Continually Improve The Support Services To Internal Constituents
Continally improve the support services to internal constituents
Objective
Timely And Complete Mandated Reporting
In serving the university community, a primary responsibility of IRA is to comply with federal & state government, as well as with non-governmental reporting mandates on behalf of the university and its various functions. Mandated activities include providing information, conducting research studies, analyzing, interpreting and reporting data. It is critical that all of these mandated jobs be performed to specification and within deadline, lest the university suffer dire consequences.
Indicator
Tracking Mandated Reports
The Office of Institutional Research and Analysis will use the IRA Work Order Table to track when mandated jobs are received by the IRA Office. Mandated jobs may include any official jobs for government entities such as IPEDS, THECB, TSUS, Board of Regents, Legislative House or Senate bill compliance reports, LBB, LAR, U.S. Dept of Education, NSF/NIH reports, etc. Mandated jobs may also include mandatory, non-governmental jobs such as the national surveys by Peterson's, College Board, US News and World Reports, SACS, ACT, VSA, Business Week, etc. Incoming jobs are recorded and progress tracked through completion in the IRA Work Order Table. Other data captured in the IRA WO table for a given FY include: Whether mandated (external or internal), client requested, internal IRA project, external to University (but not mandated); priority level; to whom job is assigned; when completed; and the shared drive locations of job-related files. The 2010-2011 Work Order Table will be reviewed, mandatory research and reports will be identified among the work orders and they will be counted along with completion times, and the number will be reported in relation to timely delivery.
Criterion
100% Completion Of Mandated Reports
100% of mandated reports received by the IRA office will be completed.
Finding
Assessment Outcomes For Mandated Jobs
Based upon internal IRA accuracy checking and completion tracking systems, 100% of mandated jobs have been accurately completed and submitted by deadline, in FY 2011, through the end of the FY.
Action
Improve Accuracy Of Information Recorded Re. Mandated Jobs
The IRA Office continues to seek out options for the automation of our work order table through a database fed by the web work order template. This process would facilitate improved accuracy and ease with the mandated report process. It is understood that manual work order entry is cumbersome and time consuming and encourages forgetfulness, at very busy times, about entering job information which may enter unexpectedly by phone, email or walk-in requests extension requests. The IRA Office group is also discussing backing the IRA WO web template, or an expanded version thereof, with a database. This discussion requires permissions and approvals from Computer Service/IT and it has been rejected a number of times in the past. We are discussing and working on alternatives that might be acceptable to CIS/IT. In addition, the IRA Office will pursue options for disseminating its satisfaction survey upon completion of each job in order to obtain wider, and more timely and job-specific feedback in a more standardized form than the usual email acknowledgements and reactions of clients after a completed job is delivered.
Objective
Physical Data Continuity
Maintain Institutional Data
Indicator
Migrate IRA Database To Oracle
IR Microsoft SQL server has expired as of the end of August. In order to facilitate physical data continuity the database is being migrated to Oracle to avoid the purchase cost of a new server, as well as facilitate support from Information Technology Services. The Oracle server will allow for regular backups of Institutional Data and provide a repository for reporting longitudinally. The migration process involves working with ITS to set up the databases and migrate data from our MS SQL database, and also requires IR to verify the integrity of the data after the migration is complete.
Criterion
Migration To Oracle Complete By July 31st
The migration to an Oracle development server environment must be completed by July 31st before the IRA Office MS SQL server warranty expires at the end of August.
Finding
Migration At 100%
As of the end of the FY, the migration of the longitudinal IRA database is complete. An Oracle Development Server environment has been created for IRA and has been fully populated with IRA historical data by IRA Analysts. There will continue to be problems for which there are no fast or easy solutions with regard to maintaining the perfect continuity of the IRA database, given the that the university has abandoned its legacy data system and has moved all data collection to Banner, which does not and will never entirely map to historical legacy data.
Indicator
Banner To Legacy Conversion
In order to facilitate Longitudinal Data Continuity, IRA is working with ITS to translate data from Banner into a data format that is compatible with our legacy data. This will allow us to maintain the ability to report longitudinally until a sufficient body of historical data is maintained in the Banner and ODS databases.
Criterion
75% Of Banner Data Converted To Legacy Format
75% of Banner data will be converted to legacy format by August 31.
Finding
70% Converted As Of FY11
As of the end of FY 2011, roughly 70% of IRA Legacy variables have been converted from Banner entry sources for annexation to the historical longitudinal IRA database. Even with the help of IT experts in both Legacy and Banner, we discovered that 50% of the standard STDM, SECM, REGR, FACM, SADR, FADR, STFM, UADM and GADM variables in university legacy and IRA longitudinal data sets did NOT have direct correspondent variables in the Banner database and even fewer (about 50%) had correspondents in the Banner ODS data. The Banner ODS data was intended by the university to serve as the data pool from the IRA office would draw for official university reporting and for internal client research and analysis. The IRA Office was forced to find other means of identifying and modifying data from both ODS and Banner which could be massaged and used in conjunction with historical IRA variables. Essentially, we learned that original hopes of convenient data continuity extended by the university ERP project at its inception had been naïve and optimistic and our success benchmark of achieving 75% conversion was almost laughable, were it not fraught with so much frustration and hard work. Nevertheless, when conventional options fail, the IRA Office resorts to the ugly but practical motto: “there’s more than one way to skin a cat”. As a result, the IRA Office has created a baseline level of functional data and strategies for filling in gaps, which we believe will allow us to meet our mandatory reporting requirements for the Fall 2011 high intensity season.
Action
Continue Effort To Meet Goals And Deadlines
The IRA Office will need to continue to mine the conventional and unconventional veins of data acquisition and transformation which were discovered during the summer of 2011 and will undoubtedly need to uncover additional approaches to pursue when those veins fail to yield data in particular areas where gaps may appear. While specific plans have been made toward meeting both the goals and deadlines which have been set with regard to physical data continuity, we intend to constantly be ready to change plans and pursue different approaches and different short term objectives in order to continue to be productive which running the current obstacle course. For two months in the summer of 2011, additional resources were requested and secured for an additional part time student programmer analyst during the height of the summer data transfer between legacy and Banner. Before the end of the FY, this additional worker’s funded time had expired and the Office will continue with less manpower, but with the advantage of greater knowledge acquired during the intensive work of the summer. Strategies learned, that will be repeated and modified throughout FY12 will include working with targeted groups of functional users and data owners to attempt to discern which data are continuing to collected in Banner, how they are collected, where they are stored and if they can be found in the ODS. Where absolutely necessary , it may be necessary to prevail upon functional users and data inputters to attempt to extract specific snapshots of their data to deliver via excel spreadsheets to IRA for use in reporting in lieu of what was previously part of the university data pool and part of the standard IRA database. Additional Cognos Reporting licenses may be requested for the office and all analysts will work together to develop and share additional expertise in Cognos report writing to improve IRA ability to help the university meet its needs for decision-making analyses and reports.
Objective
Operational Data Acquisition And Delivery
Institutional Research has an obligation to collect data and deliver reports to clients.
Indicator
Develop Cognos Body Of Knowledge
As the Banner/Cognos conversion continues, Cognos will be the primary source for new data. Therefore, it is imperative that IRA develop proficiency with the Cognos system, as well as the structure of the data within. IRA is in the process of training in the use of Cognos and developing best practices for further use of the system.
Criterion
75% Of Current Data Requests Filled From Cognos
To indicate progress with the Cognos Environment, IRA will acquire data for 75% of the reports that only require current data from the Cognos environment.
Finding
90% Filled
As of the end of the FY, 90% of all summer and early fall data requests have HAD TO HAVE been filled using ODS and Banner ETL data through Cognos. We have discovered that Cognos runs very slow much of the time and has difficulty with the level of complex, multi conditional extractions and combinations IRA routinely programs, hence, by the end of Aug 2011, the IRA Office was attempting to compensate for those system weaknesses by conducting analyses using data which had been converted from Banner sources and added to the new IRA Oracle development database where standard ORACE Developer SQL could be used for extraction, manipulation and output generation , which was far more flexible, nimble and fast than using Cognos or Cognos SQL within Cognos Report Writer.
Indicator
Develop Standard Cognos Reports
In order to facilitate efficient delivery of data, IRA will create standard Cognos reports both for distribution to clients, as well as for the purpose of templates for more specific reports.
Criterion
Deliver 5 Client Facing Standard Reports And 5 Internal Report Templates
IRA will develop 5 reports for general consumption, and 5 repots to serve as templates for new reports created in Cognos.
Finding
More Than 5 Client Facing Standard Reports And More Than 12 Internal Report Templates Completed
While the vast majority of reports and analyses requested in FY 11, including summer 2011, required the use of data that preceded the Banner ERP switch and did not exist in Banner or ODS, IRA did develop at least 5 reports for deans, executives, and for DELTA. IRA analysts also developed more than a dozen Cognos ODS reports to serve as templates for Mini Profile reports due in early fall of 2012.
Indicator
Deliver New Reports Through Cognos
Cognos provides not only a reporting tool but also a method for distribution for reports generated for internal clients. IRA seeks to take advantage of this faculty by delivering reports that can be run by the clients to get the most up to date data.
Criterion
Implement Delivery Of New Reports Via Cognos
Have this option available to clients by August 31.
Finding
Process Still In Planning Stage
IRA has been reminded that it is NOT in control of the university’s progress toward allowing Cognos general users to access and run reports that have been created for them. The IRA Office has regularly and repeatedly reminded IT that this feature was promised and was expected by executives and deans. We anticipate that by mid September 2012, SOME university executive users may be able to be allowed to access and run specific programs that have been designated for their use.
Action
Continue Efforts To Meet Goal By Deadline
The IRA Office will move forward as rapidly as possible with the use of COGNOS tools to create reports using data that exists in Banner and ODS (Summer 2011 forward) This effort will focus primarily upon the creation of standard or recurring reports and less upon ad hoc and highly complex reports which have been evidenced to run much more slowly and be far more error prone using Cognos than using IRA ORACLE Developer SQL or SPSS. In addition, the IRA Office plans to propose means of more conveniently accessing and cannibalizing Cognos reports from ODS that are being written by members of the IT Reporting Team. This MAY improve and speed IRA analyst programming efforts and may have similar advantages for the members of the IT Reporting Team. In addition cross-scrutiny of programming to identify particular variables may benefit to the university by revealing unintentional discrepancies in variable definitions, thus leading toward the generation of a practical and concrete common university data dictionary.
Goal
Promote Responsive, Welcoming And Customer Oriented Service
Promote responsive, welcoming and customer oriented service
Objective
Client Satisfaction
Federal, State, TSU System, and SHSU administrative and academic consumers of SHSU data will be satisfied with the information and services provided to them by the IRA Office in a number of areas, including Accuracy, Timeliness, Consistency.
Indicator
SHSU Client Feedback Survey
The Office of Institutional Research and Analysis will conduct a year-end "Client Satisfaction Survey" of its clients, both internal and external, from that year. This survey will include items addressing satisfaction with accuracy, timeliness, and usefulness of data provided by the IRA Office, as well as client perceptions of the office's efforts regarding assistance with unit assessment. This survey was created by the staff of the IRA Office, and a meeting is held yearly to make sure that the survey is up-to-date. A copy of the survey is attached.
Criterion
75% Client Satisfaction
A minimum 75% of survey respondents will not only be satisfied with the IRA office in general, but also with the accuracy, timeliness, and usefulness of the data they receive as a result of their work orders/data requests.
Finding
Client Satisfaction Results
The 2010-2011 IRA Client Satisfaction Survey was sent to 67 former clients, from which was received 19 responses. This equates to a response rate of 28.36%. Customers appear to be satisfied with the usefulness, clarity and thoroughness of information reported to them as a result of research jobs submitted.
DETAIL SUMMARY OF SURVEY RESPONSES: The responses from the participants who were able to form an opinion are summarized as follows: 94.7% were satisfied with the time it took to receive their results.
94.7% were satisfied with the presentation style or format of the information they received.
100% were satisfied with the customer service they received from the IRA Staff.
100% were satisfied with the usefulness of the information they received.
89.5% were satisfied with the clarity of the information they received.
94.7% were satisfied with the thoroughness of the information they received.
Action
Process Improvements
Review of the survey findings overall lead to the conclusion that a 28% customer response rate, obtained possibly months after particular jobs are completed, is not the most authentic basis for evaluating true, real-time satisfaction of clients. Consequently, the IRA Office has concluded that we should attempt to revise our survey to include a more direct question about usefulness of IRA Jobs and the particular uses to which it was put, in addition to changing the collection process to obtain responses to IRA jobs in a real-time manner. This could improve the freshness of the resulting data and also the response rate.
Goal
Actively Pursue Approaches To Recruit And Retain Quality Staff.
Actively pursue approaches to recruit and retain quality staff.
Objective
Fully Staffed Office
Fill all open staff positions.
Indicator
Open Positions
The IRA office will recruit two individuals to occupy the positions of Graduate Analysts.
Criterion
Fill All Open Positions.
Fill all open positions with very competent personnel, while remaining within the prevailing constraints of salary budgets.
Finding
All Positions Filled
Both graduate analyst position were filled by competent graduate students. Both hires were done within budget.
Action
Maintain All Current Positions In The Midst Of Budget Cuts
The IRA Office will take the necessary steps needed to maintain the funding for all current positions, even in the face of current budgets cut. Steps that can be taken to ensure the continued funding for these positions include cuts in other departmental areas, and outside fund requests.