Assistant Provost for Data Strategy and Director of Institutional Effectiveness

Quinnipiac University•Hamden, CT

40d•$140,000 - $160,000

About The Position

Quinnipiac University seeks an innovative, strategic leader to transform how the University uses data to understand performance, inform decisions, and shape its future. The Assistant Provost for Data Strategy and Director of Institutional Effectiveness will build and lead an integrated institutional effectiveness and data strategy function encompassing institutional research, analytics, reporting, assessment, and decision support. Reporting to the Vice President for Academic Innovation & Effectiveness, the role serves as the University's senior operational leader for institutional effectiveness and partners with academic and administrative leaders to turn complex data into useful insight. The position will help reduce manual reporting, accelerate the path from questions to answers, expand responsible self-service analytics, and align institutional data and evidence with the University's strategic priorities. The role leads institutional intelligence, research, and assessment; develops governed dashboards, reporting tools, data definitions, governance practices, and quality standards; and advances practical automation and responsible applications of AI and emerging technologies. It uses evidence to support planning, student success, accreditation, grants, and institutional decision-making, while developing data fluency and partnerships across the University. The role also builds, supervises, and develops an institutional research and assessment team and coordinates a broader network of university data leaders. The anticipated salary range is $140,000–$160,000. Applicants must submit a resume, a cover letter addressing their alignment with the requirements and commitment to intentional leadership that values people of all backgrounds and experiences, contact information for three references, and an example of a report delivered to senior administration that combines quantitative metrics and visualizations with narrative analysis and key insights.

Requirements

Master’s degree in higher education, data science, social science, or a related field.
Seven to ten years of experience in institutional research, institutional effectiveness, assessment, analytics, strategic planning, or a related field; higher education experience is preferred.
Demonstrated leadership experience in institutional research, assessment, analytics, data strategy, or decision support.
Strong analytical, quantitative, and qualitative research skills, including experience interpreting complex data and communicating findings to varied audiences.
Knowledge of data governance, data quality, reporting standards, dashboards, and responsible data use.
Experience with responsible uses of AI, automation, and emerging technologies to improve reporting workflows, data validation, documentation, analysis, and insight generation.
Ability to translate data into insight, strategy, and action through clear reports, presentations, visualizations, and recommendations.
Excellent communication, collaboration, consultation, and project management skills.
Ability to work effectively with senior leaders, faculty, staff, information technology, finance, admissions, and academic units.

Nice To Haves

Doctoral degree preferred.
Experience supervising, mentoring, or developing staff preferred.
Experience in higher education preferred.

Responsibilities

Set a vision for an integrated institutional research and assessment function and actively contribute to analyses, reports, and evidence products supporting institutional decisions.
Prepare accurate, trusted institutional reports for federal and state agencies, accreditors, ranking organizations, and other external stakeholders.
Conduct and lead analyses of enrollment, retention, progression, graduation, student success, academic programs, and institutional performance against benchmarks.
Design, conduct, and interpret survey research, benchmarking, peer comparisons, market and environmental analysis, and institutional effectiveness studies, including NSSE and internal instruments.
Strengthen assessment of student learning across academic program review, general education, high-impact practices, online learning, and school- and program-level assessment.
Build a reporting operation that reduces manual work, shortens the path from questions to insight, and expands responsible self-service.
Develop governed dashboards, data products, recurring reports, role-appropriate access, and reusable reporting tools for timely, evidence-informed decisions.
Establish data definitions, governance practices, quality standards, documentation, and service expectations to make institutional data consistent, reliable, and easy to use.
Create intake and triage processes for ad hoc requests and convert recurring needs into scalable solutions where possible.
Identify and implement practical automation opportunities, and prepare scheduled data products, reusable analytical workflows, standardized reports, and automated quality checks.
Lead responsible applications of AI and emerging technologies in appropriate institutional research workflows, including data preparation, validation, documentation, survey analysis, narrative generation, anomaly detection, and forecasting.
Advance predictive, prescriptive, and scenario-based analytics for enrollment, retention, student success, academic planning, resource allocation, and institutional risk awareness.
Prepare analyses, visualizations, forecasts, reports, and decision briefs for university, school, and departmental leaders, connecting evidence to implications, choices, and next steps.
Align assessment, institutional research, accreditation evidence, and planning cycles so findings support documented improvement and curricular innovation.
Support grants, accreditation, strategic initiatives, and executive or governing-body needs with rigorous analyses, evidence, and polished reporting materials.
Maintain expertise in changing reporting standards, external benchmarks, and ranking methodologies, and assess their institutional implications.
Build partnerships with the registrar, One Stop, information services, admissions and financial aid, finance, academic budgets and resource planning, and academic affairs units.
Develop training, consultation, documentation, and office hours to help leaders, faculty, and staff interpret data and use evidence appropriately.
Build, supervise, and develop an institutional research and assessment team, and coordinate a university-wide network of data leaders to strengthen shared standards, collaboration, and evidence-informed practice.