Cornwallis Road ■ P.O. Box ■ Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, USA The View from the IPEDS Help Desk: Providing Practical Solutions to Practically Every Question Jamie Isaac & Janice Kelly-Reid RTI International May 8, 2006 Presented at the 2006 SHEEO/NCES Network Conference and IPEDS Workshop

2 IPEDS Help Desk - Operated since July 2000 by RTI International - Help Desk agents are specially hired and trained to serve IPEDS customers - Open weekdays 8:30am to 5:00pm Eastern time - Open evenings and weekends during the final ten days of each collection

3 What is the Role of the Help Desk? Typically, we have staff, many of them seasoned veterans. We operate out of our Call Center in north Raleigh, NC. Respond to phone calls and s. Make prompting (reminder) calls during the last 2 weeks of each collection. Review and migrate all survey data after locked and complete. At minimum, this means careful review of the edit reports and caveats. We can enter “special notes” for individual schools, so let us know if special treatment is needed for a particular reason.

4 Meet the Help Desk

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6 Help Desk Activity – Collection Year *Through April 28, 2006

7 Inbound Call volume Collection Year *Through April 28, 2006

8 Outbound Call volume Collection Year *Through April 28, 2006

9 Communicating via Telephone Inbound Help Desk Calls (44%) No Data Prompt (24%) Data Issue Follow-Up (14%) Not Registered Prompt (9%) Bounced Follow-Up (7%) Responding to Voic (2%) Help Desk Call Activity by Type

10 Undeliverable s Turning the tide?  As we increased our use of prompting during the first few years of the web-based collection, undeliverable s became a bigger and bigger problem due to the sheer volume of them.  In 2003 we converted our systems so that they were no longer sent in “bulk.”  In the summer of 2004 we sent a letter to all Keyholders addressing delivery issues.  We continue to educate keyholders, and see a steady decline in the number of undeliverable s.

11 Undeliverable s “Bounced” s

12 Undeliverable s But have we really “turned the tide”?  Significant Changes in Internet Technology  Increase in SPAM filters– is filtered out prior to recipient, and neither sender nor receiver is aware.  “Approved” senders lists used more extensively.  Fewer systems send automated delivery failure notices (e.g. “bounced ”)  If the domain is valid, but username doesn’t exist, won’t be successfully delivered, yet it won’t “bounce” either.  Thus, while the number of Non-Deliverable s is declining, the “successful” delivery of s is not necessarily ensured.

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14 Last Minute Submissions Still a big problem! The collection system becomes overloaded during the last few days of each collection, resulting in sluggish system response. It takes longer to enter data on these days. Call volume to Help Desk increases dramatically, resulting in “hold” time. We received over 1800 inbound calls during the last 3 days of the Spring collection.

15 Typical Pattern of Response Daily Volume of Calls and Surveys Locked - Winter Collection

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17 Data Review Issues  Data Review by Help Desk Staff prior to migration to PAS  Following completion of all locks, critical fields are reviewed, especially those that cannot be edited automatically.  We pay special attention to the caveats, since many of these are posted to COOL, and often have problems such as: Typos, grammar problems, run-on sentences Acting as explanations (and sometimes bad ones at that) or instructions Make no sense when compared with the data

18 Data Review Issues  In summary:  Please know that edit explanations must explain the issue, otherwise the school will be contacted.  Thank you for your assistance in reviewing caveats and edit explanations to make sure that they are appropriate.  These efforts do seem to be making the data better, so hopefully it is worth the extra effort!

19 From the past 5 years… some of our favorite lines...  Who are you and why are you sending me this ?  I have to collect the information from many different sources within our organization. This takes time and energy!  I saw that the directions were finally posted. I haven’t read them, but I’m sure they’re not clear.

20 From the past 5 years… some of our favorite lines...  It is well known in the world of institutional research that federal answers take longer to calculate.  We registered but never got a User ID or password. Can we get one?  Forgive me for commenting…. but filling out IPEDS, or even thinking about it, is like going to the dentist.  Wow, you are really nagging this year!

21 Just For Fun…  Top Ten Suggestions for Making IPEDS more interesting: 10) Start an IPEDS blog where keyholders can write about their hobbies and upload snapshots 9) Require that the president, provost, or other chief executive enter all data 8) Instead of just perturbing the numeric data, perturb the caveats too 7) Provide an all-expense-paid vacation to any keyholder whose data do not result in edit flags

22  Top Ten Suggestions for Making IPEDS more interesting: 6) Allow submission of IPEDS data via telepathy 5) Ask Simon Cowell to develop an “American Keyholder” show to identify talented new Keyholders 4) Require all data fields to be in prime numbers only 3) Hire the GEICO Gecko as the IPEDS mascot 2) Offer IPEDS in lo-carb and high fiber varieties Just For Fun… IPEDS

23 Just For Fun…  And the Number One Suggestion for Making IPEDS more interesting: 1) Randomly match keyholders to schools!

24 In Closing… Thank you for your assistance in making IPEDS successful! As usual, we have an appreciation gift… but you will just have to wait until later to find out what it is! …and finally….