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Glossary

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A
Academic Rank (General): A state-wide categorization of faculty positions. Categories include Professor, Associate Professor, Assistant Professor, and Instructor.
Academic Year (General): The standard academic year for higher education in the state of Florida is summer term, fall term, and spring term of the next year. However, to accommodate outside agency requirements such as NCAA and IPEDS, the academic year for degreed students in the Department of Education Retention System files is defined as fall term, spring term of the following year and summer term of the following year. Enrolled and retained numbers adhere to the more standard DOE methodology.
Administrative and Professional(A&P) (General): Middle and upper level administrative and professional positions in DCU.
Advanced Graduate (General): A graduate student who has been formally admitted to a recognized Doctoral or Post-Master's degree program who has accumulated 36 or more semester credit hours toward his or her degree program or has a Master's degree.
Annual Unduplicated Headcount (General): The absolute number of individual students enrolled over a given academic year.
Attrition (Retention): Used in a retention context to describe those students who leave without graduating and do not return during the length of the retention study. The USF Retention Reporting System tracks students for 10 academic years.
Auxiliary Enterprise (General): A budget entity which is comprised of ancillary support units on each university campus. The major activities are student housing, food service, bookstores, central stores, facilities maintenance, and computer support.
B
Beginning Graduate (General): A graduate student who has been formally admitted to a graduate program but who is not an advanced graduate student.
Board of Education Retention Files (Retention): Series of files built by the Office of Information Resource Management, Division of Colleges and Universities of the Board of Education. These files include student graduation and retention data for all the SUS universities. The USF Retention Reporting System is built from these files and further augmented by pertinent institutional data from internal files.
Budget Entity (General): The lowest unit to which funds are specifically appropriated in the appropriations act.
Building Square Footage (General): Square footage in buildings is categorized as Gross or Net. Gross square footage is the sum of all areas on all floors of the structure. Net is gross, less all structural areas. Net is further characterized as Assignable or Non-Assignable. Assignable square footage includes all areas that can be used by occupants to carry out their functions. Remaining areas, those that are not suitable for occupants, like mechanical areas, are called non-assignable.
C
Campus (Retention): Selection is based on the campus where the student took the most credit hours during the initial academic year. Tampa must have the most credit hours for it to be assigned. Otherwise, in the case of equal credit hours on multiple campuses, assignment is by descending order of enrollment as follows: St. Petersburg, Sarasota, Lakeland, Port Authority, Off Campus. Ft. Myers and New College students are excluded from the Retention Reporting System.
CIP (Classification of Instructional Programs) Discipline Codes (General): These codes represent a nationally used, common taxonomy for the classification of higher education discipline/degree programs.
Cohort (Retention): The type of undergraduate student at the time of application. The four cohort types are First-Time-In-College (FTIC), Florida Community College Transfer with an AA Degree, Florida Community College Transfer without an AA Degree, and Other Undergraduate Transfer. All students considered non-degree seeking are excluded.
Common Data Set (CDS) (Retention): The CDS is a set of standards and definitions of data items that is the result of a collaborative effort among data providers in the higher education community and publishers as represented by the College Board, Peterson's-Tomson Learning, U.S. News & World Report, and the Wintergreen/Orchard House. Additionally, data items and definitions used by the U.S. Department of Education in its higher education surveys often serve as a guide in the continued development of the CDS.
Contracts and Grants (C&G) Budget (General): A budget entity which contains activities in support of research, public service, and training. These activities are funded with awards from federal, state, local, and private sources.
D
DCU (General): Division of Colleges and Universities within the Florida Department of Education.
Degree-Seeking Student (General): A student formally admitted to the University and pursuing a degree.
Degreed (Retention): Obtained a Bachelor's degree, or equivalent in the fall term, spring term of the following year or summer term of the following year in a given academic year.
Departmental Account (General): The lowest level of accumulation for preparation of the university's Operating Budget such as President's Office, University Controller's Office, Department of Chemistry, etc.
E
Educational and General (E&G) Budget (General): A budget entity that contains resources that provide educational opportunities to the citizens of Florida through instructional programs leading to formal degrees at the baccalaureate, masters, and doctoral levels; research directed toward solving technical, social and economic problems facing the state and nation; and public service programs which apply the expertise of university personnel in solving public problems.
Enrolled (Retention): Attended at least one summer, fall, or spring of the following year term. Enrolled for a given academic year includes those who were degreed during that period.
Enrollment Benchmarks (General): Mandated dates during each academic term at which a copy of the Student Data Course File is submitted to the DCU. At each of these points, enrollment reports are created for internal management information purposes. Currently, benchmarks are Drop/Add (five days into the term), Preliminary (approximately 8 weeks into the term), and Final (approx. 7 weeks after the end of the term).
Expenditure Analysis (General): A document which reports the actual expenditures (fiscal and personnel) for the fiscal year ending the previous June 30 and includes total expenditures from all sources and distinguishes costs for master's and doctoral programs as well as direct, indirect, and full cost data.
F
Faculty (General): A person appointed to a position defined by the Florida Department of Education Personnel Classification system as in the faculty pay plan. Categories include Professor, Associate Professor, Assistant Professor, and Instructor, as well as non-instructional staff such as Counselor/ Advisors, and Librarians.
Faculty Rank (General): A state wide categorization of faculty positions. Categories include Professor, Associate Professor, Assistant Professor, and Instructor.
First Professional Student (General): At USF, a student working toward a M.D.; also refers to students of Law, Pharmacy, etc.
Fiscal Year (General): A 12-month period beginning July 1 and ending June 30.
Florida Community College Transfer with an AA (Retention): Transfer who graduated from an approved Florida Community College with an AA or AS degree.
Florida Community College Transfer without an AA (Retention): Transfer whose last institution attended was an approved Florida Community College.
FTIC (Retention): First-Time-In-College has less than 12 hours of transfer credit earned after high school enrollment. The FTIC cohort also includes Early Admits, those students admitted prior to high school graduation.
Full-Time Equivalent (FTE) Employee (General): A numerical designator for an appointment based on 100% for full time (40 hours). An FTE for a full-time employee is 1.00. A part-time employee FTE is calculated based on the proportion of number of weekly hours worked to 40.
Full-Time Equivalent (FTE) Student (General): A measure of student enrollment, normally annualized, based on the number of student credit hours for which students enroll. Full-Time undergraduate is 15 hours (Fall and Spring Terms), 10 hours (Summer Term). Full-Time graduate is 12 hours (Fall and Spring Terms), 8 hours (Summer Term).
Full-Time Student (General): An undergraduate enrolled for 12 or more semester credit hours in a term; a graduate student enrolled for 9 or more semester credit hours in a term.
Full-Time Student (Retention): Student taking 12 or more credit hours in any term of their initial academic year.
Fundable Student Credit Hours (SCH) (General): Those student credit hours for which the university receives funding from the state.
G
Graduate Fee Waivers (General): Graduate assistant fee waivers are used to fund graduate and fellowship fee waivers granted by the universities. The graduate assistant fee waivers are provided to students based on graduate credit hours taken and the number of hours worked.
Gross Student Credit hours (SCH) (General): Total student credit hours, regardless of funding source.
L
Level of Student (General): The student's level of progress toward a degree. Freshmen and Sophomore students are categorized in the Lower Level; Junior and Senior students are categorized in the Upper Level; Graduate students are categorized in the Graduate Level.
Lower Division Student (General): A student who has earned less than sixty semester credit hours.
M
Major Field of Study (General): Students are classified as majors according to their selection of a primary field of study. This field must be selected for state approved programs and university approved majors within each degree program.
N
Non-Degree Seeking (General): See Unclassified Student.
Non-Tenure Earning (General): Non-tenured faculty whose position does not provide for the possibility of attaining tenure.
O
Operating Budget (General): An expenditure plan developed for each fiscal year. The plan must conform to the annual allocation/appropriation and list estimated expenditures by budget category for the year.
Other Personal Services (OPS) (General): Persons paid from OPS are performing temporary work of some nature. There is no continuing obligation on the part of the University toward OPS appointments.
Other Undergraduate Transfer (Retention): Transfer student not from a Florida Community College.
Out-of-State Fee Waivers (General): Appropriations by the Legislature are used to fund out-of-state fee waivers granted by the universities. The funds support undergraduate students, graduate assistants, and fellowships. The out-of-state fee waivers are provided to students based on credit hours taken and the number of hours worked.
P
Part-time Student (General): A graduate student enrolled for less than 9 semester credit hours in a term, or an undergraduate student enrolled for less than 12 semester credit hours in a term.
Part-Time Student (Retention): Student taking less than 12 credit hours in the fall term of their initial academic year.
Persist (Retention): See 'Retained'
Person Years (General): A budgeting term calculated and based on a position budgeted for twelve months of activity and a full-time portion of effort (weeks budgeted multiplied by FTE, divided by the actual number of weeks in the fiscal year (52.2).
Preliminary Headcount Enrollment (General): The enrollment taken from the official data files of the University, as submitted to the DCU, approximately eight weeks after the beginning of each term.
R
Retained (Retention): Includes those enrolled in a given academic year plus the cumulative degree number as of the previous academic year, if applicable.
S
SACS (General): Southern Association of Colleges and Schools
Service Area (General): Ten county area designated by the Board of Regents as the portion of the state to which the university provides academic services. [Note: USF forfeited 5 counties to FGCU in 1997.]
Stop Out (Retention): See 'Attrition'
Student (General): A person who is entered into a relationship with the University in an officially recognized capacity. An active student is one who is eligible for registration or currently enrolled.
Student Data Course File (SDCF) (General): DCU computer file containing enrollment data for every student registered during a term.
Student Headcount Enrollment (General): The absolute number of individual students enrolled at a specified time.
Student Level (General): Classification of students based on number of semester hours earned.
Student Right-to-Know (Retention): By law (Public Law 101-542, federal Student Right-to-Know and Campus Security Act), graduation rates are measured by the percentage of previously enrolled students who graduate from an institution within 150% of the normal time for completion.
SUS (General): State University System of Florida
T
Tenure (General): The condition attained by a faculty member through scholarly activities which assures the faculty member security of employment and immunity from reprisals or threats due to an intellectual position or belief which may be unpopular, and which guarantees annual reappointment for that faculty member until voluntary resignation, retirement, or removal for adequate cause.
U
Unclassified Student (General): A student who is not formally admitted to a degree program, and, thus, not degree-seeking.
Undeclared Student (General): A degree-seeking student who has neither declared a major nor been admitted to a limited access program.
Unduplicated Headcount (General): Headcount which includes only one count for each student who is simultaneously enrolled in courses on any two or more campuses. Total University headcount is unduplicated; headcount by campus is duplicated.
University Support Personnel System (USPS) (General): A state pay plan and personnel system for support personnel (excluding A&P and Faculty) within the State University System of Florida.
Upper Division Student (General): A student who has earned 60 or more semester credit hours or has a Associate of Arts degree or is working toward an additional Baccalaureate degree

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