Institutional Research
The University of Tennessee System Institutional Research (IR) oversees the management, storage and governance of UT System Administration data used for decision support, planning, reporting and analytical studies.
What is Institutional Research?
Institutional research is research conducted within an institution of higher education to provide information which supports institutional planning, policy formation, decision making and serve the governance responsibilities which reside within the system (Saupe, 1990).
Role and Function
UT System Institutional Research:
- manages the creation of University System Administration data policy and supporting processes and tools;
- organizes and facilitates a Systemwide committee overseeing data governance;
- works with System executive officers to integrate data strategy into strategic planning and operational decision-making;
- develops policies to increase University System Administration accessibility to data for analytics;
- encourages a Systemwide culture of data driven decision making;
- collaborates with IT security, legal, audit and other key administrative officers to ensure that the data management and use complies with regulatory requirements and security policies;
- serves to facilitate collaboration between University System Administration and each of the campuses to ensure data standardization and reporting alignment
- works directly with campus-level institutional research directors to serve as recognized points of contact for sharing data, creating common data definitions, identifying discrepancies and data validation.
Reporting Cycle
O1 JANUARY
- Internal UT – UT System HR Annual Employee Turnover Report; Campus Submissions: Fall End of Term Student Data; UT Presence by Legislative District
- Public – UT Transparency Impact by County
02 FEBRUARY
- Internal UT – Campus Submissions: Spring Census Student Data; Annual Diversity Metrics of Student, Faculty, and Staff
- Board of Trustees – Winter BOT Meeting: UT Institutions’ Peers Comparison Metrics and At A Glance Infographic
03 MARCH
- Internal UT – Annual Request for Changes to Campus Data Collection
- THEC – Fall End of Term Student Enrollment and Course Data
04 APRIL
- IPEDS – Annual Survey of UT System Office and IPS Human Resources
05 MAY
- Internal UT – Annual Data Dictionaries and Staging Table Script and ITS/OIT IPEDS Licensing Reports
06 JUNE
- Internal UT – Campus Submissions: Spring End of Term Student Data
- Board of Trustees – Summer BOT Meeting: UT Faculty & Staff Academic Year Trend Metrics and At A Glance Infographic
07 JULY
- THEC – Spring End of Term Student Enrollment and Course Data
08 AUGUST
- Internal UT – UT System HR Annual Title VI (Diversity) Report
09 SEPTEMBER
- Internal UT – Campus Submissions: Fall Census and Summer End of Term Student Data and Annual Degrees Awarded
- THEC – Annual Student Degrees Awarded
- Public – UT Transparency Student Dashboards
10 OCTOBER
- THEC – Summer End of Term Student Enrollment and Course Data
- Board of Trustees – Fall BOT Meeting: UT Enrollment & Student Success Metrics and At A Glance Infographic
11 NOVEMBER
- Public – UT Transparency Salary Dashboard
12 DECEMBER
- Public – UT Transparency Student Dashboard Peer Data (Timing dependent on IPEDS release date)
Services
We provide data and analyses related to students, faculty, staff, research, finance, alumni and facilities. See data.tennessee.edu for examples. If you are interested in requesting data, please complete our Data Request form.
All data is stored in the UT System’s Consolidated Data Repository.

After passing quality check data is stored in a staging environment, Data Warehouse, and Consolidated Data Repository, all powered by Microsoft SQL Database Engine.
A data dictionary for all sources and definitions is maintained independently for this data model.
Semantic models powered by Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services (SSAS) interpret information from the Consolidated Data Repository for a presentation layer. These take the form of data visualizations, including reports and dashboards generated with the Power BI reporting service.
Partners
IR partners have offices across the UT System to gather information and data. Primary partners include the Tennessee Higher Education Commission and each campuses’ institutional research offices: UT Knoxville, UT Chattanooga, UT Martin and UT Health Science Center.
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