The Voluntary System of Accountability (VSA) project is collaborative effort among the American Association of State Colleges and Universities (AASCU), the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities (A٠P٠L٠U), and the public higher education community. Collectively AASCU and (A٠P٠L٠U) represent over 520 public institutions that enroll 7.5 million students and award 70% of bachelor's degrees in U.S. each year.

The VSA system is designed to improve public understanding of how public colleges and universities operate. Specifically, the information is intended for students, families, policy-makers, campus faculty and staff, the general public, and other higher education stakeholders.

The center piece of the system is the "College Portrait" that provides consistent, comparable and transparent information on the characteristics of institutions and students, cost of attendance, student engagement with the learning process, and core educational outcomes. The majority of the data elements selected are from currently available data sources with established definitions and reporting conventions, e.g., the Common Data Set.