COMPUTING & IT RESOURCES
What can data tell us about student wellbeing?
Education Today hears from Leo Hanna, UK Executive Vice President at TechnologyOne, on how universities can use data to improve the student experience.
On top of this, there is the data specific to the department(s) that need it most, departmentalised to make it manageable. And the technology systems used to house the data were mostly implemented to serve that department’s needs. There are many departmental datasets, managed by the IT departments, living within discrete systems on servers owned and managed by the university. These systems are required to integrate just to execute simple business processes that keep the university running.
The timetabling system needs to integrate to the student records system, which needs to integrate to the financial management systems, which in turn needs to integrate to the HR system and then to the payroll system or provider. But these integrations are expensive and every time a system is upgraded, the integrations need to be tested and possibly reworked. This is non-negotiable, because the data is necessary.
W
ith student applications falling and international student enrolment significantly down in 2024, universities are facing some of their biggest challenges around student retention.
From a student perspective, the high cost of living is also adding pressure, with 27% of universities opening food banks and seven in ten students indicating that they have considered dropping out of university due to the increase in cost-of-living.
Given the fragility of universities’ financial viability and how closely it is tied to student retention, investing in student wellbeing and monitoring tools becomes more important than ever. The student experience is a phrase that gets used a lot. A singular moniker to describe many discrete but connected components. From the quality of the teaching to the friends made, the shared houses lived in, the part-time jobs and the logistical challenges of being at the right place at the right time. It’s complex.
And of course, it’s not one student, it’s tens of thousands of unique students, each with their individual and specific requirements, challenges, strengths and weaknesses. Therefore, the job of delivering an excellent student experience at scale becomes one of data visualisation and manipulation.
Imagine all the data institutions must hold about every past, prospective or current student, or employee, academic, building or asset.
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In fact data is one of the most powerful assets universities have in delivering an exemplary student experience. However, collecting data is meaningless if you can’t make sense of it, and turn it into an actionable insight to provide a better student experience. By harnessing improved data, institutions can optimise timetables to take into account students’ home locations, financial situations, health conditions and part-time work schedules. Moreover, accurate grade prediction based on comprehensive university data could improve academic outcomes as well as student wellbeing. Finally, the smart use of data can provide early identification of disengaging students, allowing for timely intervention, to reduce dropouts and enhance academic performance.
Picture a unified digital platform streamlining all administrative tasks, from enrolment to graduation. Students could effortlessly manage academic records, finances and course registrations, freeing them to focus on learning.
If students were able to interact with their institution through a consumer-grade digital experience utilising their own journey data, this could foster a stronger connection between students and the institution, potentially leading to improved engagement and outcomes.
However, sadly, most institutions are sitting on a legacy and siloed technical infrastructure that doesn’t allow for the efficient use of data. So how can universities unlock all the goodness for students and the university? One example is the University of Buckingham who has chosen to retire those departmental systems and are now implementing Financials, HR and Payroll and Student Management from TechnologyOne. They went to market looking for a finance system, but when they saw the benefits of combining their data to make the employee and the student experience work better, they broadened the scope of their digital transformation. Technology is only part of the solution, but it is a powerful enabler. The challenge is to unlock the power of the data you already hold to make the university more efficient, with the student experience at the centre of the decisions you make.
February 2025
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