2008 Woodie Awards
Listening to numbers
Research director collects, interprets data for PSU
Matthew Knoche
Issue date: 2/28/08 Section: Campus Life
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"I study the university, I research important things for the decision makers," Wilkinson said.
Wilkinson is the director of institutional research for Pittsburg State University. In other words, he's the guy who makes sense of the numbers.
"If you understand the research, the numbers talk to you," he said.
For Wilkinson, a normal day can range from dealing with higher-learning organizations in meetings to fielding calls around Kansas.
Originally, Wilkinson worked at Eastern New Mexico University, but wanted to do more. When a position opened at PSU in 1987, he took it.
"I discovered this career path during a doctoral program," Wilkinson said. "Sometimes to move up, you have to move on."
Wilkinson says that his profession has been around only since 1966.
Since Wilkinson has been at PSU his duties have increased from mainly reporting to the government to providing information to PSU and also analysis, planning and assessment.
"What I was mainly doing when I first came here is only a small part of what I do now," Wilkinson said.
Currently, Wilkinson is working on the N.S.S.E., or National Survey of Student Engagement, a survey that was distributed to freshmen and seniors a few weeks ago.
Wilkinson says he was hoping for a higher rate of return, but plans on resending the survey with hopes of a higher return rate. He says the survey is important because it can give administrators an accurate look at the strengths and weaknesses of PSU programs.
Wilkinson has also had many big projects in the past. The projects he has worked on was a three-prong look at student success.
First, Wilkinson sent out a survey like N.S.S.E. that looked at students and where they spend their money, time and how they viewed the campus.
Wilkinson's second approach was randomly interviewing students, asking them 18 questions that would see how they felt about campus and their classes.
The third approach was getting 200 freshmen in Freshman Experience classes to keep a journal. At the end of the semester, Wilkinson would review them.
"The journals were one of my favorite projects because you got to know a group of students on a level no one else did," Wilkinson said.
"If they didn't make you smile, they would be making you laugh or cry."
When he isn't dealing with his projects, he says his day is mixed.
"I really don't have a normal day - it goes as it goes," Wilkinson said. "I get what I need done during the day, and if I don't, I do it at night like everyone else."
Students who have been to his office may have noticed his coffee cup collection or his statue of the Greek oracle.
Wilkinson says that the coffee cups come from all the conferences he has attended over the years.
One of his favorite pieces, though, is his statue of a ferret holding a gazing ball.
"I enjoy staring into it and collecting my thoughts," Wilkinson said.
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