DataU: Recent Episodes
Steppingblocks
More than ever, people are questioning the value of higher education. Let's explore why they’re right, why they’re wrong and which institutions are rising to the challenge. Let's normalize data for student success, together.
Growing skepticism of higher education combined with an often overwhelming social media and technological landscape can make it challenging for college admissions and marketing professionals to cut through the noise and reach prospective students. In this episode, we sit down with Kyle Nolan, Director of Admission Marketing at Curry College, to discuss the role of admissions marketing in 2024.
Most people have heard of “hard” or “technical” skills and their alleged opposite, “soft” skills. However, many career development practitioners and employers are shifting the focus to “essential” skills. In this age of rapidly evolving technology, employers want college graduates who have essential skills that can serve as a foundation for the makings of a great employee.
These skills span industries and academic disciplines, and can help students future-proof their career success. Check out our conversation all about the critical need for essential skills with Suzanne Helbig, Associate Vice Provost, Division of Career Pathways at University of California, Irvine. In this conversation, we talk about:
- The meaning and value of essential skills
- Common misconceptions about essential skills
- How colleges and universities can help their students develop and articulate their essential skills
- Why essential skills matter to employers
- How data informs the narratives around essential skills
Accreditation for a University is more than just a label.This vital process serves as a testament to a university’s commitment to delivering a high-quality education that equips students for success beyond graduation. The accreditation process is an ongoing process that requires the collaboration of people across campus, the consistent evaluation and assessment of a university’s programs, and open communication with their university community.
Check out our conversation with two distinguished higher education experts at Marshall University, Doctor Mary Beth Reynolds, The Associate Provost and Associate Vice President for Assessment and Quality Initiatives, and Brian Morgan, Vice President for Institutional Research and Planning and Chief Data Officer, as they delve into the ins and outs of Accreditation, how to obtain this distinction and what goes into achieving this distinction, and their thoughts on the future of accreditation.
Creating partnerships with external stakeholders provides many benefits for students as well as universities. With the job market becoming more and more competitive, it is imperative that universities build strong partnerships with top employers in order to support student success post graduation. Check out our conversation with Clifton Puckett, Student Engagement Coordinator at Georgia Highlands College.
In this conversation, we discuss:
- The importance of partnerships with external organizations (like the Georgia Highlands College partnership with Atrium Health).
- Utilizing graduate outcomes data to set students up for success .
- How data can be useful in a multitude of ways at a university.
- How Georgia Highlands College have leveraged the graduate outcomes data from Steppingblocks, and plans they have for the future.
In our increasingly globalized world, people are more mobile than ever. While this is an exciting phenomenon, it can make it hard for a college or university to keep track of their alumni. We recently sat down with Sarah Robinson, Vice President of Advancement at Husson University, to talk about this challenge, and discuss how Husson is using Steppingblocks and Graduate Insights to leverage their alumni data.
More than ever, colleges and universities are attempting to support student success through campus support resources. These resources have gained greater importance as students and families question the return on investment for a college degree and additional accountability metrics seek to hold institutions accountable for the success of their graduates. As these support resources expand, it is imperative for universities and their staff to proactively share information about these resources to students, ensuring their accessibility. This empowers students with the knowledge of the resources available to them and equips them with the skills to utilize these tools when they are most needed.
Check out our conversation with Kendall Coffman, Senior Academic Advisor at The Ohio State University. In this conversation, we discuss:
- The importance of student support resources and making sure they are accessible to students, and students are aware of these resources.
- Intentionally and purposefully sharing resources with students.
- The importance of advisors stepping into a role of being a resource to students.
- Other tips and tricks to supporting students and helping them be successful at your University.
Check out our conversation with Dr. Jason Dodge, director of the ADVANCE program at George Mason University and Northern Virginia Community College. In this conversation, we discuss:
- The value of institutional partnerships in supporting transfer students
- The diversity of transfer student needs
- The importance of career readiness in the transfer student journey
- The need for structural and cultural changes to support transfer students
PLUS, check out our new supplemental resources for supporting transfer students on your campus:
- Empowering Transfer Students eBook
- Advisor’s Guide to Supporting Transfer Students
- Empowering Transfer Students with Digital Career Counselor
Join us as we sit down with Dr. Stephanie Hartkopf, Senior Campus Recruiter at RSM. We explore:
- Workforce trends and the strategies for skills development and career preparation.
- How universities can collaborate with recruiters to support career readiness.
- How students can maximize their opportunities when collaborating with recruiters.
Learn how West Virginia University leverages graduate outcomes data to support student success and career readiness.
How did Haleigh Blocker break into the hyper-male field of football, and what career advice does she have for other women wanting to do the same? Hear her story from Texas State University and her rise from small town athlete to big time role model.
Ambition has a new voice. It's cultivating pathways from Georgia State University to Wall Street to the world. It's Gen-Z, and it's leading the workforce of the future. Hear Bronson Slattery's story from his senior year at Georgia State and through the lens of a Student Ambassador.
Our resident Data Scientist and Chief Technology Officer, Sébastien Arnaud, shares the most surprising insights he has found in our data, how we develop our university rankings and trends, plus, his predictions for shifts in our data as the workforce continues to change.
March Madness is packed with stats, so we pulled a few of our own to analyze career outcomes for the top 20 universities with the most players on 2021-22 NBA opening day rosters according to this list from the NCAA. We also investigated why Kinesiology and Physiology degrees are a great way to break into the field of sports entertainment from a different type of career trajectory. Read the full report here.
For Jason Owen-Smith, Executive Director of the Institute for Research on Innovation & Science (IRIS), it's about our future and the public good. Listen to his take on why research universities are a form of social insurance and valuable to our entire nation, beyond Velcro and Tang.
College students need a modern career center willing to shift and meet the needs of the modern student. So how are universities doing? We looked into our database of student users to find out exactly how engaged students were with career exploration and development in 2021. Here are our findings.
We took our podcast to the virtual streets to talk directly to our audience about what higher ed is up against in 2022 and how to solve new challenges with data, including the microcredential boom, the skills gap and the isolation of Career Services.
Major doesn't equal career. Gail Cornelius, Engineering Career Center Director at the University of Washington, comes to higher ed from 17 years at Boeing. Her experience gives her street cred and the desire to give back to an industry she loves by putting homegrown talent into the system. She explains why brand management is critical for the entire ecosystem from students to career centers to employers.
Not everyone experiences university life the same. Storytelling through data allows different perspectives to come to life. Data tells the story of how to recruit, retain, progress and promote. The reality is that data also dictates dollars. Dr. Belinda Higgs Hyppolite, VP for Diversity and Inclusion and Chief Diversity Officer at the University of Oklahoma, shares why diversity is not our problem but our promise for a better future.
Universities aren't doing a good job communicating with their students. It's why students don't visit their career centers. It's why new grads don't have the right skills. It's why alumni giving is down and university leadership can't excite their audiences. Justin Nguyen, founder of Declassified Media, is urging universities to listen to their students, but until they do, he shares three things your Gen Z students wish you knew.
As more low-cost degree programs, microcredentials and digital certifications emerge, the more choice learners have. Institutions must shift to an outcome-based strategy to meet the needs of the modern workforce. How? Build a sustainable culture of data at your institution. Dr. Adam Ross Nelson, instructor in statistics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, shares his step-by-step strategy.
Dr. Peter Ricci, Director of Hospitality and Tourism at Florida Atlantic University, measures the success of his students by asking: Where do you land and are you happy? He talks about the evolution of hospitality and the strength of the industry to adapt and survive.
Dr. Patrick Turner, Associate Provost for Student Success at New Mexico State University, shares how their student success initiatives support traditional students with nontraditional responsibilities. He explains the danger of mistaking a sense of welcoming for a sense of belonging and why Hispanic-Serving Institutions need to be held more accountable.
The nature of work is changing. What is the impact, and who is responsible for the skills gap: students, educators or employers? Steppingblocks believes it is all three. Join us for a conversation with our founder and CEO, Carlo Martinez, as we talk about the skills gap and how higher ed is being held more accountable than ever based on the availability of data-driven evidence to understand shifts in demand.
Eight years after Andy Chan, Vice President of Innovation and Career Development at Wake Forest University, gave a TEDx Presentation titled "Career Services Must Die," he discusses the critical work that still needs to be done, how to educate the whole person and how to help students take ownership of their own lives.
Dr. Dhanfu Elston, Chief of Staff and Senior VP for Strategy at Complete College America believes that higher education has a choice. Sustainable reform relies on participation from the classroom to the capitol and every system in between. Dr. Elston and CCA insist that equitable outcomes for students is a responsibility we share and can realize through policy, perspective and practice. He explains that true innovation for student success is scale. Listen in to learn how he's leading innovation for critical reform and opening his playbook for structural change.
Goal One of the 2030 Strategic Plan at the University of Colorado Denver is to become the nation's first equity-serving institution. Goal Two is to become known as a university for life. Both are working to catalyze social mobility and provide a diverse workforce for the future. We sat down with CU Denver's Senior Vice Chancellor for Strategic Enrollment & Student Success, Dr. Monique Snowden, to learn more.
Paden Goldsmith, Assistant Director of Strategic Data Analysis at Florida International University, shares how FIU monitors the health of their graduates using outcomes data to illustrate employment, salary and outlook. On the flip side, Paden explains how they use the same tracking to uncover weaknesses and inform interventions to help current students.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts cybersecurity jobs will grow 33 percent by 2029. On top of faster than average job growth, the median pay is higher than the national average making cybersecurity an extremely attractive field to break into. So what’s causing the shortage? We'll talk to Brandon Anthony, a recent graduate from the University of Maryland Global Campus (UMGC) who earned his degree at the height of the pandemic while working in the field. Today, he's a Cyber Risk Consultant at Coalfire.
Employers are facing a critical shortage of skilled data analysts, and universities are dealing with unforeseen challenges of providing learning through application for data science and analytics. Dr. Jennifer Priestley from Kennesaw State University demonstrates how to bridge the gap with context from her book co-authored by Dr. Robert McGrath from the University of New Hampshire.
Hispanic-Serving Institutions enroll two-thirds of all Latinx undergrads. Here are the top 10 making the biggest impact for their students and alumni based on career outcomes, diversity grade and overall student success.