Help Students Jump Ahead... Let the Data Flow!

I recently started listening to episodes of the Leading Community Colleges of California podcast with Larry Galizio, Ph.D. I wanted to better understand community colleges, and they have helped me to think differently about the challenge to get more nurses, hospitality professionals and other people into the workforce.

The reality is that we have millions of people in the United States that are eligible for education that would lead to filling gaps that exist. In my full-time role I think about #nursing, but in my teaching and non-profit work I think about employment trends in #hospitality and #tourism. If we have so many people out there that could be students, what's standing in the way?

In a recent podcast episode with Dr. Galizio, "Let the data flow" was a mantra expressed by California Community College Chancellor Sonya Christian . I think this is something that all higher education professionals and related organizations should adopt.

Dr. Christian's example of dual enrollment was a great illustration, in that we already have a ton of students in our pipeline. Why do we have to create redundant barriers for students that already qualify? Why does the partner college need a new application for admission? If they have already provided their data, it could be as simple as running a report of students that qualify for a particular program and inviting them.

The above example reminds me of a former institution where we would have every high school student who visited campus fill out a physical card. What happened with that data was up to whoever is sitting in the chair when the cards come back. If coded incorrectly, we may not even follow up - and certainly not "let the data flow..."

When Dr. Christian speaks of data, I think of #CRM - customer relationship management, as well as lead generation. When I teach this concept in hospitality courses, the idea is to create a system that matches your business needs. For a #coffeeshop with one or two locations, a simple pad & pen sign-up sheet was sufficient. In recent years this has been replaced by Square and Clover , simple systems that grab customer data when payment is made - instant loyalty programs. For a bigger organization, you might go to a platform like Salesforce which has almost unlimited fields and customization. This is what I use for admissions, and it is uber helpful to run all sorts of reports. The point is that we have all of this data at our fingertips, but we don't always use it.

My biggest takeaway of what Dr. Christian said is something that I have told students and clients for years - have a plan for what to do with the data.

As I think about the data that's out there, let's take a look at what could be done. Any college that sponsors events (college readiness, career days, etc.) with junior or high school students has an opportunity to collect student contact information so long as they follow proper guidelines. Let's assume that this creates a bank of data that can be coded to fuel a variety of programs that exist. "Coded" means there are parts of the data collected that can trigger a response from the college; e.g. this student is eligible for our "Urban Scholars" program.

To Dr. Christian's point, data can have more than one life. It can be used once to trigger one thing, and then again to trigger something entirely different. More importantly, "let the data flow" also asks us to cut out the procedural, repetitive, bureaucratic applications that create unnecessary friction. It also requires the proper infrastructure - so that platforms can talk to each other. Once you've addressed the obligatory security issues, something as simple as a Zapier connection can build new data bridges.

Looking back at various roles and organizations, I can think of so many missed opportunities. However I also recognize that these inefficient systems of sharing data allow entire units of people to operate. Letting the data flow means change, and not everyone wants to...

What would "letting the data flow" mean for your organization?