Data as a Catalyst: Empowering Faculty and Community at Coastal Bend College

By all appearances, Coastal Bend College is a small institution with a student body of just under 4,000, nestled in Beeville, TX. But under the leadership of Dr. Michelle Lane, Executive Director of Institutional Effectiveness & Research, the college is making outsized strides in how it approaches assessment, student success, and institutional improvement.

We sat down with Dr. Lane to understand how her philosophy centered on empowering faculty, leveraging data for informed decision-making, and fostering deep community partnerships is driving key change in these critical areas.

Data as a Compass, Not a Dictator

At the heart of successful institutional effectiveness lies the strategic use of data. Dr. Lane emphasizes that the role of the Institutional Research (IR) office is to guide and inform, not to overwhelm. “What we are figuring out is we might have too much data given out right now without helping to focus the conversations,” she explains. The goal, she clarifies, is to empower faculty by providing targeted data that focuses assessment conversations on student learning, rather than merely crunching numbers.

With this approach, the team at Coastal Bend wants to transform data from a bureaucratic hurdle into a tool for informing improvement. “What we find is, we need to make space for our faculty and staff to have those robust discussions. Not data-driven discussions but data-informed discussions,” Dr. Lane states. She highlights the impact of this frame shift: “We find that when we focus on the students and we focus on their learning, the conversations become much more impactful.”

The IR office, in this model, acts as a “guide on the side.” Dr. Lane elaborates: “We’re not saying, ‘this is what the data is, this is what you have to do,’ but really empowering our faculty and our subject matter experts to own the student learning platform and own that arena.” This sense of ownership, she asserts, has been game-changing: “The faculty owning the work that they do and being given the ownership and the autonomy to celebrate their programs has really been a transformation for this institution.”

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The Imperative of Accurate Data and Continuous Education

Leveraging data in impactful ways hinges on the accuracy and accessibility of data. Dr. Lane notes that systems improvements are making it easier to share data, but cautions that it’s “only as good as how it is put in and structured in a system.” She also stresses the ongoing need for systems education, especially with staff changes. “We may have said something a year ago, but we have whole new players. So we have to come back and re-educate, reiterate, and make sure we didn’t lose anyone along the way.”

A key challenge lies in bridging the gap between data experts and the wider institutional community. “We live in the numbers. We live in the day-to-day data. Most folks do not,” Dr. Lane reminds. “And so it is finding that common language, whether it’s in data or it’s in a system for assessment... Having that common language or a way to translate ‘what we need in the system is this’ so that we can show you ‘how your students are doing here.’ I think this is a really big challenge for any institution.”

When faculty and staff witness tangible progress through data, it creates a powerful ripple effect. “They see some progress happening, and they see some impact for the students,” Dr. Lane observes. “And so when you can see that directly occurring in your classroom, and you can see that you’re making those gains. That’s where your data, I think, becomes the most impactful.”

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Closing the Loop: From Assessment to Action

As a peer evaluator and coach for the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC), Dr. Lane has a unique vantage point on common institutional pitfalls. She reveals that institutions are most frequently dinged not for a lack of data, but for failing to act on assessment findings. “It is not because folks are not doing planning or they’re not doing assessment. But in that continuous improvement cycle, there’s results. And then there’s the use of those results.”

The critical missing piece, she asserts, is the “closing the loop” aspect. “It is one thing to get the data and go, ‘Okay, well, that didn’t work.’ It’s another thing to say, ‘Okay, what parts didn’t work, what parts did? And now what are we going to do about it?’”

A significant missed opportunity, Dr. Lane points out, is the failure to disseminate and scale innovative practices happening within pockets of the institution. “If I have a program and they are moving along and doing what’s absolutely some stellar work, but we have not shared that work with the other programs … we missed the opportunity for other programs to learn.” She passionately advocates for making time and space to share these “magical” innovations, allowing them to “shine across so that everyone can learn and innovate from it.”

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Mapping Processes for a Seamless Student Experience

Beyond data analysis, academic operators such as Dr. Lane are employing practical tools to improve the student journey. Process mapping, Dr. Lane explains, is a “very, very powerful activity to do in any activity or any group across campus.” By stepping into the student’s shoes and examining processes such as class registration, institutions can uncover hidden roadblocks. Particularly, how is a given process serving different student groups, such as students with jobs or students with children? “When you do the process mapping, and you keep in mind those students: Do we really serve all students? Are we really providing that access?” Dr. Lane challenges.

Process mapping also serves as a vital diagnostic tool for long-standing processes that may have become inefficient or outdated. “Sometimes there’s nothing wrong with your process, except nobody’s looked at it in 10 years,” she states. This review can reveal opportunities for automation and greater efficiency, ultimately benefiting students. It “helps having the space to discuss: ‘Is this the most efficient way?’ or ‘This is what we actually do. Is this what our policy says we do? Does this match? Does this align?’ That’s a very impactful thing to do as well.”

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Rekindling Community Connections and Holistic Support

To truly fulfill an institution’s mission, Dr. Lane passionately advocates for community colleges to reaffirm their foundational connection to their surrounding communities. Drawing inspiration from organizations like Achieving the Dream, which focuses on community vibrancy and momentum metrics, she urges institutions to move beyond perfunctory partnerships. “We need to go back to the community side of community colleges,” she emphasizes “Let’s talk about how this town is part of the college as well.”

True partnerships, she stresses, go beyond a handshake and a website mention. “Let’s really look at how we partner. What is the quality of those partnerships? And then making sure that we are keeping that connection. And keeping that work alive, I think, is really, really crucial.” This involves a deeper engagement with economic development and workforce needs and ensuring that the college serves as a catalyst for both regional growth and student mobility.

Coastal Bend College has taken this commitment to heart with its new “Cougar Care” program, offering wraparound services to address students’ holistic needs. Dr. Lane understands that a student’s success can hinge on seemingly small factors: “The difference between succeeding in a semester or not, for a student is a flat tire. Sometimes it is.” By leveraging community resources for mental health, transportation, and internet access, the college aims to provide comprehensive support to students, especially for those in rural areas.

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Navigating the AI Frontier with Literacy and Critical Thinking

While the advent of AI presents both exciting opportunities and critical challenges for higher education, many leaders are grappling with how it can be used most effectively. To address these questions, Coastal Bend College proactively established an AI task force to explore its implications. “Not only are we going to be looking at things like information literacy and how students utilize it, but how do our faculty use it in detection? Also, what are the appropriate avenues for using it in the workspace?” Dr. Lane explains.

While enthusiastic about AI’s potential, particularly for workforce and labor market data, Dr. Lane emphasizes
the paramount importance of AI literacy. “We want to teach our students not only the wonderful, amazing, innovative components that come with AI, but also remind them that it’s a tool.” She sees this as a natural extension of existing educational goals: “That [AI] really just then becomes something else we teach with critical thinking and information literacy.”

In this new era, educators have a crucial role to play in shaping how AI is understood and utilized. “I think now we’re just in that new phase of ‘This is a new exciting tool.’ But it’s only going to be as good as the brains that are putting things in, and the brains that are interpreting it out,” Dr. Lane concludes. “And so if we, as educators, can get on the forefront of that conversation. I think you will see it move pretty big mountains.”