Dive Brief:
- A study out of Iowa State University created an “engagement index tracker” to analyze student use of digital textbooks, finding patterns in use and outcomes.
- The Ames Tribune reports that Associate Professor of Education Reynol Junco found students at Texas A&M in the study cohort who spent more time highlighting their readings got better grades.
- Junco advocates an increase in the use of digital textbooks to give faculty more data to analyze whether a student is on track, even before the first graded assignment is turned in.
Dive Insight:
The digital world provides nearly endless opportunities for analyzing data. Colleges and universities collect and store data that many haven’t even tried to analyze. But analytics efforts are becoming more common, especially when it comes to student outcomes.
Time spent reading digital textbooks will have similar benefits as the ability to track student engagement in a college’s CMS. Indiana's Ivy Tech has also used data analytics to assess faculty outcomes and predict financial aid fraud, with new uses coming up all the time.