Requesting Data: Policy Details
Note that the Office of Institutional Effectiveness, Registrar, Admissions and other offices on campus will not release any unit-record data (data with identifying variables) except under very specific conditions and only in accordance with FERPA regulations. All identifiers (such as ID number or name) will be redacted, thereby maintaining the confidentiality of the data. There are specific conditions for the release of unit-record data and they are:
- Requests by Board of Trustee members, senior administrators and faculty representatives of standing committees or academic departments for decision-support, institutional planning or departmental assessment, upon approval by the appropriate senior administrator.
- Requests by recognized researchers for scholarly work, to be considered by IE and the appropriate senior office. A request for data must include reason for research, intended audience and plans for dissemination and/or publication.
- Mandated reporting to the State and Federal government.
Unit-record datasets cannot be released to any other parties, including students (even for classroom use or research purposes.) One exception to this policy is that of class rosters released to instructors from the Registrar’s Office. To be eligible to receive any data with identifying factors, the recipient must be approved by the FERPA officer on campus.
Aggregate results of some Institutional Effectiveness reports such as the Common Data Set, Factbook and assessment surveys are considered public and are posted on the IE homepage. Although this information is not subject to FERPA regulations, data posted at the IE website and aggregate data released to you should still be handled with care.
If you are seeking data about Earlham College, please first check the IE website.
If you need to request data for your use or request permission to conduct institutional or campus-wide research, please email [email protected].