Global Issues in Institutional Research

EDITORS' NOTES 1 Angel Calderon, Karen L. Webber 1. Institutional Research in Light of Internationalization,Growth, and Competition 5 Barrett J. Taylor, Karen L. Webber, Gerrie J. Jacobs Globalization, growth, and competition are challenges faced by manypostsecondary institutions across the world. Institutionalresearchers have a prominent role to play in examining the issuesrelated to these challenges and alerting campus leaders to theimpact they may have on the institution and higher education ingeneral. 2. Institutional Research in Emerging Countries of SouthernAfrica, Latin America, and the Middle East and North Africa: GlobalFrameworks and Local Practices 23 Lis Lange, F. Mauricio Saavedra, Jeanine Romano Focusing on the practice of institutional research in emergingcountries across southern Africa, Latin America, and the MiddleEast and North Africa (MENA) regions, this chapter contextualizesthe growing need for IR in these regions, identifi es problems andchallenges related to the implementation of IR at system andinstitutional levels, and offers some refl ections about the futureof IR in these regions. 3. Challenges in Developing Data Collection Systems in a RapidlyEvolving Higher Education Environment 39 Victor M. H. Borden, Angel Calderon, Neels Fourie, BenedettoLepori, Andrea Bonaccorsi Efforts to develop common higher education data standards areexpanding both within and across countries. The institutionalresearch community plays a critical role in assuring that theseefforts capture the diverse manifestations of the postsecondary andtertiary education systems and promote responsible comparisons. 4. The Evolution and Practice of Institutional Research 59 John Taylor, Martin Hanlon, Mantz Yorke Although institutional research has been a signifi cant featureof U.S. higher education for more than 50 years, it is not so welldeveloped in other parts of the world. As higher education aroundthe world faces increasingly challenging times, IR will inevitablyevolve to become a stronger force. The authors discuss availablemodels that describe organizational maturity and propose acomprehensive maturity model for IR. 5. Institutional Research in the Future: Challenges WithinHigher Education and the Need for Excellence in ProfessionalPractice 77 Angel Calderon, Charles Mathies The upcoming challenge for higher education institutions (HEIs)is how to respond to an increasing variety of societal needs butwith less public resources and increased accountability demands.This chapter draws attention to the central role IR professionalsplay in advancing HEIs, and the need for them to have awell-developed set of skills to support decision-making processes.The chapter concludes by posing questions for the practice of IRinto the future. Index 9