Glossary of Terms

A unit of measure applicable to an academic year and typically derived from attempted credit hours in Term Section. SUNY obtains these student credit hours from the SIRIS TERM SECTION submission. Currently, the standard AAFTE calculations used by System Administration refer to state-supported AAFTE and are based on activity reported in SIRIS to be state-supported.

Generally speaking, one AAFTE workload is equivalent to 30 student credit hours in undergraduate courses or 24 student credit hours in graduate courses.

In addition to teaching/instruction, faculty are expected to fulfill responsibilities in the areas of instructional related activities (e.g. advisement), institutional/departmental service, research/scholarly related activity, administrative assignments, and public service activities. Faculty teaching workload (number of courses or credit hours) may be adjusted due to additional responsibilities according to the Assigned Time Guidelines.

Categories of Assigned Time include:

• Administration—Department/Program
• Administration—Institutional
• Coordination: Regular
• Coordination: Specific
• Large Group Instruction Other/Lab
• Scholarly Activity—Funded
• Scholarly Activity—Unfunded

A group of students tracked longitudinally to assess traditional academic outcomes. For example, an entering cohort is typically tracked to establish retention and graduation rates. Common defining characteristics of a cohort may include first-time or transfer status, full or part-time status, race/ethnicity, gender, entering student SAT scores or GPAs, and EOP status.

The Common Data Set consists of the following sections:

• General information
• Enrollment and persistence
• First-time, first-year (freshman) admission
• Transfer admission
• Academic offerings and policies
• Student life
• Annual expenses
• Financial aid
• Instructional faculty and class size
• Disciplinary areas of degrees conferred

CUPA-HR collects data on salaries for administrators, faculty, professionals and staff, as well as on healthcare and other benefits. SUNY Oswego participates by providing its institution's data for the Faculty in Higher Education Survey.

Extra service is defined as work by a full-time state employee in a state payroll agency other than the one to which the employee is regularly assigned. Extra service may not interfere with the employee's regularly assigned duties. Extra service may only be paid after the service has been rendered.

The Faculty Survey of Student Engagement (FSSE) was designed to complement the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE), which is administered to undergraduate students. FSSE measures instructional staff expectations for student engagement in educational practices that are empirically linked with student learning and development. Learn more about FSSE.

For use in the Campus Profile, Faculty FTE is calculated as follows:

• Add together the FTE of department faculty
• Subtract assigned time hours divided by 12
• Add number of extra service courses x 0.13

A unit of measure applicable to a semester and typically derived from student credit hours.

• UG FTE: UG state-supported credit hours/15
• Graduate FTE: Grad state-supported credit hours/12

• Full-time undergraduate - enrolled for 12 or more credit hours
• Full-time graduate - enrolled for 9 or more credit hours

The percentage of students from an entering cohort who graduate within a specific time frame at the reporting institution.

A system of interrelated surveys conducted annually by the U.S. Department’s National Center for Education Statistics (NCES).

A national database that lenders, loan service providers, guaranty agencies, schools, and students can access to verify student enrollment and degree information.

The National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) collects information from first-year and senior students about the characteristics and quality of their undergraduate experience. Learn more about NSSE.

The percentage of students from an entering cohort who continue to be enrolled at a specific point in time at the reporting institution.

First administered in academic year 2016-17, this is a campus climate assessment mandated by SUNY Board of Trustees resolution.

A national project established to allow post-secondary institutions to more fully account for the outcomes achieved by all incoming students. Learn more about SAM.

The online report form is organized in terms of strategic directions and allows discussion of performance drivers and indicators for each impact by various units.