The depths of the impact of COVID-19 on nearly every aspect of our personal and professional lives was becoming painfully clear in May and June of 2020. While institutions of higher education had implemented crisis/emergency plans in the immediate onset of the pandemic, and largely extended those efforts into summer terms, the fall 2020 term…

The recently increased importance of practicing precision education has attracted much attention. To better understand students' learning and the relationship between their individual differences and learning outcomes, the bird-eye view possible for educational policymakers and stakeholders from educational data mining and institutional research…

This article describes how a large Institutional Research and Decision Support (IRDS) office engaged in efforts to promote culturally responsive and inclusive institutional research (IR) practices that take into account the increasingly diverse student, faculty, and staff populations we serve. We describe how we developed a diversity, equity and…

Dual credit programs have become important gateway programs between universities and school districts across the nation. The ability for high school students to take academically rigorous college courses while still in high school creates a situation that can be beneficial to students, parents, districts, and higher education partners. Morehead…

Restorative justice practices are an increasingly popular approach to behavioral management, rooted in relationships rather than the behaviorist approach of many traditional forms of schooling. Research on restorative practice implementation demonstrates that schools rarely have time to consider cultural change, as they rush to reduce suspensions…

Institutional researchers can be confronted with ethical quandaries. Pressures from their institutions can conflict with professional standards and general ethical requirements. Analyses that appear to be neutral can conceal hidden assumptions that are unintentionally harmful to those individuals whom institutions have a responsibility to protect.…

Ethical issues are structurally present in the design and choice of data; the interaction between problem, model, and intervention; and the scientism that supports data analytics' claims to authority. In this chapter, I argue against three social assumptions behind common implementations of learning analytics: data realism, technological…

It may seem like stating the obvious to note that providing excellent instruction is a key priority at colleges and universities in the United States given the underlying educational mission of those institutions. However, over the past few decades, there has been a remarkable trend in these institutions towards baking greater intentionality into…

Higher degree research students and their contributions to society and the economy are well known. However, the recognition of the increasing numbers of such students and the decreasing availability of supervisors implies that traditional individual modes of research supervision are no longer sufficient, while models of cohort supervision have led…

A successful IR leader in the digital institution requires effective communication skills to articulate institutional goals, as well as to collaborate with multiple groups for the design and management of operational tasks. This chapter examines the needed skills of senior IR professionals and how these skills apply within a digital institution.

The expansion of big data and analytics has led to the diffusion of institutional research functions across campus departments. In this new environment, IR professionals expect to lead and coordinate various institutional analyses. This article presents a four-quadrant framework to facilitate the dynamics between data analysis and decision-making.

An awareness of the relevant legal issues and an understanding of the appropriate times to engage legal counsel are essential skills for institutional research (IR) professionals.

We provide an overview of existing and emerging ways that institutional researchers can leverage National Student Clearinghouse data to expand a culture of data-driven decision-making across campus, with a focus on examples from the field.

Despite the case study research method has been widely adopted in qualitative research, few scholarly articles addressed the comprehensive guidance on the use of embedded case study research design. This paper aims to contribute to the literature by demonstrating the use of embedded case study research design in qualitative research. A pseudo case…

Traditional institutional research systems may limit who is counted and how they are counted because of limitations associated with disability classification, self-disclosure of disability status, and accessibility limitations inherent within some data-collection methods. As postsecondary institutions work toward improving access for disabled…