Travino Valley College (TVC) is a small,...

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Travino Valley College

(TVC)

is a small, non

-

church affiliated

college in western Idaho.

Between 2000 and

2010, total enrollments increased from

1600 to 2400 students. Since 2010, enrollments have grown very

slowly. They peaked at 2600

in

2016 but

are now around 2500 and expected to stay

between 2450 and

2550 for the foreseeable future.

Due

to shifting

finances and revenue,

they have

analyz

ed

enrollment patterns

with the

goal

to realign

resources

to better match student demand.

This process will eliminate

15 of the 43 different majors that

they

currently

offer.

It could also restructure depar

tments and divisions for more efficient

administration.

It’s important to note that eliminating a “major”

does not necessarily mean that the subject would be

eliminated. For example, if the accounting major were eliminated, Travino Valley would still nee

d

some

accounting courses for management, marketing, and finance students.

You have been given two files:

First, there’s a

n Excel file showing the percent of all students enrolled in each major between 2013 and

2021.

In this file,

•

t

he smallest 15 majors

in 2013 and 2021 have been highlighted in yellow

, and

•

t

he largest 10 majors in 2013 and 2021 have been highlighted in green.

You will notice that

the

list of

majors on both

the high and low enro

llment grou

ps

change somewhat

over the years. In fact, one of the 15

-

smallest in 2013 moved to the

10

-

largest in 2021.

Some other things that you should know:

•

In 2013, the smallest 15

majors

held

9.3% of all students.

•

In 2021, the smalle

st

15

majors held

9.9% of all students.

•

In 2013, the largest 10

majors held

53.3% of all students.

•

In 2021, the largest 10

majors held

54.5% of all students.

Even though the majors on both ends shifted, the “market share” on both ends was remarkably

consistent. The 10 largest major

s attracted over 50% of all students and the 15 smallest majors attracte

d

just under 10% of all students.

Second, there’s a Packaged Tableau workbook with th

e same

data. It has two

sheets

with visualizations

.

Neither is particularly impressive.

•

Table sheet: This is the data in the same format as the spreadsheet, sorted in alphabetical order

.

•

Timeplo

t sheet: This is a time plot of EVERYTHING in the table. At first glance, it doesn’t look

horrible. However, there’s a hierarchy

of Division => Department => Major

. If you click through

the hierarchy to show the

majors on the plot, it looks like this.

Here’s the

good news

–

In spite of these

poor graphics,

the decisions have already been made.

•

The 11 majors that were

in the bottom 15 in

both

2013 and 2021 are being eliminated

:

Art

History, Asian Studies, Chinese,

French, Geographic Information S

cience, German, International

Political Economy, Japanese,

Philosophy, Religion, Sociology.

•

Three majors that were not in the bottom group in 2013 but dropped into this group in 2021 are

being eliminated: Classical Studies, Public Relations, and Spanish.

o

However, Public Relations once showed reasonable enrollments. Therefore, it is

being

moved from a major in the Communications and Media department to a concentration

in the Marketing major in the Management and Marketing Department.

•

The

Economics

major

is being

eliminated. Some courses in this subject will remain to support

the business majors, but

the major will go away.

Even though economics has strong enrollment

in most colleges, the nine years of data shows that this isn’t the case at

TVC.

•

The Finance major

is being retained. It was new in 2013

and has shown substantial growth since

then.

•

Music Theatre and Music Education

were

also

new in 2013

. Their growth has been more modest

t

han Finance, but they show promise and

don’t require significant resources beyond those

already present in the Music/Theatre department.

•

Four “traditional”

majors

(History,

English, Math, and Music

) had

reasonably

strong enrollments

in 2013

. Two of them we

re in the top 10 list. All four

have seen declines in the eight

-

year data.

TVC is going wants to promote and reinvigorate these four majors.

Here’s the

bad news

–

even though you didn’t make any of the above decisions, it’s your job to create

one or more dashboards to

support

those decisions.

•

Your audience is the Board of Trustees. Even though they aren’t active administrators, they have

responsibility for strate

gic oversight of TVC. They are not faculty. Most of them have business

backgrounds and understand

the realities of revenue, costs, and cash flows even in a not

-

for

-

profit environment like

higher education

.

•

Your message is that these changes are

necessary f

or TVC to thrive in the 21

st

century

yet still

maintain their educ

ational roots and traditions. More important, the changes are supported by

the enrollment data.

Some things to think about (perhaps even hints):

•

Many majors aren’t even mentioned in the dec

isions. Some have strong enrollments (top 10)

and others are middle of the pack. What is their role in your dashboards? Do you want to

highlight the strong majors before delving into the bad news of the majors eliminated? Should

the middle of the pack majo

rs be filtered out

completely

to avoid clutter? Should they show up

somewhere

, but be

deemphasized through color choices?

•

It’s likely that some time plots will be used (yes, that’s a hint). Do you want to plot every year?

Just the first and last year

(slope graph)? First, last, middle? First, last, high, low? Something

else?

•

What ot

her visualizations will work be

st? Bar charts? Heat map

s? S

q

uare a

rea (Tree ma

ps)

?

•

Your Dashboard(s) should be static. You will not be there to answer questions, but the Board will

not interact with the

D

ashboard

(s)

. Therefore, you don’t need filters. You might (

or might not)

need LOTS of filters on your Sheets, but not on the Dashboard

(s)

. However, legends, titles and

other labels will be very important.

•

Speaking of labels

–

how will you label data points? Will the ax

e

s

be sufficient or

will points need

labels? I

f you label points, do you still need

all

the axes?

•

Will text and annotation

be used to

draw attention to key items? How will you use white space?

Y

o

u

should submit two files:

1.

A Packaged Tableau

Workbook with your

D

ashboard(s

).

2.

A short write up (Word or pdf

) explaining your

cho

ices.

Travino Valley College(TVC)is a small, non-church affiliatedcollege in western Idaho.Between 2000 and2010, total...

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