the government tracking a student through his/her college career? Let's look at how this affects an institution like Kuyper. My incoming class last fall was 89 students, 54 of which were FTIACs. The 35 transfers poof into thin air -- who cares about them? So my FTIAC cohort for retention and graduation tracking is 54 students. ONE student leaving equals OVER 1%. When we consider that 75% retention is the high side of average, for my college that equals 40 students, or a 14 student attrition. That's not bad! What is worse, losing 14 students, or with a college that has a 5000 student incoming class losing 250 students? Is there a comparison? 

And why doesn't the government take any account of the reasons a student leaves? Why is it implicitly assumed it's the college's fault? Why are only 18-year old students the only group tracked? This affects not only small, private or specialized colleges, but community colleges too. 

My question is, when is the federal government going to get with the times?