Improving Skills and Capabilities in the Conduct of Institutional Research in Postsecondary Educational Institutions

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9523700 Russell This five-year project will support a variety of activities designed to promote the use of national databases maintained by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the U. S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). The grantee, the Association for Institutional Research (AIR, will organize and administer a program to support several types of awards to investigators using these data bases. The project will consist of three components. The first component would support fellowships to individuals, to support on-site work in Washington, DC Project would be expected to utilize national databases and also provide a significant professional development experience to the fellow. The second would support research work at the awardees home institution, either on national databases or work of such a nature that it will contribute to an overall understanding of postsecondary education or to the professional development of personnel working in postsecondary education. The third component would provide small grants for communicating and disseminating information about the content of the NSF and NCES databases and techniques for utilization of these databases for analysis. Activities under this component could include small meetings or seminars, support for special sessions at larger meetings, special publications, or other dissemination activities. Results from all projects will be disseminated through a variety of means to the user community. This project will be administered by the Executive Officer of the AIR, which will publicize the availability of project funds, organize and conduct review panels for evaluating individual proposals. A Grant and Fellowship Advisory Committee will provide guidance on program direction and priorities; NSF and NCES will be represented on the committee. Other members will be broadly representative of the higher education research community. The project offers benefits including greater visibility of issues in postsecondary education and science and engineering education, and improved data quality fostered by greater use and scrutiny of existing data sources.