Study Information
High school transcript studies have been conducted by NCES as part of the Longitudinal Studies Program and the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) High School Transcript Studies (HSTS) program since 1982. Each transcript study is associated with a major NCES data collection. The first NCES sponsored transcript study was associated with the High School and Beyond's (HS&B) first follow-up survey in 1982. Additional longitudinal studies beginning in 1988, 2002, and 2009 also collected transcripts after the end of high school. The National Educational Longitudinal Study (NELS:88) 1992 second follow-up was associated with the 1992 transcript collection. A third transcript study associated with the longitudinal study series was conducted for the Educational Longitudinal Study (ELS:2002) in 2004/05. The High School Longitudinal Study of 2009 (HSLS:09) conducted a high school transcript study in 2013. The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), an ongoing, cross-sectional assessment of student performance, has collected transcript data in 1987, 1990, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2005, 2009, and 2019.
What is Collected?
NCES high school transcript studies collect information that is contained on the student high school record—i.e., courses taken while attending secondary school; information on credits earned; year and term a specific course was taken; and, final grades. When available, information on class rank and standardized scores is also collected. Once collected, information (e.g., course name, credits earned, course grades) is transcribed and standardized (e.g., credits and credit hours standardized to a common metric) and can be linked back to the student's questionnaire or assessment data.
Purpose of Collecting Transcript Data
Transcripts include information that is considered to be the official and fixed record regarding student coursetaking behavior. It is considered to be more accurate than student self-report information and represents a record of courses taken by the student. This information can be used to examine coursetaking patterns of students and to predict future education outcomes.
Data
High School Transcript Collections and Associated NCES Data Collection
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NCES releases data to the public for statistical purposes only. Every effort is made to provide the maximum research information that is consistent with reasonable confidentiality protections. Record matching to identify individual respondents or deductive disclosure by any user is prohibited.
Transcript data is available only as restricted-use data because of the sensitivity of the data. Restricted-use files, which include all reported data, are released only to researchers licensed by NCES. (For information on obtaining a restricted-data user’s license, see the website http://nces.ed.gov/statprog/confid5.asp). NCES will review the submitted documents for content and completeness and inform the requestor whether a license to use the restricted data is approved.
Classification of Secondary School Courses (CSSC)
The Classification of Secondary School Courses (CSSC), based on the 2000 HSTS, provides a general inventory of courses taught nationwide at the secondary school level (grades 9 through 12). The basic unit of instruction in the CSSC is the individual COURSE. Vocational, academic, and general courses are offered for credit and included in this listing.
The (CSSC) was designed to describe course offerings in secondary education and to provide a coherent means for classifying these courses. It was developed in response to a need for a classification system that addressed course-level data and focused on secondary school curricula. This provides school administrators, state and local education planners, and research scientists a resource to convert course offerings, information from transcripts, master teaching schedules, and other sources into formats appropriate for analysis and practical application. NCES uses the CSSC to classify courses transcribed from the high school transcript.
A six-digit numerical code is used to identify each course within a program area:
- the first two digits identify the main program area;
- the second set of two digits represents a sub-category of courses within the main program area.
- the remaining two digits are associated with the specific courses within each of the main and sub-categories.
For example, the 6-digit code (270404), which represents Algebra in a Mathematics program, can be viewed as follows:
| 27____ | defines the main program of Mathematics. |
| 2704__ | defines the main program of Mathematics and the sub-grouping of courses related to Pure Mathematics. |
| 270404 | defines the main program as Mathematics, the sub-grouping of courses in Pure Mathematics, with a specific course in Algebra 1. |
Course Codes
Reference the following for information on course codes 1 -52.