Week 2

Why Now?

Why are learning analytics gaining attention today? What has changed over the last several years that is now producing significant interest and attention in analytics?

Data science and analytics sit at a crossroads of several significant development including

• Increased quantity of data.
• Increased computing power.
• Increased storage of data.
• New types of data being captured (such as mobile data, data automatically captured by sensors).
• Greater emphasis on efficiency and accountability of public institutions, largely driven by the current economic climate.
• Growth of "data-based decision making" and statistical models for planning and acting, rather than traditional focus on "gut instinct" and intuition.

Taken together, these trends produce a climate where not only the data, tools and technology exists for analytics, but the will of business leaders, politicians, and university leaders/faculty is slanted toward data and analytics as a strategic tool.

This week we'll build on the readings and topics that we covered last week by looking at a few cases or examples of the use of analytics.

Readings

Kolowich, S. (2010, November 9). Technology and the completion agenda. Retrieved from the Inside Higher Ed website: http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/11/09/completion

LeBlanc, R. (2011). Why big data? Why now? Retrieved from https://www.slideshare.net/MauricioSWG/robert-leblanc-why-big-data-why-now

Peter Norvig – The unreasonable effectiveness of data [Video]. (2010). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvDCzhbjYWs

Activities

1. Complete your profile on The Landing (https://landing.athabascau.ca/groups/profile/10337535/comp683-learning-and-knowledge-analytics-fall-2021) and join the Learning and Knowledge Analytics group (Fall 2021).