Local schools on new online database

Three Luzerne County schools are included in an online national database of private colleges and universities which was launched on Wednesday.

The University and College Accountability Network (U-CAN) was designed and is run by the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities to provide free, accessible, and easy-to-understand information on nearly 600 private higher educational institutions to prospective students and their parents.

King’s College and Wilkes and Misericordia universities are part of the network.

U-CAN users may search for institutions based on city, state, size, distance from home, affiliation, programs offered, degree offerings and Carnegie classification.

Each college and university profile features a common data set with 47 elements including admissions, enrollment, academics, student demographics, graduation rates, most common fields of study, transfer of credit policy, accreditation, faculty information, class size, tuition and fee trends, price of attendance, financial aid, campus housing, student life, and campus safety.

To test U-CAN before its inception, focus groups were held in four cities throughout the country. Prospective students and their parents gave their opinions on the database.

Misericordia University President Michael A. MacDowell said Misericordia was one of the first institutions to sign on for U-CAN. He feels the database gives a preliminary overview of the characteristics of an institution and provides an excellent place to start a college search.

“It gets people asking questions which is a very, very good thing,” MacDowell said. “It makes them wiser consumers of college degrees.”

MacDowell thinks U-CAN provides a good summary of Misericordia; however, all of the information can be found on the university Web site. He also feels the database will let the public know institutions have nothing to hide.