| |
|
|
from the issue of September 30, 2004
|
| |
|
|
| |
Nunez, IRP keep the information flowing
BY TOM HANCOCK, UNIVERSITY COMMUNICATIONS
One of Bill Nunez's favorite sayings is, "Never change anything until you understand how it works." As director of the Office of Institutional Research and Planning, he helps units within and outside of UNL gain that understanding.
| | Bill Nunez is director of Institutional Research and Planning at UNL. His office provides data on all sorts of university statistics to a variety of sources and assists with larger campus planning issues. Photo by Brett Hampton.
| |
The Office of Institutional Research and Planning's core job is to provide information to assist UNL units in decision-making and to help advance the institution, Nunez said. Some of the information the office tracks includes student enrollment, retention rates, graduation rates, salary comparisons, gender equity and pay.
"I want IRP to be seen as the go-to place for information," Nunez said. "If we don't know the answer, we will know where to point (people) to get it. We want people to think of us as proactive. We want to be seen as a group that provides solid information that can help in making a decision."
Nunez works with the chancellor's office, deans, department chairs and others, and receives many ad hoc requests. For example, if the chancellor wants to know if there has been a shift in degree awards in a particular college, Nunez's department will find the answer. Or a department chair might want information about how many students are in the department, the ethnic distribution, gender, average age, and how many degrees have been awarded in the last five years.
The office also gathers information for use in campus planning, Nunez said. Workers coordinate with on- and off-campus groups to ensure adequate input from all involved. Academics, recreation, parking, housing and landscaping are all part of campus planning. The university balances interests between groups, and the office provides data to help make those decisions. An example is how to deal with space allocation and finding the best use of a building.
"We want to find the combinations of use that make the most sense," Nunez said. "Someone has to carry the torch, and many times IRP facilitates that. The ultimate decision is often the chancellor's or a dean's. We rely on the senior administrative team and vice chancellors to approve or disapprove a plan."
Peer analysis is a big part of the office's work, Nunez said. The office has information on UNL's 10 peer schools and also compares UNL to the 62 institutions in the American Association of Universities. The office tracks a wide variety of topics. For example, the office might look into how many peer universities are asking for a deposit from students before admission. Or the office might look at retention rates for comparison.
Another example is enrollment trends. In some areas in the United States, such as the Sun Belt, high school graduation rates are skyrocketing, while in other areas, such as the central and northern Plains, graduation rates are flat or declining. The details are important to know for determining how to formulate recruitment practices at the university. Credit hour production is also tracked. If there is low student demand in a high-cost course, for example, administrators will want to investigate why. All this research is oriented toward the goal of making the university more efficient, Nunez said.
In addition to peer comparisons, Nunez's office completes standard reports required by the state and federal government, such as the Integrated Post-Secondary Education Data System. Such reports require the office to provide information about students, degrees, faculty and salaries. The office also creates a fact book, trend report and a profile of the institution. It provides the information for the U.S. News and World Report annual ranking of universities as well as dozens of other surveys.
On top of creating the required reports and answering questions from anyone inside UNL, the press and private businesses also request information from the department. An accounting firm, for example, may want to know how many accounting graduates to expect in a particular year and how many students are enrolled.
All in all, the office has received more than 400 requests for information in the past two years.
"We want to get content in front of the public as much as possible," Nunez said. "I want to have available to the university community, either through online or published materials, data and information that answer 80 percent of all inquiries. The other 20 percent are generally much more complicated and require significant analyses and staff time. But, given that the bulk of requests would be satisfied through published materials, more staff time would be made available."
The university was also recently selected as national host of the American Association of Universities Data Exchange. UNL will collect, exchange and report information for members of the AAU.
Nunez earned a bachelor's degree from Missouri Western, an MBA from Northwest Missouri University, and a master of arts and doctorate at the University of Louisville in Kentucky. His doctorate is in educational administration.
After receiving his MBA in 1991, Nunez worked for Robinson Nugent, a 3M company specializing in copper and fiber optic interconnect products for electronic applications. He was responsible for marketing research as well as product marketing. He then worked at the University of Louisville Office of Planning and Budget to coordinate planning and lead institutional research. He also served as assistant director for planning and institutional research. Nunez earned his master of arts and doctorate degrees while working at Louisville. He has been at UNL since September 2003.
The move to Lincoln was made easier by UNL's IRP colleagues, Nunez says, whom he praises for their support and knowledge.
"I have staff with excellent institutional knowledge and history as well as technical skills. They are wonderful resources for our operation," he said. "They also are open to new ideas and challenges. Together we will create an IRP office that is a 'one-stop information resource' for the university community."
GO TO: ISSUE OF SEPTEMBER 30
NEWS HEADLINES FOR SEPTEMBER 30
Nunez, IRP keep the information flowing
Grant aids American Indians in mental-health-care research
Grant focuses on math transitions
Seminars tackle U.S. role in world
A Piece of University History
A Tepee Goes Up On Campus
Be careful how you use your work computer
Campus announces Internet access changes
731854S33677X
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|