Using National, State, and Local Data for Administrative Decision-Making: Sathasivam ‘Kris’ Krishnan, Chengbo Yin, William Mahler, Albertha H. Lawson, Michael Harris, and Karen Ruedinger

From its inception, higher education has operated according to tradition, intuition, and a complex set of rules and regulations. Data-informed decision making gives higher education leaders an increased ability to know what works and how to improve the areas of challenge for the benefit of their constituents. “We may intend that our decisions result in the best for our organization (to be effective), but we may not have enough information, we may not understand the information we have, or we may be influenced by ideological or even moral ideas that push us into decisions that are not the best for us or our organizations” (Hall, 2002, p. 152).