Data Warehousing and Decision Making in Higher Education in the United States

Problem. Compared to the business world, higher education has a lower level of acceptance and a lower rate of adoption of data warehousing for decision making. Studies into the way data warehouses are used in higher education and the extent to which they are used are hard to find. Accordingly, this research examines the use of data warehousing in higher education and its role in decision making. Method. Internet survey research method was used in this study. I asked college and university presidents to provide me with contact details of senior decision makers and technology managers from their institutions. A web-based survey was developed which was then emailed to the 1,438 potential respondents obtained from the presidents. From this sample, 290 completed the survey. Most of the analysis is performed using descriptive statistics. Results. The mean value from 202 responses for extent of use of data warehousing across all levels of management and all subject areas of interest in higher education was 3.02 on a scale of 1 to 5 (1 is low use, 5 is high use). Operational use (3.15) scored higher than tactical (3.05) or strategic use (2.86). Areas of interest making the greatest use of data warehousing were Enrollment (3.64), Student Information (3.50), and Financial Budgeting (3.49). Data warehousing is considered to be important to decision making. Data quality and resourcing were identified as implementation challenges. Better, faster, fact-driven decision making featured in questions about benefits and project objectives. Two thirds of data warehousing projects have completion dates (actual or planned) post 2001. Conclusions. Data warehousing is not used extensively in higher education, although it is regarded as important to decision making. In many institutions, it is still in the emerging or developing stage. Data warehousing is used more for day-to-day operational purposes than for tactical or strategic purposes, except in the financial area where the difference between management levels is not significant.