The Benchmarking Blueprint: IPEDS, Peer Selection, and Actionable Data with Jon Gallegos

How do you turn massive amounts of public data into a customized, actionable benchmarking strategy that campus leadership actually understands?

In this episode of Data Stakes, Debbie is joined by Jon Gallegos, Data Analyst at WSU Tech, to unpack his recent AIR Forum presentation, "The Benchmarking Process from Initiation to Implementation." Jon walks us through the exact technical and strategic steps he used to build a benchmarking data store from the ground up.

Key Takeaways:

• Starting with Purpose: Why securing leadership buy-in is the critical first step before pulling a single data point.
• Leveraging IPEDS: How to utilize free, standardized IPEDS survey data (and why standard definitions matter for peer comparison).
• Building the Architecture: A look under the hood at extracting data with Python and structuring longitudinal time-series data within a Snowflake repository.
• Strategic Peer Selection: Moving beyond basic groupings by using clustering and cosine similarity to identify peer and aspirational institutions.
• Designing for Meaning: Best practices for data visualization in Power BI, using intentional color schemes and simplified matrixes to ensure your colleagues can easily digest the metrics.

Plus, Jon discusses a custom calculation—the Outcome Efficiency Index—that bridges the gap between campus finances and student awards.