The deployment of engagement analytics within a university is most appropriately described as a technology-enabled solution, rather than a technical solution. This is because the physical set-up of your solution is but the first step in what is more accurately viewed as a business or digital transformation project. The real value to be gained from deploying engagement analytics is about how using data in this way enables universities to take advantages of the affordances that come with introducing a system with data insights that more aptly inform an end-to-end notifications, interventions and referrals process. Put another way, a successful deployment is not only about the categorising of engagement but also about the outcomes that follow – something that is influenced primarily by how analytics are positioned and used within the institution to meet strategic objectives.
Identifying the problem
When thinking about digital solutions, it is important to know the problem for which the ‘solution’ is being deployed. In the context of engagement analytics, the reasons why more institutions are seeking to develop a data-informed approach to supporting student success can be defined holistically as a response to the regulatory requirement from the Office for Students contained in condition B3, namely to ‘deliver successful outcomes for all … students’. Unpick that requirement and myriad strands and reasons for enhancing the use of data to understand how students engage with their academic studies begin to emerge.
Determining, defining, articulating and successfully communicating the strategic priorities that underpin the deployment of engagement analytics is critical to success. Here I’d like to explore those priorities in more depth. This matters, because once you enter the project phase of an analytics deployment, those strategic priorities should inform the design and development of your analytics platform. Developing the technical solution in tandem with the wider piece of work around business transformation – typically part of a wider project on digital transformation – helps to deliver a technology-enabled solution to a wider business need that is truly integrated, workable in practice and that delivers against those strategic objectives outlined at the start.
A broader focus for deployment
In the last 10 years, Kortext has seen an evolution in focus from institutions deploying our StREAM student engagement analytics platform. Retention is possibly still the most immediate and oft-cited reason why universities begin to explore how better to use student engagement data to support the student experience and secure successful student outcomes. Work with our clients and prospective customers identifies that there are three main reasons why an institution’s relationship with engagement data starts with retention. Firstly, it is a tangible means by which an institution can justify the initial outlay – the potential return on investment argument. Secondly, to successfully retain students, they need to be supported to work through issues that are impacting engagement with their studies which in turn, thirdly, makes adoption of a learning analytics solution easier to understand and position internally – largely as enhancing the student learning experience and supporting successful student outcomes are arguments that are easy to identify with.
Other reasons for deploying engagement analytics have emerged in recent years; strands of the same successful outcomes thread, made visible in national policy initiatives like access and participation, the Teaching Excellence Framework or UKVI Student Route requirements. Some of these use cases may be the explicit strategic reason for deploying analytics, others may emerge over time as the benefits of using and making engagement data visible to staff and students in this way, are recognised and realised. I’ll expand on a couple of them here.
Sadly, reports of student suicide, loneliness or poor mental health, particularly post-COVID, are prevalent across the media. Each tragic loss has strengthened the call for universities to be more proactive in supporting students struggling with their mental health. Student Minds, the UKs student mental health charity, partnered with other higher education bodies, and thousands of staff and students to create the University Mental Health Charter. The Charter provides both a principle-driven framework to help ensure student mental health is a university-wide priority, and a programme that allows universities to work together to share best practice and create cultural change. Analytics can help to indicate when an outreach conversation with a student who has started to disengage from their studies might be beneficial which in turn, could lead to health and wellbeing issues identified early – before they become a crisis that could potentially lead to withdrawal. The university can then help the student to access appropriate and timely professional support.
Supporting international student success is another factor driving institutions to have a better understanding of engagement data at the individual level. Institutions that are sponsors of international students under the UKVI Student Route framework are required to show how international students are engaging with their studies. This shift from a focus on physical attendance on campus to engagement with their studies more broadly is a shift that Kortext endorse and has been demonstrated by research conducted at our clients to provide a more holistic representation of what students are doing when it comes to learning.
A whole-institution approach
Whatever the strategic reason underpinning a university’s use of engagement data, this is ultimately a project around business-change. It is for this reason that for Kortext, the introduction of analytics is, as I said at the start, a technology-enabled solution, rather than a technology solution. Given that the OfS regulatory framework focuses on successful outcomes for all students, it makes sense to start with that end goal in mind: how to achieve those successful outcomes? Ultimately, – and this may well be something of a generalisation – the aim of the vast majority of university students is to achieve a degree-level qualification in their chosen subject area with the view to this enhancing their post-graduation employment prospects, their career and life opportunities and, of course, their income. When issues arise that could impact the probability of this happening, university support structures kick in to help the student overcome those barriers to engagement with a view to getting them to re-engage with their studies and stay on track to achieve those successful outcomes.
The data within an analytics platform and the information about student engagement at the individual level are therefore just the starting point in an ecosystem of institutional student support. It is the accompanying knowledge that tutors and students can infer from the engagement information that provides staff with the insights to connect the relevant student and institutional dots, collaboratively make wise decisions about what to do given the circumstances and, ultimately, impact individual outcomes. This is where understanding the strategic priorities for each stakeholder group and the combined priorities for the institution come into play. Universities who choose StREAM as their engagement analytics platform are encouraged to work with us to collaboratively explore stakeholder priorities during the early project phase of a StREAM deployment.
Conclusions
The importance of strategic underpinnings to the success of any change project is not in doubt. Done well, multiple benefits can flow to the institution where the strategic aims and objectives are understood and appreciated across stakeholder groups and a clear line of sight can be established between individual job roles and responsibilities up to the strategic imperatives, and vice versa.
The new requirements for the Teaching Excellence Framework offer providers the ‘opportunity to submit evidence tailored to the specific character of its students and courses, and evidence of how it delivers excellence for all its student groups’2. Further, this combination of course and student specific data and contextual evidence will be considered alongside the institutional TEF indicators meaning that those responsible for drafting a provider submission will need to understand the reasons for any data outliers and anomalies and address them in their submission. From a senior management perspective, there is therefore value in exploring how the strategic priorities for analytics are landing within faculties and subject areas and using disparities between actual data and threshold or target KPIs to encourage subject areas to review and respond how effectively they are utilising the engagement data insights to meaningfully impact individual and therefore university outcomes.
Engagement analytics can also support institutional work to address attainment and assessment gaps identified as part of a provider’s access and participation plan (APP). Awareness of strategic areas of focus from an APP perspective can inform the way in which analytics platforms are configured, the data that is ingested and the set-up of any data filters and reports.
In both scenarios (TEF and APP), understanding the relative importance of the possible reasons for introducing engagement analytics can inform the segmentation of internal marketing communications and help engage members across each different stakeholder group.
A final reason why determining the strategic c priorities for deploying an engagement analytics platform is where it can be useful to bring a level of consistency across a more decentralised institutional structure and help to unite faculties and departments with different degrees of institutional autonomy around a central theme.
Whatever your priorities, the importance of developing and sharing your strategy remains critical if your analytics deployment is to be executed successfully. In the words of Larry Bossidy, former chair and CEO of Honeywell:
‘Execution is the ability to mesh strategy with reality, align people with goals, and achieve the promised results.’
To speak to us about student engagement analytics in relation to your institutions strategic priorities contact us.
