What's New in Business Intelligence?
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The Business Intelligence (BI) team have had a very busy couple of months! Not only have we completed the enhancement project of the Student Profile for Course and Program, but the International Student Statistics and Student Cohort Retention projects are also starting to gather momentum. We have received your very valuable feedback on how to ensure these reports are meeting your needs. See details of these exciting developments and more below.
Student Profile for Course and Program
The BI team are proud to announce enhancements to the Student Profile for Program and Course reporting suites. The enhancements include efficiency in executing reports and a range of new features including the addition of:
• Campus;
• Attendance;
• Disability; and
• First in Family information.
Furthermore, reports have been consolidated with the flexibility to run them at the University, Group, School or Program/Course levels. These improvements make it easier for users to identify the relevant report and provide more functionality to select a range of variables.
After many years, it was time for an overhaul of the University’s Statistics in Brief information. This snapshot (using census date) provides some useful University information. Along with longitudinal (5 year) data, key statistics are now presented in a high-level summary on the landing page, highlighted by captivating infographics and drillable links to detailed reporting. You can find the information here: Statistics in Brief
Reporting using trimesters in the Planning and Statistics Portal (PSP)
In preparation for the new trimester calendar, we are reviewing all reports in the PSP.
Program Cohort Retention reporting was the first report for review, as it is the most complex set of reports requiring an update as a result of the introduction of trimesters. The focus at present is on meeting different user preferences across the academic and administrative areas of the University.
Domestic applications and other reports in the PSP will also be reviewed and updated based on the change to the academic calendar.
Student Cohort Retention
In addition to the work for trimesters, the Program Cohort Retention reporting will be undergoing enhancements, particularly around attrition and load. The enhancements will allow for the merge of useful information found in earlier retention reporting on the PSP in this reporting. If you would like to be involved in this project, please contact us on bi-info@griffith.edu.au
International Student Statistics
The International Student Statistics reporting suite will be refreshed with some exciting enhancements. This project is aimed at:
• updating the report format;
• ensuring it is most relevant and efficient;
• providing easy access to information;
• including trend graphs and data;
• consolidating the reports (from approximately 40 reports to less than ten); and
• the addition of an interactive and drillable report which allows users to select
from Agent, Application, Student or Profile before providing summary data,
which will drill down to record level information.
Keep an eye on the PSP for updates on these developments.
Student Load and Enrolment
Thanks to the feedback of our users, we have a number of enhancements coming for the Student Load and Enrolment reports. Particularly important has been the consolidation of similar reports, allowing users to customise the layout and output, and the addition of funding types. While working through this, we will also be gathering feedback and requirements for ongoing reporting needs. If you would like to be added to our stakeholder list, please contact us on bi-info@griffith.edu.au
Reporting to the government
On 15 October, the student submissions to the Australian Government for the first half of 2016 were signed off by the University as accurate and complete. These submissions are a legislative requirement and enable the University to report student enrolment numbers, demographics and Higher Education Loan Programme (HELP) debt to the Commonwealth. Key statistics from this data are provided below:
* In line with the HEIMS reporting schedule, full year data will be finalised on 15 May 2017.
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Data Warehouse Update
The University’s Data Warehouse has undergone a significant change. Few stakeholders and PSP users were aware of the significance of the delivery, or impacted by the project during this time. The project's benefits include the review and improvement to data and processes, opportunity to build more sophisticated methods of storing transformed data to improve agility and capabilities in a changing environment, and a single source of truth.
The Data Warehouse, Strategic Information Services and Business Intelligence teams all played key parts in the upgrade. None more than the Data Warehouse team however, who delivered the:
• consolidation of internal data warehouse sources;
• transition to a single tool;
• upgrade of the source system - PeopleSoft;
• migration of the Oracle Database; and
• a hardware upgrade.
We would like to acknowledge the work undertaken by the Data Warehouse team – congratulations on the success of this project!
New and improved
A growing number of areas access data stored in the Data Warehouse for their own reporting and analytical requirements. Planning Services is pleased to welcome Information Services in to this group of users.
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New ‘Survey Crew’ Success
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Student Pathway Analysis
Understanding how students perform from different pathways is important for recruitment, marketing and student success. The Advanced Analytics team has started tackling some analysis, with the first step to develop a Griffith Connect School student dashboard.
The project has led to improvements in data quality, understanding of the data, data availability, as well as our understanding of Tableau server deployment. The team is now about to deliver Phase 1 of the project; a dashboard incorporating historical data dating back to 2012 with automatic data updates on the Tableau server. Stakeholders will be able to access the automatic dashboard from their desktop soon. To find out more about the dashboard please contact the Advanced Analytics team.
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Building Analytical Capability
To improve speed and ability to run a range of analytical projects, Advanced Analytics are working on a new analytical server. This server will allow multiple users to develop, execute and serve analytical content simultaneously, and reduce the burden of administering multiple analytical environments. The current (and growing) list of tools to be supported by the new analytical server includes:
• An RStudio Server - for accessing and
work with RStudio anywhere via a web
browser. For those of you who don’t
know, R is a statistical programming
language for advanced analytics.
• A Shiny Server - for combining the computational power of R and the
interactivity of modern web technology to produce interactive analytics.
• A trial Tableau Server - for creating and publishing dashboards that
are accessible anywhere via a web browser and a smartphone.
• A central job manager - to perform tasks such as collecting data,
transforming, publishing data, etc. on a regular basis.
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Musings from our Resident Nerd
If you’re interested in how you might pre-determine the best number of questions in order to minimise the overlap of questions on auto-generated tests in exams, and don’t mind taking the journey with one of our most interesting minds, please review Clancy’s
“A Question of Overlap”.
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Organisational Reviews - Impressive Stats for 2016!
This year has been an exciting and fulfilling year for the Organisational Reviews team - eight of nine reviews have been successfully completed. The reviews span all four academic groups - Science, Health, Arts, and Business; as well as administrative areas in the Office of Research (coming in November) and Griffith Enterprise.
It has been a bumper year with close to 500 staff, 97 industry representatives and 48 students participating in the reviews.
Each review committee is chaired by an internationally-recognised discipline expert, supported by a team of three academic staff - including one internal and two external experts. In 2016, we visited each of Griffith's five campuses, enabling the review committee to gauge the breadth and depth of the University's activities as well as its strategic position in the Brisbane - Gold Coast corridor of South East Queensland.
We were proud to introduce an industry dinner on the second evening of the review committee's visit to all reviews in 2016. Schools prepare a guest list of senior industry and professional partners who enjoy the opportunity to meet with the review committee and the Head of School/Department and relevant Pro Vice Chancellor and exchange views on where the discipline is heading within Australia and internationally and the ways in which the School can position itself to effectively take part in these new directions.
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Introducing our New Team Members
Hi, my name is Brooke Johnston and I have recently commenced as Communications and Stakeholder Engagement Officer within the Survey Services & Engagement Team. Prior to joining Griffith, I was working in national construction companies delivering high-profile projects for local and state governments.
My expertise spans corporate communications, stakeholder engagement, digital marketing, campaigns, event management and marketing strategy. Before starting at Griffith, I was living in Italy where I taught English to children.
This is where I really found my passion for education and was ready to change industries when I returned to Australia.
Since commencing at Griffith, I have been welcomed with professionalism, kindness and support, not only from OPS but the University as a whole. I am impressed by the systems and processes we have in place and am excited to be a part of making a difference in Griffith’s future.
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Hello, I’m Eva Fang, a new member of the Advanced Analytics team. I have been hired as a Data Engineer and will be closely working alongside Clancy and Leo. Before joining Advanced Analytics, I was working as a software engineer for IBM. My technical background includes software development, testing, DevOps and technical writing. A few months ago, I went to Griffith University's Gold Coast campus Open Day, I was impressed by the modern buildings, cutting-edge facilities and the energetic atmosphere. It made me realise how much I missed life at University. So when I came across the job advert of Data Engineer in Advanced Analytics, I applied for it immediately.
Although it has only been a short time, I have seen a lot of professionalism during work hours. I appreciate the support the team has given me and the opportunity to work on various tools and technologies. I look forward working with all of you, and contributing to the success of the team, OPS and Griffith University.
And in case you’re wondering what a data engineer does – they assist with the acquisition and management of data (identification, storage, processing, documentation, manipulation) and related software and server environments with a specific focus on the needs relative to the advanced analytics team.
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PSP Enhancements 
New 'How-to-Video'
Now available to help make your experience navigating through the PSP easier!
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SEC Group Results
Survey Results Available
Please view the first 'group breakdown' survey infographic results for Student Experience of Course (SEC).
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