Collaboratory is a powerful tool that helps campuses track their community engagement and public service activities. Members may choose to create one activity to represent the breadth of their engagement, or multiple activities. Understanding how and when to enter your engagement as one, or many, activities is essential for accurate data representation and effective reporting.
NOTE: Data captured in Collaboratory ranges from individual community-based projects to initiatives that extend division, unit, or are institution-wide.
Collaboratory's Central Unit of Analysis
Collaboratory's central unit of analysis is the activity. When entering data, members must be mindful not to center their data through the lens of a partner or a course, but rather the activity of what happened in/with community. This is a fundamental shift from how community-based data has traditionally been captured.
When centralizing data entry on the activity, members can connect other data points (e.g., community partners, courses) to their activity. This allows institutions to more deeply understand how their engagement is connected to other key data points, like funding, external partners, specific areas of focus, etc.
NOTE: Understanding the activity as the central unit of analysis is key when deciding to capture engagement as one or multiple activities.
Entering Activities in the Aggregate
When to Capture Activities in the Aggregate
Use aggregate entry when multiple related activities can be summarized under a single entry.
This approach is ideal when the activities share common attributes, such as the same community partner, focus areas, population engaged, and/or location.
Time and bandwidth of engaged faculty/staff, or proxies for data entry is more limited.
HEADS UP! Consider leveraging Collaboratory's clone feature to duplicate similar activities and encourage a more granular approach to data entry.
Benefits of Aggregate Data Entry
Simplifies data entry and reduces the number of individual activities to be entered.
Provides a broad overview of engagement efforts without needing detailed segmentation.
Useful for high-level reporting where detailed differences are less critical.
Example of Aggregate Data Entry
Consider the following scenarios as examples of when aggregate data entry is suggested:
15 undergraduate students are participating in a service-learning Political Science course. All students are working on the same project, with one community organization, addressing civic literacy.
30 students are completing their individual teacher placements in local elementary schools. All students have the same desired outcomes and focus, though they are placed in different schools.
Explore an example of a public page for an activity captured in the aggregate. Clicking into the "Courses" and "Collaborators" tabs in the example activity illustrates how these data points are related to the single activity.
Entering Activities Granularly
When to Capture Activities Granularly
Opt for granular entry when activities involve diverse elements that need to be distinctly tracked, such as different community partners, locations, or focus areas.
This approach is best when each activity's specifics are important for more granularly reporting and analysis (e.g., understanding exactly what faculty, staff, and students are doing with specific community partners).
Benefits of Granularly Data Entry
Allows for detailed tracking and analysis of each unique aspect of engaged activities.
Enables stakeholders to drill down into specific activities for deeper insights.
Essential for understanding how different elements contribute to broader institutional goals.
Examples of Granularly Data Entry
Consider the following scenarios as examples of when aggregate data entry is suggested:
9 undergraduate students are participating in a service-learning Political Science course. Each student works with a different community organization on singular projects addressing different issues (e.g., mental health, civic advocacy).
8 students are completing their individual internships as a requirement for their Computer Science degree. Each student is placed at a different community organization and completing different projects. They are all enrolled in the same internship course.
Explore an example of a faculty's public profile page who oversees the Computer Science student internships and captures them granularly in Collaboratory. Viewing the public page of a course associated with the student internships illustrates how the individual internships can be aggregated up under the single course that is connected to each individual internship activity.
Key Choice Points
Choosing between aggregate and granular activity entry in Collaboratory depends on the nature of the engagement activities and the data needs of your institution. These choice points can help guide your decision-making process when determining the most appropriate level of detail for activity entry.
Commonality of Attributes:
Are the activities similar enough in terms of community partners, focus areas, population engaged, and locations to be summarized under one entry?
Depth vs. Breadth of Data:
Do you need detailed insights into each activity (depth), or is a broader overview sufficient (breadth)?
Reporting Requirements and Stakeholder Expectations:
Does using an aggregate approach limit the ability to perform detailed analysis on specific aspects of the activities? Would a granular approach provide more meaningful data for understanding impact?
Will stakeholders require granular details for analysis and reporting, or is a high-level summary adequate for decision-making?
How do your faculty, administrators, and data liaisons prefer to view and understand the engagement data? Do they need granular breakdowns or aggregated summaries?
Bandwidth for Data Entry and Management
Consider the time and resources available for entering and managing data. Does your team have the capacity to handle a granular approach, or would an aggregate approach be more practical given current bandwidth?
HEADS UP! For further assistance or to explore more examples, please reach out to your Collaboratory administrator or email [email protected].