Learn how to use the Postsecondary Data Partnership Credit Accumulation Rate dashboard to measure the difference in credit accumulation between male and female students.
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In this tutorial, we demonstrate how to use the PDP credit accumulation rate dashboard to measure the difference in credit accumulation between male and female students.
The credit accumulation rate institution level dashboard reports the number of students who have successfully completed enough credits for satisfactory academic progress. It also helps clarify which students are or are not gaining academic momentum in their college career. Understanding which students are lagging in momentum will help determine which students need additional support.
Let's use this dashboard to answer this research question: do a higher percentage of female students meet the credit threshold compared to male students?
First, navigate to the PDP credit accumulation rate dashboard. Let's leave the credit threshold filter set to 15 credits for part-time students and 30 credits for full-time students in and let's leave the academic year filter set to one, which denotes the first year. So the students represented in this dashboard are part-time students who completed 15 credits in their first year of college and full-time students who completed 30 credits in their first year of college.
Now let's find the credit accumulation rate for all students. Hovering over the 2022-23 data point in the line chart, we find that 41.2% of students succeed successfully met the credit threshold. Looking at the previous cohorts, we find that the credit accumulation rate dropped during 2020-21 likely due to the global pandemic and has increased since then.
Now let's change the credit threshold to 12 credits for part-time students and 24 credits for full-time students to see what impact that might have on the credit accumulation rate. Hovering over the 2022-23 data point, we find that 68.7% of students met that threshold. Looking at the previous cohorts, we see that same sharp decline in 2020-21, but the rate has rebounded some.
Now let's determine if the credit accumulation rate is different between male and female students. Applying a dimension makes it easy to compare different groups of students. To do that, click on "edit", which opens chart settings. Select "gender" from the dimension dropdown and click "apply settings".
Notice that our line chart now has three lines: one for female students, one for male students and one for students whose gender is unknown. To make our charts easier to read, let's remove the unknown gender data from our dashboard. To do that, click on "edit", which opens chart settings. Click gender and deselect "unknown", then click "apply settings".
Now we are ready to review our results. Looking at the line chart, we noticed that female students had a higher credit accumulation rate in 2017-18 through 2019-20 compared to male students. Then in 2020-21, both male and female groups experienced a decline in that rate. In 2021-22, both groups rebounded, but female students had a slightly higher rebound and in 2022-23, that equity gap closed.
Now, let's reset the credit threshold to 15 credits for part-time students and 30 credits for full-time students to find if the equity gap between male and female students changes. For all cohorts represented in this line chart, we find that our equity gap widened. But notice the gap narrowed after 2020-21. Hovering over the 2022-23 data points, we see that 42.2% of female students and 38.7% of male students met that higher credit threshold. That is a 4 percentage point gap.
Let's summarize what we learned. Through this exploration, we found that fewer students achieve a credit threshold when it is set to the higher threshold of 15 credits for part-time students and 30 credits for full-time students compared to the lower threshold of 12 credits for part-time students and 24 credits for full-time students. A higher percentage of female students met the lower credit credit threshold compared to male students prior to the 2019-20 academic year, but that equity gap closed in 2022-23 and a higher percentage of female students met the higher credit threshold compared to male students prior to 2020-21, but that gap has since narrowed.
We encourage you to explore your institution's PDP dashboards to better understand your students who meet or don't meet accepted credit thresholds. Thank you for joining us.