CITY UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK

COLIN CHELLMAN, PH.D.ASSOCIATE DEAN FOR INSTITUTIONAL RESEARCH

CHERYL LITTMAN, PH.D. DIRECTOR OF THE PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT PROCESS

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CUNY Institutional Data for Research and Policy

Analysis

The City University of New York2

Largest Public Urban Higher Ed System in the US

23 Institutions, community, senior and graduate colleges

Located across all 5 boroughs of New York City and online

272,000 degree-seeking students250,000 adult and continuing education studentsRacially, ethnically, socioeconomically diverse7,300 full-time and 11,000 part-time Faculty

The Institutions of CUNY3

24 colleges and professional schools 11 senior colleges

7 baccalaureate + 3 “comprehensive” colleges

7 community colleges Macaulay Honors College CUNY Graduate School CUNY Law School CUNY Graduate School of Journalism CUNY School of Professional Studies CUNY School of Public Health

Undergraduate Student Profile4

    Senior Colleges Community Colleges TotalUndergraduates  Total Undergraduate Enrollment N 137,220  91,264 228,484Female %  58.6  58.6  58.6Race/Ethnicity     American Indian/ Alaskan Native %   0.2   0.3   0.3   Asian %  19.3  15.4  17.7   Black %  25.7  29.0  27.0   Hispanic %  24.0  36.6  29.0   White %  30.7  18.8  26.0Age Mean  24.0  24.0  24.025 Years and Older %  28.5  28.2  28.4Attend Part Time %  30.3  39.4  33.9Born outside of U.S. Mainland %  42.9  43.7  43.3

Countries of Ancestry N  206  190  210Native Language Other than English %  41.8  46.3  43.6Languages Spoken N 165 165 189Pell Grant Recipients2 % 52.8 64.5 57.3Household Income Less than $20,0003 % 32.8 46.2 38.1First Generation in College3 % 41.5 48.4 44.2Married3 % 13.4 13.7 13.6Supporting Children3 % 13.2 15.6 14.2Work For Pay more than 20 hours per week3 % 33.2 29.8 31.8

What is institutional research?5

Institutional research is a form of “organizational intelligence,” providing decision makers with information about an institution, its educational objectives, goals, and purposes, environmental factors, processes and structures to more wisely use its resources and more successfully attain its objectives and goals.

-- Knight (2003). The Primer for Institutional Research

Institutional Research at CUNY6

Provides support for… University accountability Policy analysis Outcomes Assessment Academic program review and accreditation Program evaluation Regulatory reporting to federal, state, city

government Press inquiries Reporting to commercial and inter-

institutional agencies Marketing

Who we study7

Students Applicants Enrolled Students – undergraduates and

graduate students Degree recipients

Faculty Profiles Workload

Institutional Data Sources

Freshman and Transfer Application Processing Data System

Student Information SystemBasic Skills TestsFinancial Aid PackagingFinancial Aid Disbursement

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Institutional Data

Student Data Applications/High School Background Enrollments/Registrations Basic Skills Test Scores Financial Aid Degrees granted

Employee Data Work History Teaching and other activities

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Organization of Institutional Data

Operational Systems Transactional data systems, live, changing

Frozen Extracts Census data snapshots of operational data systems Systematic, repeatable

Relational Databases Data organized to facilitate analyses

Cross section/Trend reporting Longitudinal tracking

Oracle Database, data organized into: Fact tables Dimension tables Lookup tables

End-user layer developed to make data more accessible

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How are data moved from operational systems into a data warehouse?

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Step 1. Snapshots are extracted from operational systems. Step 2. Extracted files are reformatted and cleaned. Step 3. Pre-processed files are loaded into staging tables and

metadata are loaded into lookup tables in an Oracle relational database.

Step 4. Data in the staging tables are migrated to normalized tables.

Step 5. Summary tables and other high performance query structures are created from the normalized tables and lookup tables.

Step 6. Semester-based fact and dimension tables are created from the normalized tables and lookup tables.

Step 7. Longitudinal fact tables are created from the semester-based fact and dimension tables.

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CUNY IRDBData Flow Diagram

CAS(freshmanadmissions)

Special Reports

StandardizedFiles

Joins fromMultiple Tables

acrossMultiple Terms

Group bySelectedColumns(SQL)

OracleDiscovererCrosstabs

Ad-HocQueries

Migrate Datainto Oracle9iEnvironment(SQL*Loader)

NormalizeData

(PL/SQL)

OracleForms

CUNY Data Bookon InstitutionalResearchWeb Site

Extract Files

OracleDiscovererTables

ASTA(transfer

admissions)

SHOW(enrollment)

SKAT(skills tests)

PERF(grades)

GRAD(degrees)

NCES (job survey)

SFA(financial aid)

Clearinghouse(transfers to non-CUNYcolleges)

Reformatand CleanInput Files(SPSS)

Create Factand Dimension

Tables(SQL)

Migrate Datainto Oracle 9iEnvironment(SQL*Loader)

Type orCut and Paste

SPSSfor

Windows

Crystal Reportsand

Oracle Portal

InstitutionalResearchers

UniversityAdministrators

Public Users

OracleDiscovererCrosstabs

StagingTables

Code Descriptionsfrom File Layouts

PC Files

OperationalData Store(normalizedstudent-level

data)

LookupTables

(metadata)

Flash Enrollment

SummaryTables

(denormalizedaggregate-level

data)

DataWarehhouse(denormalizedstudent-level

data)

LongitudinalCohorts

(denormalizedstudent-level

data)Ad-HocQueries

Spreadsheets

CUNY OIRA Reports

• http://www.cuny.edu/ir

• http://www.cuny.edu/opr

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Overview: NYCDOE–CUNY Data Exchange

• CUNY/ DOE MOU Established in August 2008 A new two-way data-sharing agreement created an

opportunity to examine the common research goals of both institution.

• Research designed to support policy for: Administration Central office staff Schools and colleges

• Shared research agenda with focus on college readiness Policy questions informed by data What happens to DOE students in their first year at CUNY? What are predictors of college success?

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Gates_NLC_Using Data as Information to Drive Change_1_24_2012_cuny.pptx

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LTDB – Longitudinal Tracking Database

DOE and CUNY matched student records No reliable common identifier before matching Matching algorithm developed to ensure a degree of accuracy and reliability Match process identifies best match between DOE graduates and CUNY

enrollees Common identifier assigned to individual student records

Student data – DOE students who applied to or enrolled at CUNY

Data from both systems structured to facilitate trends and tracking over a student’s secondary and post-secondary career

Access for DOE and CUNY institutional researchersFlexible cohort definitionsItem and row-level security

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