Frequently Asked Questions
Q: I have my EPI report for two different years and despite the fact that I made no changes to the site during the time between the reports, my EPI score changed. How is that possible?
A: The point value for each individual EPI criteria is recalculated every year. To keep the research reflective of the way in which prospective students are using sites in any given year, we assign stronger points to features the research reveals students are using to distinguish strong sites from ones they perceive as weaker or less useful.
For example, the value of virtual diaries or blogs of current students has more than doubled in value from 1.72 points in 2006 to 4.08 in 2011. When determining if the site meets their needs, learning about the current students virtually has become increasingly important to prospective students. On the other hand, the campus visit scheduler tool has decreased in value from 5.89 points in 2007 to 2.14 in 2011. This feature has not become less important, but because it has become standard on the vast majority of sites, it does not serve to differentiate one site from another to as great of an extent.
Over the years, a website that has an online campus visit scheduler, but no blogs of current students, would see its point score decrease as the campus visit scheduler becomes standard and thus worth fewer points. Adversely, as virtual diaries or blogs of current students become more important but not yet standard, they are worth more points. So, even if no change was made to either feature, the overall score of the admissions website would change.
Q: You say that my site may have been evaluated by as few as four raters. How can that be a valid evaluation as the sample is so small and I don't even know if the students who evaluated my site would match my target audience?
A: The student evaluators who rate each of the nearly 3,000 sites are not designed to serve as an opinion panel that will represent all students. They are researchers who are attempting to answer basic Yes/No questions about your site. For example: "Is there an admissions office email address provided?" Multiple raters are used to ensure accuracy. Since these students do not offer subjective opinions and are highly trained, their individual academic and demographic characteristics have little or no effect on the research results.
Your assurance in the validity of the research lies in the fact that a statistically valid sample of over 1,000 students completed an online rating of the quality of a sample of 50 randomly selected admissions sites. The EPI formula represents the relative value of each characteristic as it relates to the subjective ratings of these students and therefore is a highly valid measure of how potential students would perceive your site.
Q: I had a professional website design firm create my site and yet it got a score that is below average. What makes you think that your evaluation is better than my design firm?
A: NRCCUA®’s research methodology pinpoints issues critical to prospective students who are currently using admissions websites to make college choice decisions. The EPI report tells you what specific admissions website criteria these students want, not what design looks appealing or what approach has worked well in other industries. Your website design firm most likely has very talented graphic designers and technical experts. However, it would have been impractical and extremely expensive for them to conduct the depth of research performed as part of the EPI project. As a result, they were working with incomplete information.
Help your design firm to maximize their expertise by providing them with the checklist of functional features provided in the EPI formula. Then they can use their design and programming capabilities to tie the features together in an attractive site that integrates with other institutional needs and branding standards.
Q: My EPI report from 2011 says that I have a website grade of "A" and a ranking in the top 100. As that is in the top 5% of all sites rated, I think I’m doing fine. Is that right?
A: No. The grading system in the 2011 report is designed to show how you compare with others, but it is important to note that no institution has a perfectly functional site. In fact, the grades were curved to provide a tool for comparison. Many schools, like yours, will use the insight provided by the 2011 EPI report to improve their sites. If you plan to keep in pace with other admissions sites, you will need to continue to search for ways to improve your site each year.
In addition, NRCCUA adjusts the EPI formula each year to reflect the most important admissions website functions. If your site scored less than a 100, the items you are missing may increase in value, causing your website rating to drop. With the Internet being such an integral part of today's admissions process, it is crucial to your admissions process that your site be constantly monitored and upgraded.
Q: My EPI report from 2011 indicates that our site received partial or no credit for some features that are present on our site. Why would we not get full credit for a feature if it definitely is available to students using our site?
A: The student evaluators who rate each of the nearly 3,000 sites are trained to search for specific features and functions. However, they are not given an unlimited amount of time on each site. Other researchers have demonstrated that students who are using websites to gather information will only search for the information for a short period of time before giving up and abandoning the site. EPI evaluators are encouraged to spend between four and six minutes on each site. If the specific feature or function is not located within that time window, it is assumed that it is not available.
Due to the training given these student evaluators and their experience in searching for information on college websites, we believe that they are even more likely to find a feature or function than the general population of students. As a result, if two or more student evaluators were unable to find something, for practical purposes, the site is not providing the desired value and receives a score that is less than the total number possible for the specific item being rated.