Data Drives the Future
“…the response has been extremely positive, and I know this is going to
make a difference for our institution.”
—Jim Moran, Ph.D., USD Provost and Vice President of Academic Affairs
The University of South Dakota (USD) needed a systematic process for assessment and strategic planning. The school’s course outcomes were not directly linked to academic program outcomes nor were department goals effectively tied to the institutional strategic plan. Annual assessment reports contained only one year of data, so they didn’t provide any longitudinal insight. Department goals were not part of any larger strategic initiative, and the data required for program or other ad hoc review were not readily available, as they had to be requested from Institutional Research. Jim Moran, Ph.D., USD Provost and Vice President of Academic Affairs, recognized that the school needed a better system for tracking student learning outcomes. He also knew that the vision could be broader. Nuventive was just the company to help bring a comprehensive vision to life. USD began implementation of the Nuventive Improvement Platform in summer of 2015; it was completed in 2017, with a goal of incorporating institutional data into strategic planning, assessment, and budgeting strategies. “To meet university goals, you have to focus on what’s going on at the department level,” Moran explains. “And often, the data and information are scattered. We’re really pleased to have the Nuventive Improvement Platform.”
Big Gains in a Short Time
It hasn’t been long since the school implemented the Nuventive Improvement Platform, but Matt Heard, M.B.A., Senior Budget and Finance Specialist, says that the changes can already be felt. “Before we had this ‘one stop shop’, we used to have to go to multiple places on campus to get the student-side data, and now that that’s pretty readily available, we’re able to make a lot of our decisions a lot faster and track trends. It’s nice to have it all in one dashboard.” Lisa Bonneau, Ph.D., USD’s Assessment Associate, agrees that the improvements are palpable. For instance, she says, “the data have assisted college deans and their respective department chairs in recognizing programs with too many credits required for graduation and programs with hidden prerequisites.” In addition, she notes, faculty from many programs have revised their student learning outcomes after training on the software. “We’ve done a variety of trainings with faculty so they’re able to utilize the software to the fullest extent.” And this training and engagement has had a profound effect on USD’s faculty. Heard says, “The data that is coming out of this now is part of the transparency that we really wanted with this budget model. And now that we’re sharing this [data] with the faculty, they feel more involved with the process. They see what mark they make by the class sizes and number of sections that they teach.” In December of 2016, the school purchased Nuventive’s Managed Services. Some of the school’s staff had left and Bonneau had recently joined the University, so this was a logical juncture to add on-going professional services to aid with the transition. Nuventive has since helped with the Council for Advancement of Standards (CAS) standards. The school’s student services group needed help tracking the 14 student service units around the CAS standards, and Nuventive helped lay out a model so that the school can now align its assessment efforts to the standards. The transition to the Nuventive Improvement Platform has been smooth. Moran says, “Oftentimes as we bring in a new innovation and new ideas, we don’t know how the faculty are going to respond. In this case, the response has been extremely positive, and I know it’s going to make a difference for our institution. That’s a real compliment to our faculty at the University of South Dakota and also our partnership with Nuventive.” The transformation at the University of South Dakota has been huge, but the school isn’t finished. “Our next step is to assure that the department goals are living documents. The integration of this information to our budgeting structure is pretty critical,” says Moran. The data that has been harnessed by the Nuventive Improvement Platform is part of the transparency so important for the school’s progress; making the financial picture more accessible will be yet another way for the school to shape and achieve its goals. It’s an exciting time at the university, says Heard: “I think we’re on the road to something really great.
Nuventive adapts to unique
institutional plans
“We also wanted something that was more ours,” says Bridget. “In other words, we didn’t want to take our adaptive strategy, our institutional assessment plan, our operational plans, or our student learning plans and adapt all of those to a tool. Instead, we wanted to work with a partner that could adapt a tool to how the culture of assessment, planning, and transparency was evolving at Arcadia. Nuventive provided us with some options that allowed us to build the solution we needed.” Nuventive’s solution was also straightforward for everyone in the university community to adopt and use. It also helped break down, connect, and integrate previous data silos.
Nuventive adapts to unique
institutional plans
“We also wanted something that was more ours,” says Bridget. “In other words, we didn’t want to take our adaptive strategy, our institutional assessment plan, our operational plans, or our student learning plans and adapt all of those to a tool. Instead, we wanted to work with a partner that could adapt a tool to how the culture of assessment, planning, and transparency was evolving at Arcadia. Nuventive provided us with some options that allowed us to build the solution we needed.” Nuventive’s solution was also straightforward for everyone in the university community to adopt and use. It also helped break down, connect, and integrate previous data silos.
A single source of truth for
adaptive planning
So far, Nuventive has proved itself to be a single source of truth for Arcadia’s adaptive strategy tracking and progress – which means a reduction in data duplication. As phase one draws to a close, all of the university’s operational units and academic programs are already on the system.
The next step is to pull together a holistic view across the organization. This picture will help assess whether or not the initiatives of operational units and academic programs enable the progress and ultimate success of the university’s adaptive strategy.
About Nuventive
Nuventive enables higher education institutions to turn their plans into progress through the better use of information. Its cloud-based platform-as-a-service brings business process and information together to support any improvement initiative, including overall strategy, accreditation, student success, learning outcomes, general education, sustainability, administrative outcomes, program review, and diversity. Nuventive is headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania with distribution in North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific regions.
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Resources
Location: Vermillion, South Dakota
Nuventive Solutions: Nuventive Improvement Platform (Nuventive Improve & Nuventive Impact), Managed Services.
Overview: The University of South Dakota (USD) needed a systematic process for assessment and strategic planning. The data that has been harnessed by the Nuventive Improvement Platform is part of the transparency so important for the school’s progress; making the financial picture more accessible will be yet another way for the school to shape and achieve its goals.
Value: Rather than going to multiple places on campus for student-side data, information is brought together within the Nuventive Improvement Platform and is shared with all faculty. Decisions can be made a lot faster and it is easier to track trends.