Institutional Research & Policy Studies
Quinn Administration, 03, 00025
617-287-5420
inst.research@umb.edu
Glossary of Terms
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
A
Academic Year (AY) - Two full semesters, starting in the fall and continuing into the spring (e.g., Fall '94 and Spring '95 = AY94-95); does not include summer.
Acceptance Rate - Percentage of students formally accepted to UMB; it is calculated using number of accepted students divided by number of completed applications; same as admit rate.
Admitted - Students who are formally accepted to UMB.
Admitted but Deferred - Students who are formally admitted to UMB, but choose to delay enrollment until a later date.
Admit Rate - See Acceptance Rate.
Applied - Students whose application forms have been received by the university; only students submitting complete applications are counted.
AY - Academic Year; see definition above.
C
CAGS - Certificate of Advanced Graduate Study; generally earned after a Master's degree has been earned; considered a separate award in some disciplines.
CAS - College of Arts & Sciences.
CCDE - Corporate, Continuing, and Distance Education.
CE - Continuing Education; Corporate Continuing and Distance Education. See also CCDE.
CLA – College of Liberal Arts .
CM - College of Management .
CSM – College of Science and Math.
CN - College of Nursing and Health Sciences
CPCS - College of Public and Community Service.
Centers - Official entities that exist outside of the college structure, but report to the Dean of Graduate Studies (e.g. The Center for Survey Research, Joiner Center ) Some are also called "institutes" (e.g. Institute for Learning & Teaching). See also Institutes.
Certificate - An award for successful completion of a particular sequence of courses, usually over one or two years, in a selected area of study.
Cohort - A group of individuals (in this case, students) who went through the same experience or event at the same time. A cohort does not necessarily progress at the same rate. Thus, students who entered the university in Fall 1998 for the first time form a cohort.
Completed Application - Application with all required materials and fees received by UMB.
Contact Hour - refers to the number of actual hours students have with instructors in classes or labs. Used in measuring faculty instructional activity.
Corporate, Continuing, and Distance Education - The organization that manages courses available at UMass Boston (credit and non-credit) that are not subsidized by state funds. Many of these courses are offered in summer or winter inter-sessions, outside the traditional academic year. Students may enroll in state-supported and continuing education courses simultaneously. In Spring 2000 the Continuing Education division was renamed Corporate Continuing and Distance Education.
Credit Hour - Refers to all academic credits earned by students in courses. Courses are assigned a specific number of credits; most are 3 or 4 credits per course.
E
Exercise Science & Physical Education Department – (ESPE) Formerly Human Performance and Fitness.
D
Decision-Ready - Application with all required materials that has been submitted to UMB and is ready for an acceptance decision.
Degree-Seeking Students - Students enrolled in courses for credit who are recognized by the institution as seeking a degree or formal award. At the undergraduate level, degree seeking students include those enrolled in vocational or occupational programs.
DCE - Division of Continuing Education; see Corporate Continuing and Distance Education.
DSP - Directions for Student Potential Program. A six-week free summer program offered to Massachusetts residents for pre-admission to the university. Aimed at improving Math and English skills and in preparing students for university life.
F
Faculty:
Adjunct Faculty - Non-tenure track faculty serving in a temporary or auxiliary capacity to teach specific courses on a course-by-course basis. Includes both faculty who are hired to teach an academic degree credit course and those hired to teach a remedial, developmental, or ESL course.
Contracted Services - Services obtained through contracts with outside agencies which would normally be provided by paid employees.
Full-Time Staff - Person on the UMB payroll and classified as full time. Includes faculty who are on abbatical leave and persons on leave but remaining on the payroll. FTE –
Full-Time Equivalent; A faculty member that works full-time hours, which are expressed as a percentage of full-time. (i.e. 100% teaching hours = full time.)
Part-Time - People on the UMB payroll who are classified as part time. Part-time faculty, most commonly referred to as "Instructors," are fully qualified in their field and teach 1 or 2 courses at the university in any given semester; they do not teach 100% of the time like their full-time counterparts.
Tenure - This status is awarded to faculty members who have successfully and consistently met rigorous standards for research, teaching, and public service at UMB.
Tenure Track - Position that leads to consideration for tenure if standards are met.
Non-Tenure Track - Faculty members who have been hired into positions in which they are not eligible to receive tenure.
Fall Semester - Most mandated reporting in Higher Education is based on Fall Semester counts obtained from a 'snapshot' of data taken on a consistent census date. Data in the Statistical Portrait are from fall semesters, unless labeled otherwise.
Feeder High Schools - Group of high schools in Massachusetts from which many of UMB's students have come over the years. Regardless of how long a student has been out of school, if the student has not attended any post-secondary educational institution, the student's high school is considered the feeder school.
Feeder Institution - The group of colleges and universities from which most of our transfer students come.
First-Time Freshmen - An entering freshman who has never attended any college or postsecondary institution; includes students enrolled in the fall term who attend college for the first time in the prior summer term. Also includes students who entered with advanced standing (college credits earned before graduation from high school).
Freshmen
Traditional Freshmen : Students who have completed high school and are entering college for the first time and have no previous college courses. See first-time freshmen.
Non-Traditional Freshmen : Students who have graduated from high school three or more years ago, but who have not enrolled in a university or college before coming to UMB.
Freshman Standing
UMB Definition - A student who has completed 0 - 19 degree credits.
IPEDS Definition - A student who has completed fewer than 30 degree credits.
FTE:
FTE (Employee) - Full-Time Equivalent; A full-time equivalent measure is a way of 'equating' the work of full- and part-time personnel. A full-time employee 'counts' as 1 FTE; a part-time employee is calculated by using the percentage of time worked by the employee on the personnel action form detailing their appointment. Thus, 4 employees who each occupy 0.25 of a line = 1 FTE employee.
FTE (Faculty) - Full-Time Equivalent; The amount of time a faculty member works expressed as a portion of full-time (i.e. 100% hours = full time.)
FTE (Student) - Full-time equivalent; A full-time equivalent undergraduate is a student who takes 15 credits per semester. A full-time equivalent graduate student is one who takes 9 credits. Thus, for UMass Boston, undergraduate FTE is calculated by taking all credits for which undergraduates are registered and dividing that total by 15. Graduate FTE is calculated by taking all credits for which graduates are registered and dividing that total by 9. The sum of these is UMB's total FTE. NOTE: No distinction is made between students registered for graduate or undergraduate courses in calculating student FTE.
Full-Time Student - Undergraduate student taking 12 or more credit hours; Graduate student taking 9 or more credit hours.
G
GCOE - Graduate College of Education.
Graduation Rate – The number of students in an entering cohort who have completed their degree by some specified number of semesters or years later. For freshmen the graduation rate defined by the federal government is based on six years.
Graduate Student - A student who holds a bachelor's or first-professional degree, or equivalent, and is taking courses at the post-baccalaureate level. These students may or may not be pursuing a graduate degree.
H
HCT: Headcount - The count of students whether full- or part-time. This measure is mainly useful when examining the amount of administrative services needed. Part-time students consume almost as many resources as full-time in the areas of admissions, counseling, advising, etc. Similarly, employees consume certain resources in personnel support, whether they are part-time or full-time.
HPF - Human Performance and Fitness; part of the College of Nursing and Health Sciences (see ESPE).
I
IPEDS : Integrated Post-Secondary Education Data System - supervised by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). IPEDS was designed to help NCES meet its mandate to report full and complete statistics on the condition of post-secondary education. The IPEDS system is built upon a series of interrelated surveys used to collect data in such areas as enrollment, program completions, faculty and staff, and financial aid. For more information, see the NCES website: http://nces.ed.gov/
Induced Course Load Matrix - This table shows the amount of each college's Instruction FTE (IFTE) that is used to educate students who's major is in a different college. Using this table, one can see how much service each college provides to students from other colleges within the university. The Instructional College (rows) is the college paying for the course that generated the credit hours, and the Sending College (columns) houses the major that the student has declared.
Institutes - Official entities that exist outside of the college structure, but report to the Dean of Graduate Studies. Some are called "centers" (e.g. The Center for Survey Research, The Joiner Center). There are also some entities within the college system that are called institutes although they are much like centers. (Ex. Institute for Learning & Teaching.) See also Centers.
Instructional FTE (IFTE) - Instructional Full-Time Equivalent. This is a method of standardizing the amount of instruction provided by a unit. The formula for FTE undergraduate and graduate is based on 15 credits for undergraduates and 9 for graduates, but in this case it is the level of the course that determines whether it is undergraduate or graduate. The undergraduate IFTE for UMB is the sum of all credits registered for undergraduate courses, divided by 15. The graduate IFTE for UMB is the sum of all credits registered for in graduate courses, divided by 9. It is similar for a college or department, or even as taught by an individual faculty member. In each case, it is the amount of instruction provided regardless of which students "consume" that credit. See also FTE.
J
Junior Standing -
UMB Definition - A student who has completed 50-79 degree credits.
IPEDS Definition - A student who is classified as having 60-89 credit hours.
M
McC. Sch - McCormack School of Public Policy
Matriculated - A student who has been accepted into and has enrolled in a degree-granting program.
N
Non-Degree Seeking Student - A student enrolled in courses for credit who is not recognized by the institution as seeking a degree or formal award.
Non-Matriculated - A student who is enrolled in classes, but is not formally enrolled in a degree program (Same as non-degree seeking).
Non-Resident Alien - A student or employee at UMB who is neither a Resident Alien, nor a U.S. citizen (i.e. a foreign student). This person is in the country on a student visa or temporary employment basis. The race/ethnicity of non-resident aliens is not used to calculate any of the race/ethnicity totals in the other categories.
P
Part-time Student
UMB's definition : Any undergraduate student taking fewer than 12 credit hours and any graduate student taking fewer than 9 credit hours.
IPED's definition : Any undergraduate student taking fewer than 11 credit hours and any graduate student taking fewer than 8 credit hours.
R
Race/Ethnicity - State or Federal mandated categories used to describe groups to which individuals belong, identify with, or belong in the eyes of the community. The categories do not denote scientific definitions of anthropological origins. A person may be counted in only one group. The groups used to categorize U.S. citizens, resident aliens, and other eligible non-citizens are listed below.
American Indian or Alaskan Native - A person having origins in any of the original people of North American or who maintain cultural identification through tribal affiliation or community recognition.
Asian or Pacific Islander - A person having origins in any of the original people of the Far East , Southeast Asia , the Indian Subcontinent, or Pacific Islands , American Samoa , India , or Vietnam .
Black, non-Hispanic - A person having origins in any of the black racial groups of Africa (except those of Hispanic origins).
Cape Verdean - The Commonwealth of Massachusetts recognizes individuals with ancestry from Cape Verde to be a distinct ethnic group. There are no Cape Verdean students in Federal regulations. All are categorized as Black/African-American. For Commonwealth reporting purposes, Cape Verdeans are reported as a separate ethnic group.
Hispanic - A person of Mexican, Puerto Rican, Cuban, Central or South American, or other Spanish culture or origin, regardless of race.
White, non-Hispanic - A person having origins in any of the original people of Europe, North Africa , or the Middle East (except those of Hispanic origin).
Recentered SAT Scores - In April of 1995, the College Board changed the scoring structures for SATs. Scores since then have been designated as "recentered." Scores prior to the change have been adjusted to make them comparable to recent scores. SAT (Scholastic Aptitude Test) is managed privately by the College Board. http://www.collegeboard.org/
Res. FTE - Residential Full-Time Equivalent for the specific college in which a student is matriculated. See also FTE.
Retention - This measures students' persistence at the university from one fall semester to the next.
S
SAT M - Math SAT Scores; see also Recentered SAT Scores.
SAT V - Verbal SAT Scores; see also Recentered SAT Scores.
Senior Standing
UMB Definition - A student who has completed 80 or more degree credits.
IPEDS Definition - A student who is classified as having 90 or more credit hours.
Sophomore Standing
UMB Definition - A student who has completed 20-49 degree credits.
IPEDS Definition - A student who is classified as having between 30 and 59 credit hours.
Snapshot - An electronic data file created at a particular time each semester from daily operating files of admissions, enrollment, and human resources, for academic reporting and research purposes.
State Supported - Courses taught by the university that are paid for with state support, not continuing education fees.
Session - Continuing Education offers courses in Summer and Winter sessions.
T
Transfer Student - A student entering UMB for the first time but known to have previously attended a postsecondary institution at the same level (e.g. undergraduate, graduate). The student may or may not transfer credits from previous courses to UMass Boston to fill their UMB degree requirements.
U
UMB- The University of Massachusetts Boston.
Undergraduate Student - A student enrolled in a 4- or 5-year bachelor's degree program, an associate's' degree program, or a vocational or technical program below the baccalaureate level.
Unduplicated Headcount - At UMB, students may be enrolled simultaneously in state-supported courses and continuing education courses. The unduplicated headcount counts such simultaneously-enrolled students as only one student.
Y
Yield Rate - The percentage of students who are offered admission to UMass Boston and decide to enroll at UMB (as either freshmen or transfers) with matriculated status. The formula is: number of enrolled students divided by number of admitted students.