Student Achievement Definitions

Cohort. The results generated on these pages are based on groups of students called a COHORT. A cohort is all students who enrolled in a summer or fall quarter in a certain year.

First-Time Freshmen (FTF) Cohort. Students who enrolled for the First Time in their college career with 12 units or more. These student will have enrolled in the fall quarter of a specific year.

New Transfers (NTR) Cohort. Students who started college elsewhere and have subsequently transferred to CalPoly.

Ethnic Origin or Federal Ethnicity. This is the self reported ethnicity as checked on the CSU application. The grouping of students into the nine ethnic groups used by Cal Poly's Institutional Research is based on the Federal standards defined by the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System as part of the National Center for Education Statistics.

Graduate Students are defined as only those students who are pursuing master's degree.

Post Baccalaureate are defined as those student who have a bachelor's degree but are NOT seeking a Master's Degree.

WASC is the acronym for the Western Association of Schools and Colleges, one of six regional organizations that the federal government has authorized to accredit institutions of higher learning.

Additional details for WASC and Cal Poly can be found at: https://wasc.calpoly.edu/