Request For Comments on New Time Burden Estimates for Completing IPEDS

How Many Hours Does It Take to Complete IPEDS Surveys?
NCES Seeks Comments on New Time Burden Estimates for IPEDS Reporting.

The Federal Government requires each Federal agency to estimate the burden associated with every Federal data collection. In 2007, the National Center of Education Statistics (NCES) received comments from the postsecondary education community expressing concerns that the time-burden estimates on record for IPEDS reporting did not accurately reflect the time that institutions spend “reviewing instructions, searching data sources, completing and reviewing their responses, and transmitting” the data to NCES. To address these concerns, NCES commissioned an internal study, which confirmed that among the handful of institutions contacted, the completion of IPEDS required considerably more time than NCES estimated. At the same time, through the Higher Education Opportunity Act of 2008, Congress directed the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to conduct a study that examined the NCES burden estimates (see http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d10871.pdf). That study also found that NCES was significantly understating the reporting time for the IPEDS data collection.

Based on the results of both its own study and the GAO study, NCES is proposing new estimates and seeks comments from the community as to their accuracy. Institutions responding to the NCES study indicated that it took between 60 and 160 hours to complete IPEDS in 2008-09. Institutions contacted by the GAO for its study estimated between 12 and 590 hours for 2009-10. Previous NCES estimates, which averaged to only about 28 hours per institution, were based on the time required to complete different versions forms for each component. The GAO report suggested that NCES instead consider basing estimates on institutional characteristics and IPEDS keyholder experience, as these have significant impact on variations in time burden.

Based on the GAO recommendations, NCES has developed new time burden estimates that take into account the type of institutions (4-year, 2-year, and less-than-2-year) as well as keyholder experience. Recognizing that there will still be great variability in the time required to complete IPEDS by different institutions and keyholders, and that as the GAO noted, “estimates are not precise,” NCES estimates that the time required to complete the IPEDS survey components annually ranges from 57 hours for a returning keyholder at a less than 2-year institution to 206 hours for a new keyholder at a 4-year institution. Detailed estimates are outlined on the following page. NCES encourages comments from IPEDS keyholders, and others who assist in reporting IPEDS data, based on their experiences submitting IPEDS data to NCES. The time to complete IPEDS should reflect the time that institutions spend reviewing instructions, searching data sources, completing and reviewing their responses, and transmitting the data to NCES. To submit comments, send an email with the subject line “IPEDS BURDEN” to Elise.Miller@ed.gov by October 1, 2010. Please include your type of institution and years of experience as a keyholder in your comments.