Overview
The M.S. in Higher Education Assessment, Analytics, and Change Management is an applied interdisciplinary online degree program that fuses education and business practices to improve institutional function and influence. The 30-credit accelerated and fully online curriculum helps students use data, research, theory, and analytics to understand how higher education institutions identify and improve performance outcomes. Students will become change leaders as they develop expertise in higher education administration, organizational performance, data mining, analytics, and change leadership.
The program is intended to advance the careers of educational professionals interested in institutional research, outcomes assessment, enrollment management, data analytics, and organizational effectiveness. The primary target audience will be professionals working in institutions of higher education who have experience or responsibilities in the aforementioned areas. Secondary audiences may be those working in the aforementioned areas but at the K-12 level or in educational services organizations. Both rising education disruptors and seasoned professionals will find new tools, practices, and credentials to create stronger, more effective higher education organizations.
Curriculum Overview
The 30-credit program serves those who work in a range of higher education functions and provides coursework to promote and support strategic thinking and leadership of organizational change through data analytics and collaborative decision making. Courses are offered fully online over seven weeks in the fall, spring, and summer semesters providing students with flexibility in developing their own program plan.
For those professionals who are not seeking a degree, an opportunity for professional development is provided via a noncredit option, the Higher Education Assessment Certificate.
Certificate Offered
- Certificate in Higher Education Assessment
Contact
Kellie M. McKinney, Ed.D.
Program Director
Program Website: Higher Education Assessment Certificate
Associated Department: Department of Graduate Education, Leadership, and Counseling
Related Programs
Program Requirements
(30 credits)
| Code | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| Required Courses: | ||
| EDUC 525 | The Higher Education Organization | 3 |
| EDUC 540 | Leading Operations, Change and Assessment in Higher Education | 3 |
| EDUC 541 | Assessing Organizational Performance in Higher Education | 3 |
| EDUC 542 | Assessment of Student Learning in Higher Education | 3 |
| EDUC 543 | Communicating Educational Data | 3 |
| EDUC 545 | Capstone Seminar in Institutional Effectiveness | 3 |
| PMBA 8312 | Business Intelligence Tech-Data Mining | 3 |
| LEAD 511 | Facilitating Culture and Process Change in Organizations | 3 |
| PMBA 8317 | Applied Data Management for Business Users | 3 |
| PMBA 8351 | Business Analytics Fundamentals | 3 |
| Total Credits | 30 | |
Students in this program will:
- Comply with the general requirements concerning graduate study at the master’s degree level.
- Enroll in graduate study at Rider for no fewer than two academic semesters or the equivalent thereof.
- Complete at least 30 credits of graduate study.
- Successfully pass a culminating experience and related written requirements.
- Maintain a GPA of “B” (3.0) or better for work submitted for the master’s degree.
- Complete the program within six years of the date the student enrolled in his/her first course unless an extension is approved by the Department of Graduate Education, Leadership, and Counseling.
Courses and Descriptions
EDUC 525 The Higher Education Organization 3 Credits
This course allows students to gain perspective on the historical and societal context of higher education in America and the organizational structures, functions, behaviors, and cultures that exist within institutions.
EDUC 540 Leading Operations, Change and Assessment in Higher Education 3 Credits
In this course, students will gain an understanding of the daily and long-term operational challenges colleges and universities face. The course intends to cultivate a strategic mindset about higher education organizations and a recognition that institutions exist in a competitive environment that require them to change in order to survive.
EDUC 541 Assessing Organizational Performance in Higher Education 3 Credits
Through this course, students will be introduced to the concept of institutional effectiveness which focuses on an institution’s ability to use planning strategies and evaluation information to assess current performance and plan for improvements. Students will understand the importance of a performance assessment culture including the presence of clear performance goals and measures, collaborative decision-making, and engaged leadership. A focus on determining what should be assessed in academic and administrative units and strategies for initiating performance assessment programs is reviewed.
EDUC 542 Assessment of Student Learning in Higher Education 3 Credits
This course examines institutional effectiveness matters focusing on assessment processes in higher education. It explores topics such as the evaluation of academic programs, assessment of student learning outcomes, and involvement in accreditation and accountability demands in higher education. Here, the focus is on how colleges and universities are doing assessment, at the classroom, program, and institutional levels. The course covers the pragmatic planning skills and decision-support tools relevant to assessing student learning. Just as businesses are expected to adhere to compliance and ethics standards, this course provides an in-depth look at how universities’ adherence to standards pertaining to academic success can and will lead to an assurance that accredited universities are achieving their institutional goals, meeting the public's’ expectations, and realizing their greater societal mission.
EDUC 543 Communicating Educational Data 3 Credits
Through this course, students will develop skills in statistical communication, incorporating data into delivery methods such as writing, public speaking, teaching, informal conversation and collaboration, programming, and graphic visualizations. Students will understand the importance of creating a data-informed culture and how it contributes to an organization’s success. They will also learn methods and strategies of how to communicate to a non-technical audience.
EDUC 545 Capstone Seminar in Institutional Effectiveness 3 Credits
This course will offer students an opportunity to reflect on their own work, considering their development as scholars, practitioners, and leaders in the field of higher education. Students will demonstrate mastery of content through a significant project adapted to the professional requirements of a practicum site or their current employer, which will require students to access, analyze, manage, and present data to an organization’s decision makers. The goal is to provide an opportunity to apply what students have learned about how to make data-driven decisions to a real business or operational challenge faced by a higher education organization.
Prerequisite(s): Requires approval from Program Director. Must have completed all other program requirements.
LEAD 511 Facilitating Culture and Process Change in Organizations 3 Credits
Organizational culture and existing processes can enable productive and effective environments, or they can be barriers to carrying out the central missions of corporations, not-for-profits, governmental or educational institutions. For organizations to thrive and survive in the future they must be able to change and develop rapidly. This course provides a working knowledge of the key theories and practices necessary to be an effective change agent. Students develop skills in diagnosis, design of interventions and strategies for communicating change.
PMBA 8312 Business Intelligence Tech-Data Mining 3 Credits
In this course, students will learn to solve problems/exploit opportunities by processing datasets, interpreting results, and deploying solutions. This course provides hands-on experience with these tasks. Upon this base of experience, students will build a robust data mining methodology that can be applied to real-world investigations. The course of study will include Online Analytical Processing (OLAP), statistical and machine learning techniques, and unstructured text analysis. Students will learn to apply these techniques through the study of payroll, procurement, and expense report fraud. Cell phone and credit card fraud, credit and bankruptcy analysis, and customer relationship management will also be covered.
PMBA 8317 Applied Data Management for Business Users 3 Credits
Learn the benefits of data sharing in a business organization , the benefits of the relational database model, how data is structured in a relational database model, and how data can be accessed in a relational database using the structured query language (SQL). The process of formatting, loading, and accessing data for data analytics will be shown as well as the interaction with data warehouse schemas such as the star schema and snowflake scheme.
PMBA 8358 Data-Driven Strategies for Business 3 Credits
In this course, several real-world business problems will be presented as case studies for the application of descriptive, predictive, and prescriptive analytics. Relevant business areas for these problems include online recommendations, healthcare, sports management, marketing, and revenue management. Through these business case studies, students will (1) define a real-world problem in the context of business analytics (2) develop hands-on experience on implementing analytics methodologies (3) learn to derive and communicate insights from analytics results and (4) practice the formulation of data-driven strategies.