Part A B&B 2008-2018

Membership of the Technical Review Panel
Confidentiality for Administrative Record Matching
Results of the B&B:08/18 Field Test Experiments
Cognitive Testing Report 2017-12
Sample Member Communication Materials
Survey Facsimile for the B&B:08/18 Full-Scale Study, including the Abbreviated Survey and Mini Survey Items

Tables

Table 1. Chronology of NPSAS and its longitudinal components A-3

Table 2. Incentive types and amounts included in the B&B:08/18 data collection plan A-8

Table 3. Maximum estimated burden to respondents in B&B:08/18 A-12

Table 4. Costs to NCES for the B&B:08/18 field test and full-scale A-13

Table 5. Contract costs for B&B:08/18 A-13

Table 6. Operational schedule for B&B:08/18 A-14

Justification
1. Circumstances Making Collection of Information Necessary
  1. Purpose of this Submission

This request is for the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), within the Institute of Education Sciences (IES), part of the U.S. Department of Education, to conduct the 2008/18 Baccalaureate and Beyond Longitudinal Study (B&B:08/18). The primary contractor for this study is RTI International (Contract# ED-IES-13-C-0070).

This submission covers B&B:08/18 full-scale materials and procedures required for conducting the survey, collecting résumés, and for matching data to administrative records. The full-scale materials are based on the field test materials approved in May 2017 (OMB# 1850-0729 v. 11-12). With the field test submission, NCES adequately justified the need for and overall practical utility of the full-scale study as proposed and an overarching plan for the phases of the data collection over the next 3 years, and provided as much detail on the measures to be used as was available at the time of the submission. Thus OMB approved all aspects of the initial phase of this collection, and now NCES published a notice in the Federal Register allowing a 30-day public comment period on the details of the subsequent phase of this collection (B&B:08/18 full-scale) described in this submission.

B&B examines students’ education and work experiences after they complete a bachelor’s degree, with a special emphasis on the experiences of K-12 school teachers. The B&B-eligible cohort is initially identified in the National Postsecondary Student Aid Study (NPSAS). The first cohort (B&B:93) was identified in NPSAS:93, and consisted of students who received their bachelor’s degree in the 1992–93 academic year. NPSAS:93 provided the base year data and students were interviewed in 1994 for the initial follow-up. The B&B:93 cohort was surveyed again in 1997 and 2003. The second cohort (B&B:2000) was selected from the NPSAS:2000, which became the base year for a single B&B:00/01 follow-up in spring 2001. The third cohort (B&B:08) was selected from NPSAS:2008, which became the base year for follow-up interviews in 2009 and 2012. The B&B:93 and B&B:08 cohorts also included transcript collections. B&B:08/18 will be the third and final follow-up for the third cohort of the B&B series (OMB# 1850-0729). Please note that a new cohort of baccalaureate recipients from the 2015-16 academic year (B&B:16/17) is currently undergoing full-scale data collection (OMB# 1850-0926). Given that overlapping B&B cohorts are in different stages of data collection, B&B cohorts prior to B&B:16 are approved under OMB# 1850-0729 and the new B&B:16 cohort is approved under OMB# 1850-0926.

B&B:08/18 full-scale data collection plans have been developed based on lessons learned from the B&B:08/18 field test and from earlier waves of the B&B:08 cohort as well as from other related NCES studies, such as NPSAS and BPS. The primary goals of the full-scale design are to minimize nonresponse bias and reduce the amount of time and costs of data collection efforts. Further, to optimize statistical power and to enable sub-group analysis, a response rate of at least 75 percent is targeted.

The differences between the study designs approved for the B&B:08/18 field test and those planned for the B&B:08/18 full-scale are minimal and build upon information gained in earlier collections. Most of the data collection strategies to be employed in B&B:08/18 were approved by OMB for prior B&B or related studies¹ and include:

a prepaid incentive of $2 paid by cash or PayPal;
a promised baseline incentive of $30 for prior round respondents and $50 for prior round nonrespondents;
a “flash” incentive of an additional $5 for completing the survey within a specified 2-week period;
an abbreviated interview of about 15 minutes; and
a mini survey of about 5 minutes with a paper-and-pencil version (PAPI).

Résumés were collected from B&B:08 sample members for the first time during the field test for a $10 incentive. Sample members in the full-scale study will also be asked to upload their résumé to a secure NCES server for a $5 incentive. The full-scale incentive offer for résumés has been reduced from the field test amount in order to preserve project resources for primary data collection activities. The full-scale data collection design also includes options to be implemented if needed to achieve the targeted response rate of 75 percent, including an incentive boost and an extension to the data collection period.

The B&B:08/18 study design draws on several prior data collections: (a) the earlier follow up studies with the B&B:08 cohort (B&B:08/09 and B&B:08/12), (b) B&B:93/03 – the only other 10-year follow-up, and (c) the B&B:16/17 collection with the newly identified cohort, currently underway. Most items in the B&B:08/18 full-scale survey were included in the B&B:08/18 field test and the B&B:08/12 survey, with some changes made to align the upcoming collection with the research goals for the 10-year follow-up. Compared with the 1-year and 4-year follow-up studies (B&B:08/09 and B&B:08/12 respectively), the 10-year follow-up is designed to capture the experiences and outcomes of graduates at a different life stage. By this point, many in the B&B:08 cohort will have been able to pursue and complete additional undergraduate and graduate education, establish a career pathway, marry, start a family, and/or purchase a home. Some questions unique to the B&B:93/03 (10-year follow-up) survey have been added to B&B:08/18 to allow for comparisons with the B&B:93 cohort, and other questions have been added to permit future comparison to the B&B:16 cohort on topics related to student loan debt burden, mid-career employment experiences, teacher satisfaction, and gender identity/sexual orientation. In addition, B&B:08/18 survey items reflect revisions made based on recommendations from the study’s Technical Review Panel (TRP), which met in December 2017, and the results of cognitive testing conducted in September through December 2017.

This submission includes the following appendixes:

A membership list of the TRP for the B&B:08/18 study (appendix A);
A description of the confidentiality procedures in place for administrative record matching (appendix B);
A detailed description of the results of field test experiments (appendix C);
The final report describing results of cognitive testing (appendix D);
Contacting materials for sample members selected for participation in the survey (appendix E); and
A facsimile for the B&B:08/18 full-scale interview, including items to be used in the abbreviated interview and mini interview (appendix F).

Legislative Authorization

B&B is a longitudinal series of surveys conducted by NCES in close consultation with other U.S. Department of Education offices, federal agencies, and organizations (see sections A.4 and A.8 of this document). B&B and NPSAS, the base year study for B&B, are authorized under the Education Sciences Reform Act (ESRA) of 2002 (20 U.S.C. §9543) and the Higher Education Opportunity Act (HEOA) of 2008, 20 U.S.C. §1015(a)(k):

“Student aid recipient survey

(1) Survey required: The Secretary, acting through the Commissioner for Education Statistics, shall conduct, on a State-by-State basis, a survey of recipients of Federal student financial aid under subchapter IV of this chapter and part C of subchapter I of chapter 34 of title 42—

(A) to identify the population of students receiving such Federal student financial aid;

(B) to describe the income distribution and other socioeconomic characteristics of recipients of such Federal student financial aid;

(C) to describe the combinations of aid from Federal, State, and private sources received by such recipients from all income categories;

(D) to describe the—

(i) debt burden of such loan recipients, and their capacity to repay their education debts; and

(ii) the impact of such debt burden on the recipients’ course of study and post-graduation plans;

(E) to describe the impact of the cost of attendance of postsecondary education in the determination by students of what institution of higher education to attend; and

(F) to describe how the costs of textbooks and other instructional materials affect the costs of postsecondary education for students.

(2) Frequency: The survey shall be conducted on a regular cycle and not less often than once every four years.

(3) Survey design: The survey shall be representative of students from all types of institutions, including full-time and part-time students, undergraduate, graduate, and professional students, and current and former students.

(4) Dissemination: The Commissioner for Education Statistics shall disseminate to the public, in printed and electronic form, the information resulting from the survey.”

Prior and Related Studies

The B&B series represents longitudinal studies of the education, employment, financial, and personal experiences of individuals who have completed a bachelor’s degree at a given point in time. Three B&B cohorts, each sampled for the first follow-up about eight years apart, have allowed researchers to evaluate how baccalaureate degree recipients have fared at differing times in recent history. Bachelor’s degree recipients are identified through NPSAS, a nationally representative trend study of postsecondary students designed to determine how students and their families pay for postsecondary education.

B&B:08/18 is the third follow-up of a panel of baccalaureate degree recipients identified in NPSAS:08, and part of the third cohort (B&B:08) of the B&B series. The current cohort contains students who earned their bachelor’s degrees in 2007-2008 academic year. For the B&B:08/18 field test, graduates earned their bachelor’s degrees in 2006-2007 academic year and were identified in the NPSAS:08 field test conducted in 2007.

Table 1 presents the chronology of the previous administrations of the NPSAS study and its associated longitudinal components, including the Beginning Postsecondary Students Longitudinal Study (BPS). For all studies, full-scale data collection was preceded by a field test conducted one year earlier in order to test methods and procedures planned for the full-scale data collection.

Table 1. Chronology of NPSAS and its longitudinal components

Base year	First follow-up	Second follow-up	Third follow-up
NPSAS:90	BPS:90/92	BPS:90/94	—
NPSAS:93	B&B:93/94	B&B:93/97	B&B:93/03
NPSAS:96	BPS:96/98	BPS:96/01	Administrative data matching only
NPSAS:2000	B&B:2000/01	—	—
NPSAS:04	BPS:04/06	BPS:04/09	Administrative data matching only
NPSAS:08	B&B:08/09	B&B:08/12	B&B:08/18
NPSAS:12	BPS:12/14	BPS:12/17	—
NPSAS:16	B&B:16/17	B&B:16/20 (anticipated)

— Not applicable.

NOTE: NPSAS = National Postsecondary Study Aid Study; BPS = Beginning Postsecondary Students; B&B = Baccalaureate and Beyond.

The seven major issues addressed in the NPSAS, BPS, and B&B studies are:

Undergraduate access/choice of institution;
Persistence;
Progress/curriculum;
Attainment/outcome assessment;
Financial aid and student debt;
Access to graduate programs; and
Benefits of postsecondary education to individuals and society.

Purposes and Uses of the Data

This section provides information on the purposes of B&B:08/18 and an overview of the primary research issues it addresses.

B&B:08/18 Purposes

The primary purpose of the B&B longitudinal study series is to describe the post-graduation pathways of baccalaureate recipients, with a focus on their experiences in the labor market, postbaccalaureate education, and their education-related debt. B&B also focuses on the continuing education paths of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) graduates, as well as the experiences of those who have worked as K-12 teachers. Since graduating from college, many members of this B&B cohort will have moved into and out of the workforce, enrolled in additional postsecondary education, formed families, and repaid undergraduate education-related debt. Documenting these choices and pathways, along with individual, institutional, and the employment characteristics related to those choices provides critical information on the costs and benefits of a bachelor’s degree in today’s workforce.

The B&B series of studies is critical to understanding the education paths of all types of bachelor’s degree recipients. While these graduates are homogeneous in many ways, there are important variations to consider. B&B represents both traditional-age and non-traditional-age college graduates of public, private nonprofit, and for-profit institutions, including graduates who began their postsecondary education at a community college and those who began at a four-year college or university. Findings based on B&B data are presented in multiple publications such as First Look and Statistics in Brief reports, and Web Table publications. The data are also made available to calculate statistics using PowerStats, QuickStats, and TrendStats – web-based software applications accessible to the public at http://nces.ed.gov/datalab, and to qualified researchers through the IES restricted-use data-licensing program.

B&B:08/18 Research and Policy Issues

The B&B:08/18 data will allow researchers to address a wide variety of policy-relevant topics related to various outcomes of bachelor’s degree recipients in the 10 years following graduation. Key topics include postbaccalaureate enrollment, education debt and repayment, and labor market outcomes. Data collected for the B&B:08 cohort also allow for analyses of outcomes related to STEM fields and the experiences of K-12 teachers.

Education debt and loan repayment. As the price of college has increased across the country, so has the focus on the amount of education debt accrued and the burden of subsequent repayment. Borrowing for undergraduate education is predicated upon the assumption that future employment will allow for repayment of debt. B&B:08/18 will provide the latest information on college graduates’ debt burden and employment experiences, including information on cumulative amounts borrowed and owed 10 years after graduation, repayment status, and enrollment in income-driven repayment plans. It will also allow for an examination of the relationship between loan debt and postbaccalaureate outcomes such as enrollment, employment, family formation, and financial well-being.

Postbaccalaureate education. The 10-year follow-up of the B&B:08 cohort will enable examination of outcomes related to postbaccalaureate enrollment in both graduate and additional undergraduate education. Many B&B:08 cohort members will have earned an additional degree in the 10 years following college graduation, and B&B will provide researchers with information needed to understand the factors associated with positive postbaccalaureate enrollment outcomes.

Labor market outcomes. The B&B:08 cohort is well suited to examining college graduates’ long-term employment experiences. Data collected in the 10-year follow-up will enable study of the timing and nature of employment and its relationship to undergraduate characteristics and post-graduation experiences. In addition to employment history data, B&B:08/18 will provide information about current employment status and wages as well as unemployment and under-employment, job satisfaction, and the value of the bachelor’s degree in finding employment. Trend comparisons with B&B:93/03 will allow researchers to analyze recession-era impacts on labor market participation, salary outcomes, and job satisfaction.

Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Given the emphasis that policymakers and business leaders place upon college graduates’ STEM expertise, analyzing the paths of graduates with STEM majors will provide information about why and when people move into and out of STEM occupations and graduate programs. The B&B:08/18 data will allow further study of whether college graduates with training in these fields are using that training in the workplace or pursuing graduate education in STEM fields.

The K-12 teacher. B&B cohorts have historically focused on K-12 teacher recruitment and retention as important issues for education policymakers. B&B’s focus on those who enter K-12 teaching after college graduation allows in-depth study of teacher experiences, satisfaction, and mobility into and out of the K–12 teaching profession. B&B’s unique contribution to policymakers’ understanding of the K–12 teaching workforce provides researchers the ability to use B&B data to compare teachers with their similarly-educated peers in other occupations on a variety of important topics, including career paths, workplace satisfaction, and salaries.

Some of the primary research and policy issues to be addressed with B&B:08/18 data include:

Debt and finances:

How much do bachelor’s degree recipients still owe on education loans 10 years after graduation?
What is the status of the education loans?
If in repayment, what are the monthly payments, and what is the ratio of education loan payments to income?
Has student loan debt influenced postbaccalaureate enrollment or employment plans?
Has student loan debt influenced plans regarding buying a home, marriage, or family formation?
Do graduates consider their education costs a worthwhile investment in their future?
Are graduates married or living with a partner? Do they have children or other dependents?
What is their total household income including spouse or partner incomes?
Do graduates own or make payments on a home or a car? What are the monthly payments for housing, auto loans, and credit cards?

Postbaccalaureate enrollment:

What percentage of graduates enrolled within 10 years of completing a bachelor’s degree?
What factors are associated with postbaccalaureate enrollment? What percentage of graduates completed an additional degree?
How are they financing their postbaccalaureate education?
What institutions do they attend and what types of degree programs and majors do they pursue?
What percentage pursued continuing education in undergraduate, vocational, or non-degree coursework?
What paths do college graduates with bachelor’s degrees in STEM fields take after graduation? What percentage enroll in further education in STEM fields? What percentage of non-STEM majors enroll in a STEM graduate program?
How do postbaccalaureate enrollment patterns relate to demographic characteristics, undergraduate enrollment histories, undergraduate academic performance, and financial factors?

Labor market outcomes:

What is the relationship between choice of majors and the occupations and industries in which graduates work? How does success in finding career-related employment vary by undergraduate field of study?
What percentage are employed full-time or part-time?
What are the characteristics of their current and past jobs?
How satisfied are graduates with different aspects of their jobs?
What are the reasons reported for leaving a job?
How does timing of employment relate to timing of enrollment, marriage, family formation?
To what extent have graduates experienced unemployment? To what extent have graduates spent time out of the labor force?
What is the annual income and what are the monthly wages across all jobs held?
How do the B&B:08 cohort’s labor market outcomes 10 years after receiving a bachelor’s degree compare to those observed among the previous 10-year cohort (B&B:93)?

K–12 teaching:

What percentage of college graduates were employed as a teacher within 10 years of receiving a bachelor’s degree? What percentage taught uninterrupted throughout the period?
What percentage of college graduates were late entrants to the teaching profession, and how did they become certified?
What percentage of teachers exited and re-entered the teacher workforce?
What were the reasons for those exiting the teaching profession?
With which aspects of teaching were they satisfied or dissatisfied?
What are the reported reasons for continuing in the teaching profession?

Answers to these and other questions are vital if policymakers at the local, state, and national levels are to respond adequately to the changing environment of postsecondary education and the labor market.

Study Design for B&B:08/18

Data collection for B&B:08/18 will consist of a sample member survey, a request for résumés, and matching to administrative data sources. The respondent universe for the full-scale B&B:08/18 study consists of all persons who completed requirements for the bachelor’s degree during the 2007–08 academic year, and received their degree by June 30, 2009. Survey data will be collected from sample members via a web-based survey on the Internet and through web-based computer-assisted telephone interviewing (CATI). Additionally, a paper version of the mini survey will be made available (in addition to the web-based version) towards the end of data collection. The B&B:08/18 full-scale study will also request that sample members upload a current résumé. The coverage and quality of data obtained from the résumé collection will be reviewed to assess the benefits of using résumé data in future data collections.

In addition to the survey and résumé collection, administrative data matching for the B&B:08/18 sample will be conducted with several sources. A description of the confidentiality procedures in place for administrative record matching is provided in appendix B. These data will be obtained through file matching/downloading. Administrative data sources to be matched to the B&B:08/18 sample include:

the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS), containing federal loan and grant files;
the Central Processing System (CPS), which houses and processes data contained in the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) forms;
the National Student Clearinghouse (NSC), which provides enrollment and degree verification;
the Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA) database, which contains military service records of all applicable sample members, as well as detailed information on veterans’ federal education benefit amounts, and the enrollment information associated with those benefits.

Use of Information Technology

The B&B:08/18 study website will reside on NCES’ Secure Socket Layer-certified servers with a secure data connection. On a nightly basis, the data collection contractor, RTI, will download interview data, in batches, to their Enhanced Security Network (ESN) via a secure web service. Once in the ESN, data will be cleaned and undergo quality analysis.

To improve efficiency, the B&B:08/18 interview will use web-based questionnaires across two electronic modes of data collection: a self-administered survey, which is mobile-friendly to allow completion of the survey on a tablet or smartphone, and CATI. The survey will be available through a study website that resides on NCES servers. In the B&B:08/18 field test, about 79 percent of respondents completed the full survey, and 21 percent completed the mini interview. Among full interview completions in the B&B:08/18 field test, 70% of surveys were completed on a personal computer, 23% on a mobile device, and 7% via CATI. Among mini interview completions, the rates were 50% personal computer, 21% mobile, and 14% CATI.

After completion of the interview, participants will be offered the opportunity to upload a résumé to the same secure NCES server. Résumé collection for the B&B:08/18 full-scale is designed to aid in determining quality of the data collected through the survey by looking for inconsistencies between the interview responses and résumés, and may aid in imputations by potentially providing additional information about respondents’ employment and education histories.

Efforts to Identify Duplication

Efforts to identify duplication have included NCES consultations with other federal offices, such as the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Postsecondary Education (OPE); the Office of Planning, Evaluation and Policy Development (OPEPD); and other agencies, such as the Government Accountability Office (GAO); the Congressional Budget Office; and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). In addition, NCES collaborates with the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES) at the National Science Foundation (NSF) to ensure that each unit is kept up-to-date on each other’s studies pertaining to postsecondary students and institutions. NCES and NSF meet on a regular basis to cover topical issues relevant to both offices and each has staff serving on relevant study TRPs. NCES routinely consults with non-federal associations, such as the American Council on Education, the Association of Private Sector Colleges and Universities, the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators, the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities, the Council of Graduate Schools, and the Institute for Higher Education Policy to confirm that data collected through B&B are not available from any other sources. NCES also consults with academic researchers, several of whom attend the B&B TRP meetings. Beyond identification of duplication, these consultations provide methodological insights from the results of related studies conducted by NCES, other federal agencies, and nonfederal sources. The consultations also assure that data collected through B&B will meet the needs of the federal government and relevant organizations.

No studies in the U.S. duplicate the data produced by B&B. While both B&B and NCES’ National Teacher and Principal Survey (NTPS, formerly the Schools and Staffing Survey, or SASS) survey teachers, the studies’ aims are different. NTPS includes only K-12 teachers and focuses on teachers’ preparation, working conditions, and career development. With the exception of the five-year Beginning Teacher Longitudinal Study (BTLS) that concluded in 2011–12, NTPS does not follow teachers for more than one year. B&B, in contrast, follows graduates for up to 10 years and supports comparisons between graduates who go into K-12 teaching with other graduates. The B&B study collects less detailed data than NTPS on current teachers, but provides data on graduates who consider or prepare for teaching without taking a teaching job and on teachers who leave the teaching profession.

Method Used to Minimize Burden on Small Businesses

Target respondents for B&B:08/18 interviews are individuals and the data collection activities will not involve burden to small businesses or entities.

Frequency of Data Collection

A new B&B cohort has been created about every eight years since the first set of studies was initiated with NPSAS:93, with the most recent cohort identified in NPSAS:16. Two cohorts have included transcript collections from the bachelor’s degree granting institution (B&B:93 and B&B:08). The current B&B study, B&B:08/18, joins B&B:93/2003 as the second cohort to have been followed 10 years after the base year NPSAS data collection.

NPSAS and its longitudinal spin-off studies, BPS and B&B, are conducted to reflect the large-scale and rapid changes in federal policy concerning postsecondary student aid and fluctuation in sizes of grant and loan amounts. A recurring study is essential to help predict future costs for financial aid because loan programs create ongoing obligations for the federal government for as long as loans are in repayment. Repeated surveys can capture the changing nature of the postsecondary environment. With the longitudinal design of the NPSAS survey and B&B follow-ups, representative national samples of baccalaureate recipients with similar base year characteristics may be compared over time to determine the effects of changes in federal policy and programs.

Special Circumstances of Data Collection

No special circumstances of data collection are anticipated.

Consultants outside the Agency

Recognizing the significance of the B&B data collection, several strategies have been incorporated into the project work plan that allow for the critical review and acquisition of comments relating to project activities, interim and final products, and projected and actual outcomes. These strategies include consultations with persons and organizations both internal and external to NCES, the U.S. Department of Education, and the federal government (see also section A.4 of this document).

Previous B&B implementations have benefited from a TRP composed of staff from several offices in the Department, representatives of OMB, the Congressional Budget Office, the Government Accountability Office, NSF, and the Bureau of Labor Statistics; and non-federal members who are considered experts in postsecondary education issues, including employment and teaching outcomes of baccalaureate recipients. A list of the B&B:08/18 TRP members is provided in appendix A. The latest TRP meeting was held in December 2017 to review results from the field test and to discuss plans for the 2018 full-scale study design.

The 30-day Federal Register notice was published on February 21, 2018 (83 FR, No. 35, p. 7462-7463). Five comments were posted under the 30 day comment period for this ICR but none related to the collection or were of a substantive nature.

Provision of Payments or Gifts to Respondents

The use of incentives for completion of the interview can provide significant advantages to the government in terms of increased response rates and higher quality data with minimal nonresponse bias. In addition, the use of incentives may also result in decreased data collection costs due to improved efficiency. Therefore, all eligible cases in the B&B:08/18 full-scale will be offered a monetary incentive for completing the B&B interview. Table 2 below describes the various incentives included in the data collection plan. More information regarding the timing and distribution of the incentives by respondent group is provided in the Supporting Statement Part B of this submission.

Table 2. Incentive types and amounts included in the B&B:08/18 data collection plan

Incentive type	Description	Amount	Payment method
Prepaid incentive	Included with data collection announcement	$2	Cash or PayPal
Baseline incentive	Paid upon survey completion	$30 - double respondents $50 - prior nonrespondents	Check or PayPal
Flash incentive	Added to baseline incentive if survey is completed within 2 weeks of notification, paid upon survey completion	$5	Check or PayPal
Incentive boost	Added to baseline incentive, paid upon survey completion	$10	Check or PayPal
Résumé incentive	Paid upon upload of résumé	$5	Check or PayPal

With the exception of the $2 prepaid incentive (which will be paid in cash to sample members with a good mailing address, and PayPal (an online money transfer service) to those without a good mailing address but with a good e-mail address), all other incentives for the B&B:08/18 full-scale will be paid by the sample member’s choice of check or PayPal. For reference, about 39% of respondents to the B&B:08/18 field test opted to receive promised incentives via PayPal.

Prior to the start of data collection, B&B:08/18 sample members will be matched to a federal database maintained by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Controls (OFAC). OFAC administers and enforces economic and trade sanctions based on U.S. foreign policy and national security goals. As part of its enforcement efforts, OFAC publishes a list of individuals and companies called the “Specially Designated Nationals List” or “SDN.” Their assets are blocked and U.S. entities are prohibited from conducting trade or financial transactions with those on the list (https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/Pages/default.aspx). In order to determine if there are any B&B:08/18 sample members to whom NCES cannot offer an incentive, the sample members will be matched to the SDN using the Jaro-Winkler and Soundex algorithms recommended by OFAC. To avoid over-matching, B&B staff will review the cases based on full name, date of birth, and address. The small number of individuals that NCES anticipates to not be able to confirm as not matching the SDN list will receive a survey request without an incentive offer.

Assurance of Confidentiality

NCES assures individuals participating in B&B that all of the information they provide may be used only for statistical purposes and may not be disclosed, or used, in identifiable form for any other purpose except as required by law (20 U.S.C. §9573 and 6 U.S.C. §151).

The primary contractor for this study is RTI International (Contract# ED-IES-13-C-0070). Confidentiality and data security protection procedures have been put in place for B&B:08/18 to ensure that the contractor and its subcontractors comply with all privacy requirements, including:

The Statement of Work of this contract;
Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) of 1974 (20 U.S.C. §1232(g));
Privacy Act of 1974 (5 U.S.C. §552a);
Privacy Act Regulations (34 CFR Part 5b);
Computer Security Act of 1987;
U.S.A. Patriot Act of 2001 (P.L. 107-56);
Education Sciences Reform Act of 2002 (ESRA 2002, 20 U.S.C. §9573);
Confidential Information Protection and Statistical Efficiency Act of 2002;
E-Government Act of 2002, Title V, Subtitle A;
Cybersecurity Enhancement Act of 2015 (6 U.S.C. §151);
The U.S. Department of Education General Handbook for Information Technology Security General Support Systems and Major Applications Inventory Procedures (March 2005);
The U.S. Department of Education Incident Handling Procedures (February 2009);
The U.S. Department of Education, ACS Directive OM: 5-101, Contractor Employee Personnel Security Screenings;
NCES Statistical Standards; and
All new legislation that impacts the data collected through the contract for this study.

RTI will comply with the Department’s IT security policy requirements as set forth in the Handbook for Information Assurance Security Policy and related procedures and guidance, as well as IT security requirements in the Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA), Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) publications, Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Circulars, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) standards and guidance. All data products and publications will also adhere to the revised NCES Statistical Standards, as described at the website: http://nces.ed.gov/statprog/2012/.

The B&B:08/18 procedures for maintaining confidentiality include notarized nondisclosure affidavits obtained from all personnel who will have access to individual identifiers; personnel training regarding the meaning of confidentiality; controlled and protected access to computer files; built-in safeguards concerning status monitoring and receipt control systems; and a secure, staffed, in-house computing facility. B&B:08/18 follows detailed guidelines for securing sensitive project data, including, but not limited to: physical/environment protections, building access controls, system access controls, system login restrictions, user identification and authorization procedures, encryption, and project file storage/archiving/destruction.

RTI will take additional security measures to protect the web survey from unauthorized access in the form of security questions based on data previously collected on the participants. These questions will take a form commonly associated with credit check ‘pick lists’. A survey entrant will be asked to confirm their name, and will then be presented with a series of similar answers to a background question (i.e., from which institution did you earn your bachelor’s degree?) and will be required to answer correctly before beginning (or resuming) the survey. Within the survey instrument, a barrier will be included to prevent inadvertent disclosure of confidential information by backing through a completed survey.

As part of the interview, survey respondents will be asked to upload their résumés. The resulting files will be stored on secure NCES servers. Respondents will not have access to the file location beyond uploading their own document. Résumé files will be downloaded to RTI’s ESN on a daily basis at the same time and through the same process by which survey data are downloaded.

Security measures are in place to protect data during file matching procedures described in section 3. NCES has a secure data transfer system, which uses Secure Socket Layer (SSL) technology, allowing the transfer of encrypted data over the Internet. The NCES secure server will be used for all administrative data sources with the exception of the NSC, which has its own secure File Transfer Protocol (FTP) site. All data transfers will be encrypted.

The Department has established a policy regarding the personnel security screening requirements for all contractor employees and their subcontractors. The contractor must comply with these personnel security screening requirements throughout the life of the contract. The Department directive that contractors must comply with is OM:5-101, which was last updated on 7/16/2010. There are several requirements that the contractor must meet for each employee working on the contract for 30 days or more. Among these requirements are that each person working on the contract must be assigned a position risk level. The risk levels are high, moderate, and low based upon the level of harm that a person in the position can cause to the Department’s interests. Each person working on the contract must complete the requirements for a “Contractor Security Screening.” Depending on the risk level assigned to each person’s position, a follow-up background investigation by the Department will occur.

B&B:08/18 and other NCES postsecondary studies include data linkages with many existing sources of valuable data, including Department of Education’s (ED) Central Processing System (CPS) for Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) data, the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS), the Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA), and the National Student Clearinghouse (NSC). B&B:08/18 and other NCES postsecondary studies also obtain data from institution student records and admissions test scores from ACT and The College Board.

The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) (34 CFR Part 99) allows the disclosure of personally identifiable information from students’ education records without prior consent for the purposes of B&B:08/18 according to the following excerpts: 34 CFR §99.31 asks, “Under what conditions is prior consent not required to disclose information?” and explains in 34 CFR §99.31(a) that “An educational agency or institution may disclose personally identifiable information from an education record of a student without the consent required by §99.30 if the disclosure meets one or more” of several conditions. These conditions include, at 34 CFR §99.31(a)(3):

The disclosure is, subject to the requirements of §99.35, to authorized representatives of--

(i) The Comptroller General of the United States;

(ii) The Attorney General of the United States;

(iii) The Secretary; or

(iv) State and local educational authorities.

B&B:08/18 is collecting data under the Secretary’s authority. Specifically, NCES, as an authorized representative of the Secretary of Education, is collecting this information for the purpose of evaluating a federally supported education program. Any personally identifiable information is collected with adherence to the security protocol detailed in 34 CFR §99.35:

(a)(1) Authorized representatives of the officials or agencies headed by officials listed in §99.31(a)(3) may have access to education records in connection with an audit or evaluation of Federal or State supported education programs, or for the enforcement of or compliance with Federal legal requirements that relate to those programs.

(2) The State or local educational authority or agency headed by an official listed in §99.31(a)(3) is responsible for using reasonable methods to ensure to the greatest extent practicable that any entity or individual designated as its authorized representative—

(i) Uses personally identifiable information only to carry out an audit or evaluation of Federal- or State-supported education programs, or for the enforcement of or compliance with Federal legal requirements related to these programs;

(ii) Protects the personally identifiable information from further disclosures or other uses, except as authorized in paragraph (b)(1) of this section; and

(iii) Destroys the personally identifiable information in accordance with the requirements of paragraphs (b) and (c) of this section.

(b) Information that is collected under paragraph (a) of this section must—

(1) Be protected in a manner that does not permit personal identification of individuals by anyone other than the State or local educational authority or agency headed by an official listed in §99.31(a)(3) and their authorized representatives, except that the State or local educational authority or agency headed by an official listed in §99.31(a)(3) may make further disclosures of personally identifiable information from education records on behalf of the educational agency or institution in accordance with the requirements of §99.33(b); and

(2) Be destroyed when no longer needed for the purposes listed in paragraph (a) of this section.

(1) The parent or eligible student has given written consent for the disclosure under §99.30; or

(2) The collection of personally identifiable information is specifically authorized by Federal law.

Additionally, the study, including the administrative data linkage, qualifies for a 45 CFR Part 46 waiver of consent based on the following factors:

There is minimal risk to the participants. There is no physical risk and only minimal risk associated with linkage of data to sample members. The public-use and restricted-use data, prepared as part of the contract with RTI, will not include Social Security Numbers (SSNs), even though these numbers are used for the linkage. Data will undergo disclosure avoidance analysis and disclosure treatment steps to further reduce the risk.
The waiver will not affect the rights and welfare of the subjects. The voluntary nature of the study is emphasized to sample members. Public-use and restricted-use data are only used for research purposes and lack direct individually-identifying information. The data are further protected through disclosure avoidance procedures approved by the NCES Disclosure Review Board.
Whenever appropriate, subjects will be provided with additional pertinent information after they have participated. For each round of the study, information about prior rounds and the nature of the study is made available to sample members.
The study cannot be conducted practicably without the waiver. To obtain written consent from sample members, multiple forms would have to be sent to the sample members with multiple follow-up telephone and in-person visits. This process would add weeks to the data collection process and is not feasible from a time standpoint. Additionally, the value of these data would be jeopardized from a nonresponse bias perspective.

Sensitive Questions

The B&B:08/18 interview collects information about earnings, assets, and demographic characteristics such as sexual orientation, gender identity, and marital and family status. Regulations governing the administration of these questions require (a) clear documentation of the need for such information as it relates to the primary purpose of the study, (b) provisions to clearly inform sample members of the voluntary nature of participation in the study, and (c) assurances that their responses will be protected according to relevant confidentiality laws.

The collection of data related to income, earnings, assets, indebtedness, and long-range employment outcomes is central to understanding key policy issues driving this study. Financial assets and obligations are important post-graduate outcomes and are important indicators of the rate of return on educational investments. The collection of information about marital and family status likewise facilitates the exploration of key policy issues. Financial and family-related obligations also influence decisions about employment, additional education, and loan repayment so it is important to collect information about marital status and dependents. The addition of gender identity and sexual orientation questions allow for additional demographic covariates in analyses of education and employment outcomes. Several procedures have been implemented (see section A.10) to provide assurances to sample members about the voluntary nature of their participation in the study as well as the confidentiality provisions for survey responses.

Social Security Numbers (SSNs) were collected in prior rounds, and will be used in B&B:08/18 to 1) conduct file matches to administrative records and 2) maintain the sample for the B&B longitudinal study. File matching to administrative records is a crucial element of the B&B study and would not be possible without the collection of SSNs. Data obtained from file matching will both minimize respondent burden and increase data quality.

Estimates of Response Burden

Table 3 provides the projected estimates for response burden and costs for the B&B:08/18 full-scale study, based on experiences from prior rounds of NPSAS and B&B. Prior to the full-scale study, panel maintenance will be conducted, which was approved in the request for field test data collection (1850-0729 v. 11-12). The panel maintenance address update will take on average about 3 minutes to complete. The estimated duration of the full-scale survey varies by type of instrument: 35 minutes for the full interview, 15 minutes for the abbreviated, and 5 minutes for the mini survey. All respondents will be asked to upload a résumé, which will take about 5 minutes for the upload process (see section A.2.c of this document and Part B for a description of the full-scale design). Estimating an average hourly rate of $30.75² for participating sample members, the 7,202 total burden hours translate to a respondent burden time cost of approximately $221,462.

Table 3. Maximum estimated burden to respondents in B&B:08/18

Data collection activity	Sample	Expected response rate (percent)	Expected number of respondents	Expected number of responses	Average time burden per response(minutes)	Total time burden (hours)
Address update	17,040	15	2,556*	2,556	3	128
Full interview, no résumé	17,040	49	8,350	8,350	35	4,871
Full interview, with résumé	17,040	16	2,726	2,726	40	1,818
Abbreviated interview, no résumé	17,040	5	852	852	15	213
Abbreviated interview, with résumé	17,040	2	341	341	20	114
Mini interview, no résumé	17,040	2	341	341	5	29
Mini interview, with résumé	17,040	1	170	170	10	29
Full-scale total	17,040	75	12,780	15,336	--	7,202

* Duplicative counts of individuals, not included in respondent totals.

Estimates of Cost

Respondents will incur no costs associated with participation in this study beyond the response burden time cost.

Costs to Federal Government

A summary of estimated costs to the federal government for B&B:08/18 are shown in table 4. Cost estimates include staff time, reproduction, postage, and telephone costs associated with the management, data collection, analysis, and reporting for which clearance is requested (costs shown are for the entire field test and full-scale data collections). Table 5 provides a more detailed breakdown of contract costs.

Table 4. Costs to NCES for the B&B:08/18 field test and full-scale

B&B:08/18 implementations	Costs to NCES
Field test
NCES Salaries and expenses	$110,000
Contract costs	$1,817,463
Total	$1,927,463

Full-scale study
NCES Salaries and expenses	$330,000
Contract costs	$4,970,414
Total	$5,300,414

NOTE: Costs presented here do not include base fee.

Table 5. Contract costs for B&B:08/18

Study area and task		Budgeted amount
110	Initial meeting	$18,379
120	Schedules	22,886
130	Project management	185,582
140	Study monitoring plan	283,531
150	Technical review panels (TRPs)	390,807
Field test data collection
310	Sampling	63,766
320	OMB forms clearance	48,308
321	Instrument development	709,794
322	Training	150,345
323	Tracing	29,219
324	Interview data collection	242,476
325	Interview data processing	273,030
333	NSLDS file merge	9,597
334	Other systems file merge	73,961
335	Develop data collection materials	72,613
340	Methodology memorandum	144,354
Full-scale data collection
410	Sampling	59,231
420	OMB forms clearance	53,327
421	Instrument development	682,281
422	Training	167,410
423	Tracing	109,503
424	Data collection	965,909
425	Interview data processing	885,623
433	NSLDS file merge	22,917
434	Other systems file merge	128,779
435	Develop data collection materials	45,233
436	Weighting, imputation, and nonresponse bias analysis	208,398
437	Data disclosure	24,231
Reporting
511	Report prospectus	52,368
512	Draft manuscript	242,116
513	Review-quality manuscript	145,151
514	Public-ready manuscript	80,676
515	Respond to professional judgment	20,451
520	Datalab/WebVTS tools	116,729
530	Restricted-use data files	58,896
Total		$6,787,877

Reasons for Changes in Response Burden and Costs

The apparent increase in respondent burden is because the previous approval was for the B&B:08/18 field test, while this request is for the B&B:08/18 full-scale recruitment and data collection.

Publication Plans and Time Schedule

The operational schedule for the B&B:08/18 full-scale study is shown in table 6. The contract for B&B:08/18 requires multiple reports, publications, and other public information releases, as follows:

Descriptive summaries of significant findings for dissemination to a broad audience (including First Look reports);
Detailed data file documentation describing all aspects of the full-scale study design and data collection procedures, including an appendix summarizing the methodological findings from the field test;
Complete data files and documentation for research data users in the form of both a restricted-use file; QuickStats, a public-use data analysis system in which users create their own tables and charts using pre-defined categories from a subset of variables; and PowerStats, which allows users to create their own tables and charts using all of the variables, in addition to conducting regression analysis, and is the basis for TrendStats, which allows users to analyze data across B&B administrations with optional automatic inflation adjustments for dollar values; and
Special tabulations of issues of interest to the higher education community, as determined by NCES.

Table 6. Operational schedule for B&B:08/18

B&B:08/18 activity	Start date	End date
Full-scale study
Select sample	December 19, 2017	February 28, 2018
Address update	March 1, 2018	July 12, 2018
Self-administered web-based data collection	July 12, 2018	March 25, 2019
Conduct telephone interviews	August 2, 2018	March 25, 2019
Process data, construct data files	July 12, 2018	September 25, 2019
Prepare/update reports	January 22, 2019	November 9, 2020

Approval to Not Display Expiration Date for OMB Approval

The expiration date for OMB approval of the information collection will be displayed on data collection instruments and materials. No special exception is being requested.

Exceptions to Certification for Paperwork Reduction Act Submissions

There are no exceptions to the certification statement identified in the Certification for Paperwork Reduction Act Submissions of OMB Form 83-I.

1 See the Supporting Statements Part B for the NPSAS:08 Full Scale (OMB#1850-0666), the B&B:08/09 full-scale collection (OMB# 1850-0729, v. 2), and the B&B:08/12 full-scale collection (OMB# 1850-0729; v. 7-10). Related studies include the B&B:16/17 full-scale collection (OMB# 1850-0926, v. 3), and the Beginning Postsecondary Student Longitudinal Study (BPS:12/17) full-scale collection (OMB# 1850-0631, v.10).

2 The estimated average was calculated from an estimated hourly rate of $30.75, based on the median earnings of bachelor’s degree recipients, age 25 years and older ($64,000 per year; Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor (2016). Labor Force Statistics from the Current Population Survey (www.bls.gov/cps/)).

File Type	application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document
File Title	Chapter 2
Author	spowell
File Modified	0000-00-00
File Created	2021-01-21