The number of forms at the University of Delaware, just like at any other higher ed institution, is large. From course withdrawals for students to facilities requests by staff, a stakeholder is often required to fill out a specific form deep within various web applications in order to make a business action happen on campus. […]
When making decisions about Hope College's website redesign, project team members found themselves looking at a photo of Adam, an 18-year-old freshman, to gauge what he might think is the most logical place for a piece of content—or whether he thinks the content should be there at all. And then, knowing Adam's mom is very […]
For decades, colleges and universities have used big data to track high-risk students and intervene as needed. Now a growing number of institutions are using data tools to track and analyze another group: successful students. It is a radically different approach that many campus administrators believe will help them understand what makes students successful—developing a […]
Numbers drive action in higher education. Whether they represent SAT scores, marketing leads, submitted applications, admitted students, tuition dollars, GPA, fundraising targets or graduating class size, numbers are used throughout your institution to make decisions and assess success. When you measure what you do, you end up doing what you measure more than anything else. […]
In an emerging trend that illustrates the growing importance of digital strategy in higher education, a handful of universities have named a chief digital officer to their leadership teams to merge the worlds of instruction and IT. Universities task these new digital officers—many of whose positions have been created in only the last few years—with […]
How important is it for college administrators to study successful student characteristics? "Focusing primarily on identifying at-risk students, without also identifying the profiles of successful students, is much like a doctor diagnosing a patient with an illness or disease, yet failing to offer a treatment plan or cure. When administrators understand the characteristics of successful […]
A study released in September by the Association of American Universities found that 12 percent of students across 27 universities had experienced sexual assault by force or incapacitation since enrollment, and that 17 percent of seniors had experienced this type of sexual assault while at college. Sara Carrigan Wooten, a doctoral candidate in Educational Leadership and […]
Like it or not, we spend a lot of time on planes and in airports as we travel to campuses across the Nation and around the world. Over the 2015 summer session we sensed winds of change in the aeronautics industry – read as, devising new global security measures; retrofitting outdated air fleets; and creating […]
The skill set required for today's top jobs in higher education has never been more extensive or demanding. Boards of Trustees are looking for leadership in several areas: academic authority, fundraising ability, public relations and media savvy, legal and political sensitivity, as well as ease of movement between constituent groups—alumni, students, faculty, parents, donors, business […]
Several years ago we shared with University Business readership our prognostications on contemporary polytechnic institutions popping up across the U.S. In relatively short time, higher ed is still surfing the Polytechnic Revival wave at engineering schools, colleges, and universities across the Nation. The common heritage of Classic Polytechnics extends back to the 1745 founding of […]