Planning for Higher Education Programs: Effectively Using Data and Modeling to Understand Workforce Needs

Higher education policymakers and educators responsible for planning degree and certificate programs have a wide variety of quantitative and qualitative workforce information available to support effective decisionmaking. Frequently, however, the use of this information is limited to managing ongoing programs at the institutional level. But effective use of workforce data can also contribute to strategic reviews of program alignment at the state or institutional level and support broader strategic scans of occupations and fields of study in which new programs might be needed. In May 2013, the state of Texas passed a law requiring a report on the state’s future workforce needs to help inform decisions about developing or expanding postsecondary education programs.1 To respond to this request, and to guide the use of data resources, the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) asked the RAND Corporation to analyze options for using workforce information and recommend promising practices, as well as to develop data tools where feasible to support this effort. Although this analysis focused on the Texas context and involved Texasspecific data in addition to broader information sources, the lessons learned and tools developed could potentially guide other states and institutions in planning for workforce needs.