Institutional Research Departmental Goals

• Conducting its research in a careful and confidential manner, using accepted statistical techniques and adhering to the AIR (Association of Institutional Research) professional standards.
• Assisting campus administrators, faculty, and staff to appropriately select research designs, develop surveys, analyze and interpret data, and present meaningful results and findings.
• Gathering and summarizing important university data for the administration’s internal use and/or external dissemination.
• Providing clear and accurate summaries and implications of national comparative data and survey results for decision making and institutional improvement.
• Serving as a resource to the president, the administration, and the campus community for any additional data and research information.

• Annual online publication of fact-sheet-style and other appropriate, relevant institutional data.
• Inclusion of historical summary and current, new data on enrollment, financial aid, academics, majors, faculty, staff, students, finances, campus ministries, facilities, athletics, alumni, and university relations.

• Including, for example, federal and state governmental entities, the International Board of Education of the Church of the Nazarene, the Princeton Review’s Common Data Set, the Higher Learning Commission, and the College Board.
• Annually meeting with and/or providing timely updates and login pass-codes to the IPEDS committee and to appointed data-collection persons, including the registrar, senior controller, and administrative computing staff.
• Providing special training and/or forwarding important information updates to appointed data collectors.
• Attentively monitoring all government deadlines; maintaining a data resource notebook and longitudinal records of data; meeting all government deadlines; and successfully reviewing, locking, and submitting the data in a timely fashion.
• Posting the Common Data Set and other relevant data online for intranet access to insure standardization of external reporting by other MVNU offices.
• Monitoring the deadlines for timely institutional compliance with reporting requirements.
• Emphasizing to the campus community the importance of accurate data collection and reporting.
• Alerting the campus community to the fact the IPEDS data are made available to the public two weeks following the IPEDS submission deadline.
• Advising MVNU regarding the potential benefits and hazards of responding to external data requests by organizations and for-profit companies, such as Barron’s Guide, Peterson’s Guide, and U.S. News and World Report, which demand a high level of care and accuracy in reporting and wisdom and good judgment regarding what and how data are reported.
• Communicating to campus departments important university and comparison data in positive ways that encourage continuous improvement and enhance the image of the institution.

• Represent the institution at campus meetings and in relationships with other institutions and organizations
• Operate and respond in a manner that reflects a code of ethics that is consistent with the MVNU mission, Christian values, ethics, and ideals.