Faculty Data Fellows

As decided by the Rapid Data Analytics (RDA) subcommittee of the Graduation Initiative 2025, the intention of the Faculty Data Fellows is to encourage research that could highlight potential factors that enhance or hinder students’ timely graduation. 

Fellows for 2017-18

College of Arts & Letters

               Caroline Vickers and Parastou Feizzaringhalam (team)

College of Business & Public Administration

               Alexandru Roman

College of Natural Science

               Dave Maynard

               Monideepa Becerra

College of Social & Behavioral Science

               Hideya Koshino

               Karen Robinson

Description

The Faculty Data Fellows program seeks to mine the data available from Institutional Research (IR) to identify campus-wide or college-specific challenges to student graduation and make concrete recommendations for action and improvement. During the winter and spring quarters, Faculty Data Fellows will work closely with the RDA, IR, and other campus stakeholders to:

1. Identify and substantiate with data the barriers to timely student graduation (e.g., problems pertaining to course demands, pathways, scheduling, curriculum);
2. Understand how these roadblocks operate in practice (e.g., departmental specific constraints on scheduling) and connect with relevant stakeholders (e.g., departmental chairs; Registrar’s Office);
3. Make concrete, data-driven recommendations for change;
4. Disseminate their findings to improve data driven decisions and support.

Faculty data fellows will adopt a research-based approach to their inquiry into graduation roadblocks, including formulating a research question, conducting field research into the administrative processes that operate in their area of inquiry, analyzing data, and drawing evidence-based conclusions. Because of the sensitive nature of the data, the fellows will be required to obtain Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval. Data fellows are welcome to publish the results of their research in a scholarly publication venue of their choice.

Application Requirements and Deadlines

To apply, please submit an Faculty Data Fellow Online Application by November 27, 2017.  Committee review of proposals will be on December 1, 2017.  Award announcement will be on December 4, 2017.

Online Faculty Data Fellow Application

The proposal needs to address in detail the questions in the application. To prepare your proposal, it is recommended that you make an appointment with IR staff in order to understand the nature of the available data, the resources you will need to conduct your research, and the help you might require. You may also attend any one of the two informational sessions on November 13 and 16 at 12-1 at the Faculty Center for Excellence, PL 4005. The application requires that you secure your chair’s permission.  You have one year to complete your research from the time you receive the course release or stipend.

Rapid Data Analytics Subcommittee