Classification of Instructional Programs (CIP)

Last Updated: 04/06/2024

Overview

Credential providers across the United States offer more than one million programs of study (Credential Engine). The U.S. Department of Education, which collects and reports data about many of these programs of study, developed a classification of instructional programs (CIP) in order to:

Map programs of study to develop a shared understanding of what a given program of study includes.
Collect data from schools on programs of study offered.
Create reports on educational trends for use by government and the public.

The CIP is the accepted federal government standard on instructional program classifications and is used in a variety of education information surveys and databases. The CIP is not intended to be a regulatory device.

The CIP provides a taxonomic scheme (some 60 fields of study) that supports the tracking and reporting of fields of study and program completions activity. The CIP’s list of programs is broken into categories and each program has a name and individual code. CIP codes, for the most part, are not intended to correspond exclusively to any specific academic degree or instructional program level. In most cases, any given instructional program may be offered at various levels, and CIP codes are intended to capture all such data.

The majority of CIP titles correspond to academic and occupational instructional programs offered for credit at the postsecondary level. These programs result in recognized completion points and awards, including degrees, certificates, and other formal awards.

The CIP also includes other types of instructional programs, such as residency programs in various health professions that may lead to advanced professional certification; personal improvement and leisure programs; and programs taught in schools of continuing education and professional development. The majority of these programs are non-credit and include the following in their description: “This CIP code is not valid for IPEDS reporting.” Though these programs may not be offered for credit, they represent an increasing portion of all programs of study important to track through in-house data systems. NCES intends to continue to include them in CIP.

Instructional programs included in the CIP must meet the following operational criteria:

An instructional program must be offered by, through, or under the auspices of a Title IV postsecondary education institution or other recognized provider.
To qualify under Title IV, the institution must be licensed or otherwise legally authorized to operate in the state in which it is physically located, accredited or pre-accredited by an agency recognized for that purpose by the Department of Education and certified by the Department of Education as eligible to participate in Title IV.
The program must consist of more than one isolated course or learning experience and cannot be a haphazard collection of unrelated courses or experiences.
There must be a set of structured learning experiences, defined by an institution or other provider, leading to a completion point that is formally certified by a degree, another formal award, or some other form of recognition.
The following programs are not included in the CIP:
- In-house, professional, or on-the-job training activities that are not recognized by an educational institution or provider and that do not lead to any kind of formal award, credit, or certification.
- Subject matter specializations or individual courses within a program that are not treated as a major and are generally not recognized by the education institution as a formal program offering.

The CIP is the accepted federal government standard on instructional program classifications and is used in a variety of education information surveys and databases.

CIP'S Development, Management, Use

A unit within the U.S. Department of Education —the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) — manages both the CIP and the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS). IPEDS is a database that collects, codes and tracks degree and certificate completions on postsecondary programs of study.

CIP was originally developed by NCES in 1980, with revisions occurring in 1985, 1990, 2000, 2010, and 2020. During NCES updates, the CIP adds, removes, and revises programs in order to reflect changing fields of study. NCES last updated the CIP in 2020 (Version #6). In 2022, the Department of Homeland Security added 22 CIP codes to the DHS STEM Designated Degree Program List. The next update is expected in 2030.

Since first published in 1980, the CIP has been used by a range of agencies and institutions in addition to NCES, to include the Office for Civil Rights (OCR), the Office of Career, Technical and Adult Education (OCTAE), and the Office of Special Education (OSE), and serves as the standard on instructional programs for other federal agencies, including the National Science Foundation (NSF), the Department of Commerce (Bureau of the Census), the Department of Labor (Bureau of Labor Statistics), Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and others. The CIP is used by state agencies, national associations, academic institutions, and employment counseling services for collecting, reporting, and analyzing instructional program data.

Based on the comprehensiveness and detail of the CIP and the potential for enhanced comparability with U.S. education data, Statistics Canada adopted the CIP as the standard field of study taxonomy in 2000, replacing previous Canadian classifications. However, due to several specific differences in the educational systems of each country, there are a few minor differences between each country’s version of the CIP.

CIP Organization (Series Codes & Program Groupings)

The CIP taxonomy is organized on three levels:

2-digit series represent the most general groupings of related programs. Program descriptions at this level begin with the standard phrase "Instructional programs’’ followed by a general description of the content areas and topics associated with the instructional programs within that series.
4-digit series represent intermediate groupings of programs that have comparable content and objectives. Undifferentiated instructional programs with a general focus appear at the beginning of the series; an ‘‘other’’ program entry appears as the final category within a series. The rest of the programs are listed in numerical order. Program descriptions are not provided at this level.
6-digit series represent specific instructional programs and used by Title IV institutions when filling out the IPEDS Completions Survey. These are the most detailed program classifications within the CIP. They are the basic unit of analysis used by NCES and institutions in tracking and reporting program completions and fields of study data. Each program appears with a description that generally identifies the objectives and content of the instructional programs. Program descriptions for academic or general programs typically begin with the phrase “A program that focuses on ...” Program descriptions for programs that are designed to prepare individuals for specific occupations begin with the phrase “A program that prepares individuals for...” The program description also indicates the instructional content of the program. Courses included in the instructional content of the program are intended as a general guide to the content areas addressed by the instructional program. Programs offered at different levels may include more or fewer courses than those listed.

Two-digit areas and codes are provided below. The full list of over 2,800 CIP codes and corresponding definitions can be found here.