Page 4 – Outreach and Training

HelioCampus Training Videos

• HelioCampus Basic User Training – May 18, 2021
  • Introduction to the presentation and use of admissions, enrollment, graduation, and persistence dashboards (Presented by HelioCampus)
• HelioCampus Basic User Training – May 20, 2021
  • An encore presentation of the May 18th meeting
• HelioCampus Power User Training – Admissions and Course Registrations – June 8, 2021
• HelioCampus Power User Training – Retention, Persistence, Completions – June 11, 2021
• HelioCampus Basic User Training – August 18, 2021
• HelioCampus Data Science Kickoff – August 20, 2021

REX Analytics and Data Visualization Meeting Videos

• REX Analytics and Data Visualization Meeting – November 5, 2021
  • Discussion items: Course Insights Dashboard; Visualizing Application Data with Tableau; Grade Migration: How Performance in Prerequisites can have downstream effects; What happens to admitted students that do not enroll at UMBC?; Upcoming – HelioCampus Playbooks, Retention Predictive Models, Visualizing the LRS, Graduate Enrollment Monitor

• REX Analytics and Data Visualization Presentation – April 16, 2021
  • Discussion items: how undergraduate academic affairs is using selected analytics tools for improving students success (student engagement, graduation prediction models); updates and the use of matriculation and summer melt models, where do “no show” admitted freshmen go?; an analysis of difficult course combinations

• REX Analytics and Data Visualization Meeting – February 26, 2021
  • Discussion items: how to get help with data, analytics, and reports; the helio campus admission and enrollment dashboards; deployed predictive models for course success, matriculation, and summer melt

Tableau Self-Guided Training Resources
The full list of Free Tableau Training Videos

Essential, curated, information that you’ll need to get started with Tableau and HelioCampus

• Getting a Tableau license (to publish on the free Tableau public server)
• Getting a Desktop/Creator license (to publish at UMBC) submit a Request Tracker (RT) ticket for “REX Analytics”
  • Important: Do not use the most recent version as it does not work with our server.
    When registering the software use the license provided as the product key.
    When asked for the Tableau Server, use – https://rexanalytics.umbc.edu
• Learning how to use UMBC’s Virtual Private Network (Global VPN)
• Getting access to HelioCampus
• What type of user am I? The different types of Tableau (Role-Based) Licenses
  • Basic: Viewer
  • Intermediate: Explorer
  • Advanced: Creator
• Tableau Training Video Recommendations (Short Curriculum)
  • For Viewers (9 minutes)
    • Getting Started with Tableau (Requires creation of a free account)
    • Interacting with Tableau Content
  • For Explorers, Viewer training videos plus…(19 minutes)
    • Web Authoring
    • Constructing Data-Driven Alerts
    • Asking Questions of the Data
    • What Story is the Data Telling?
  • For Creators, Explorer training videos plus…(357 minutes)
    • The Tableau Interface
    • Distributing and Publishing
    • Connecting to Data
    • Visual Analytics
    • Dashboards and Stories
• Generating reports with Tableau that have the look and feel of “classic” REX reports

Publications and Presentations

Selected Articles, Case Studies, Presentations and Scholarship

02/12/2025: “Why and How to Build a Learning Analytics Community of Practice,” The Evolllution.

09/01/23: “Inclusive excellence online: Pandemic lessons learned supporting traditionally underserved students,” in Advances in Online Education: A Peer-Reviewed Journal (Volume 2, Issue 1), Fall 2023 | UMBC Box Version (login req’d).

08/24/23: “Banking on adaptive questions to nudge student responsibility for learning in general chemistry,” in Data Analytics and Adaptive Learning (2023) | UMBC Box version (login req’d).

05/11/22: “Analytics without Action is Just Analysis,” keynote presentation & recording, Indiana University Learning Analytics Summit.

01/21/22: “Storytelling with Learning Analytics: Shifting of Faculty Perspectives About Student Success,” AAC&U Annual Meeting (presentation with Indiana University & University of Southern Indiana).

12/17/21: “Using Learning Analytics and Instructional Design to Inform, Find, and Scale Quality Online Learning,” in Online Learning Analytics  | UMBC Box version (login req’d).

09/29/21: “Scaling Course Design as Learning Analytics Variable,” in Blended Learning Research Perspectives, Vol. 3, Ch. 5. | UMBC Box version (login req’d).

05/26/20: “Ethical Learning Analytics: ‘Do No Harm’ Versus ‘Do Nothing,'” in New Directions in Institutional Research, Vol. 2019, Issue 183, pp. 27-38. | UMBC Box version (login req’d).

11/19/19: Faculty Senate Executive Committee, “Analytics Overview Presentation to the Faculty Senate Executive Committee,” UMBC

9/18/19: Cornell Data Science Forum, “Applications and how to push the last mile: Inaugural Cornell Data Science Forum,” Cornell University, Ithaca, NY

9/18/19: Cornell Data Science Forum, “Aligning data science investments to create value: Cornell Data Science Forum,” Cornell University, Ithaca, NY

7/31/19: “Predictive Analytics in Pursuit of Student Success“, Educause (YouTube)

3/28/19: “Triangulating Student Engagement with ‘Built and Bought” Learning Analytics” (Emerging Trends in Learning Analytics)

11/26/18: “UMBC partners with Blackboard, VitalSource on research to support student success” (UMBC News)

8/9/18: “Combining Data from Multiple Digital Learning Tools Produces Better Prediction” (Campus Technology)

7/23/18: “Here’s what makes students 200 percent more likely to pass” (eCampus News)

7/12/18: “Combining Activity Data from Multiple Sources to Improve Student Success Presentations” (Blackboard Blog)

2/1/18: “The use of Blackboard Predict in UMBC’s Student Success Support Ecosystem” (Bb Analytics Summit)

9/19/17: “The Secret to Life-long Learning is Taking Responsibility for It,” in ELearn Magazine.

9/7/17: “Using Analytics to Nudge Student Responsibility for Learning” in Learning Analytics in Higher Education.

8/14/17: Oregon State University Research in Action (RIA) Podcast #72: “Dr. John Fritz on Researching Course Design and Analytics”

8/10/17: “3 Ways IT is Impacting Student Success” in Campus Technology

8/10/17: “Students want more real-time information about progress” in Education Dive

7/27/17: “Linking Data to Decision-Making” in Campus Technology

7/27/17: “Organizational strategies for student success: decisions, decisions” (BbWorld17 presentation)

7/17/17: “Moving the Heart and Head: Implications for Learning Analytics Research” in Educause Review Online

2/27/17: “Learning Analytics for LMS Course Design: Two Studies” in Educause Review Online

2/1/17: “Using Technology to Leverage Peer Pressure” @ Blackboard Analytics Symposium

11/14/16“Modeling an IT Strategy for Student Success” in Educause Review Online

July 2016: Dissertation: Using Analytics to Encourage Student Responsibility for Learning and Identify Course Designs That Help

6/11/16: “Maryland universities to use data to predict student success — or failure,” The Baltimore Sun

4/25/16: “LMS Course Design as Learning Analytics Variable,” LAK 2016 Proceedings

4/19/16: “JISC Case Study: Analysing Use of the Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) at UMBC”

1/28/16: “Unlocking Predictive Analytics to Improve Student Engagement and Retention,” Campus Technology

11/10/15: “Using FAQs to Help Users Help Themselves,” ACM Proceedings for 2015 SIGUCCS Annual Meeting

8/5/13: “It’s Not Just the IT Help Desk Anymore,” EDUCAUSE Review Online

4/30/13: “Encouraging Student Responsibility and Identifying Effective Course Designs,” ECAR Research Bulletin

9/6/12: “How Analytics Changed A University Accounting Course — And Student Behavior,” Data Informed

9/5/12: “Video Discussion on Student Analytics Between IR, Enrollment Management, and IT

9/5/12: “Using Analytics for Institutional Transformation,” EDUCAUSE Review Online

9/12/11: “Assessment and Analytics for Institutional Transformation,” EDUCAUSE Review Online

March 2011: “Classroom Walls that Talk,” The Internet and Higher Education

12/15/10: “A Video Demo of UMBC’s ‘Check My Activity’ tool for students, EDUCAUSE Quarterly

1/16/09: “A Wired Way to Rate Professors — And Connect Them,” The Chronicle of Higher Education

Note: This site replaces the old UMBC Blackboard Reports that is no longer actively maintained, but is still published for archive purposes only.

Feel free to review presentations given at various conferences by UMBC’s data warehouse team. Please contact us if you have any questions related to a presentation or would like to “borrow” something.

Bridge Building: IR’s Role in Data Governance

Nov 2018, NEAIR

Data Governance at a Public Research Institution

Nov 2018, Purdue Data Summit (copy of NEAIR presentation)

Meta-Reports: a Bird’s Eye View of Operational Data at UMBC

June 2015, Higher Education User Group (HEUG)

Reporting Data Quality Issues

Oct 2012, Blackboard Analytics

State Reporting with Blackboard Analytics DW

June 2012, PeopleSoft Mid-Atlantic HEUG

Using Student Analytics to Provide State Reporting

Nov 2011, Blackboard Analytics

Using a DW to Audit a Transactional System at UMBC

Apr 2009, Higher Education Data Warehouse (HEDW)