【Building a Institution Decision-Making Model with Long-Term Institutional Tracking Research】

The Minghsin University of Science and Technology established the Institutional Research Center in 2016 to promote academic research in response to the needs of professional management and sustainable development in academia, advocating for a decision-making culture based on empirical data. To this end, the university undertook two preliminary tasks: establishing an integrated database and setting up dedicated units. Firstly, in the establishment of the integrated database, the university collaborated with various units to unify the operational definitions of various types of data and integrated and established a campus data warehousing platform through the Library and Information Office, providing analytical data required for academic research. After 7 years of gradual updates, the basic platform has been established, and 120 modules have been developed for data analysis, exploration, and visualization by demand units. Secondly, in the establishment of dedicated units, the university established the Institutional Research Center in 2016 as the driving and executing unit for academic research. In 2021, an organizational adjustment was made to incorporate the Institutional Research Center into the Office of Research and Development, responsible for tasks such as the development of strategic development plans and the allocation of MOE's funds for private technological universities and colleges, combining campus-level performance tracking with academic research. It is worth mentioning that the university is the only one to entrust the planning of "measures on departmental class adjustments of technological universities and colleges" to the Institutional Research (IR) unit.

In the execution of academic research at Minghsin University of Science and Technology, analysis topics are divided into three categories: "real-time analysis," "long-term tracking analysis," and "predictive analysis," providing comprehensive analysis based on application goals to promote a data-centric academic governance culture. Real-time analysis is used to present the current status of academic data as trend analysis indicators for routine academic health checks. The university mainly utilizes the campus data module of the data warehousing platform to establish a real-time information visualization system, assisting academic administrators in optimizing strategic decision-making. As an example, the university analyzed the application of the residence of new students and the population aged 15 to 18 in the local area, planning activities based on the characteristics of neighboring villages, such as organizing non-profit kindergartens and USR projects, to strengthen enrollment in regional areas.

The future development of academic research will establish the institutional management capabilities of universities through data, which has been deemed an indispensable part of the operation of higher education institutions by the Ministry of Education. In the spirit of continuous improvement, the role of IR units in major academic operational projects will become increasingly important, becoming accountable for major projects. Therefore, understanding the content of major academic operational plans, comprehending the context between plans, and fully mastering academic data will be the inevitable responsibilities and challenges for IR units in the future.

【Excerpt from the issue No. 01, 2024 of TWAEA’s ePaper】