Higher education institutions have experienced a sharp increase in demand for accountability. To meet the growing demand by legislators, accreditors, consumers, taxpayers, and parents for evidence of successful outcomes, this important book provides higher education leaders and practitioners with actionable strategies for developing a comprehensive data culture throughout the entire institution. Exploring key considerations necessary for the development of an effective data culture in colleges and universities, this volume brings together diverse voices and perspectives, including institutional researchers, senior academic leaders, and faculty. Each chapter focuses on a critical element of managing or influencing a data culture, approaches for breaking through common challenges, and concludes with practical, research-based implementation strategies. Collectively, these strategies form a comprehensive list of recommendations for developing a data culture and becoming a change agent within your higher education institution.

This valuable resource helps institutional leaders understand and implement a data strategy at their college or university that maximizes benefits to all creators and users of data. Exploring key considerations necessary for coordination of fragmented resources and the development of an effective, cohesive data strategy, this book brings together professionals from different higher education experiences and perspectives, including academic, administration, institutional research, information technology, and student affairs. Focusing on critical elements of data strategy and governance, each chapter in Data Strategy in Colleges and Universities helps higher education leaders address a frustrating problem with much-needed solutions for fostering a collaborative, data-driven strategy.

Internal and external pressure continues to mount for college professionals to provide evidence of successful activities, programs, and services, which means that, going forward, nearly every campus professional will need to approach their work with a data-informed perspective.But you find yourself thinking “I am not a data person”.Yes, you are. Or can be with the help of Amelia Parnell.You Are a Data Person provides context for the levels at which you are currently comfortable using data, helps you identify both the areas where you should strengthen your knowledge and where you can use this knowledge in your particular university role.For example, the rising cost to deliver high-quality programs and services to students has pushed many institutions to reallocate resources to find efficiencies. Also, more institutions are intentionally connecting classroom and cocurricular learning experiences which, in some instances, requires an increased gathering of evidence that students have acquired certain skills and competencies. In addition to programs, services, and pedagogy, professionals are constantly monitoring the rates at which students are entering, remaining enrolled in, and leaving the institution, as those movements impact the institution’s financial position.From teaching professors to student affairs personnel and beyond, Parnell offers tangible examples of how professionals can make data contributions at their current and future knowledge level, and will even inspire readers to take the initiative to engage in data projects.The book includes a set of self-assessment questions and a companion set of action steps and available resources to help readers accept their identity as a data person. It also includes an annotated list of at least 20 indicators that any higher education professional can examine without sophisticated data analyses.

Why the university should focus on community: “An enlightening interpretation of Wendell Berry’s philosophy for the pursuit of a holistic higher education.” —Publishers Weekly Prominent author and cultural critic Wendell Berry is well known for his contributions to agrarianism and environmentalism, but his commentary on education has received comparatively little attention. Yet Berry has been eloquently unmasking America’s cultural obsession with restless mobility for decades, arguing that it causes damage to both the land and the character of our communities. The education system, he maintains, plays a central role in this obsession, inculcating in students’ minds the American dream of moving up and moving on. Drawing on Berry’s essays, fiction, and poetry, Jack R. Baker and Jeffrey Bilbro illuminate the influential thinker’s vision for higher education in this path-breaking study. Each chapter begins with an examination of one of Berry’s fictional narratives and then goes on to consider how the passage inspires new ways of thinking about the university’s mission. Throughout, Baker and Bilbro argue that instead of training students to live in their careers, universities should educate students to inhabit and serve their places. The authors also offer practical suggestions for how students, teachers, and administrators might begin implementing these ideas. Baker and Bilbro conclude that institutions guided by Berry’s vision might cultivate citizens who can begin the work of healing their communities—graduates who have been educated for responsible membership in a family, a community, or a polity.

The three-volume set LNICST 465, 466 and 467 constitutes the proceedings of the Second EAI International Conference on Application of Big Data, Blockchain, and Internet of Things for Education Informatization, BigIoT-EDU 2022, held as virtual event, in July 29–31, 2022. The 204 papers presented in the proceedings were carefully reviewed and selected from 550 submissions. BigIoT-EDU aims to provide international cooperation and exchange platform for big data and information education experts, scholars and enterprise developers to share research results, discuss existing problems and challenges, and explore cutting-edge science and technology. The conference focuses on research fields such as “Big Data” and “Information Education. The use of Artificial Intelligence (AI), Blockchain and network security lies at the heart of this conference as we focused on these emerging technologies to excel the progress of Big Data and information education.

Higher education institutions have traditionally nurtured artistic and scientific development and served as catalysts for innovative ideas and products. However, contemporary discourse too often relegates the concept of innovation to the private sector, where the rhetoric of "disruption" frequently reduces innovation to economic terms. As a result, innovations that could benefit society instead exacerbate existing inequities, and the environmental factors that stimulate long-term innovative progress are neglected. Creating a Culture of Mindful Innovation in Higher Education offers a different vision by identifying the conditions that enable college and university administrators, faculty, and staff to promote an innovative institutional culture. Mindful innovation is defined through six central tenets: societal impact; the necessity of failure; creativity through diversity; respect for autonomy and expertise; thoughtful consideration for the dimensions of time, efficiency, and trust; and the incentivization of intrinsic motivation and progress over scare tactics and disruption. Michael Lanford and William G. Tierney offer a clearheaded analysis of the challenges and opportunities in creating a culture of mindful innovation and argue that the institutions that do so will be poised to lead entrepreneurial endeavors, scientific progress, and greater social equity in the twenty-first century.