Research

The Department of Research & Government Relations was established to acknowledge the need for the tracking and analysis of trends in higher education and the Federal Family Education Loan Program (FFELP) student aid program. The department functions to provide statistical information and comparative data on postsecondary access and completion and evaluates research on environmental factors that affect higher education in New Hampshire.

Department staff are members of the New Hampshire Partnership for the Advancement of Postsecondary Education Research (NH PAPER), an informal collaborative that meets monthly to work on projects and host a series of guest speakers. NH PAPER's signature project is "Measuring Aspirations and Participation: New Hampshire High School Senior Survey", an annual survey of the state's graduating high school seniors which examines those students' career and educational aspirations and satisfaction with their high school experiences. The NHHEAF Network Organizations provide funding and administrative support for the project.

The "Measuring Aspirations and Participation" reports can be found on NH PAPER's Web site, http://www.nhpaper.org. The site was designed to help educators, researchers, policymakers and members of the media locate higher education research and demographic information specific to New Hampshire.