Associate Vice President of Institutional Effectiveness and Strategy

Commonwealth of VA Careers; Pulaski (VA); On-site; USD 85,000 - 135,000; Full time

Job summary

New River Community College seeks an Associate Vice President of Institutional Effectiveness and Strategy to lead institutional research, analytics, strategic planning, and data-informed decision making. Reports to the College President and collaborates across academic and student services, IT, and assessment to strengthen data governance and reporting.

This senior role drives meaningful measures of success, coordinates major initiatives, develops dashboards, and presents findings to leaders and

Qualifications

• Master’s degree from an accredited college or university.
• Progressively responsible experience in institutional research, analytics, or related field.
• Ability to translate priorities into measurable plans.
• Ability to work across organizational boundaries and coordinate complex work.
• Experience extracting, manipulating, and analyzing institutional data.

Responsibilities

• Provide executive leadership for institutional research aligned with strategic priorities.
• Manage a lean institutional effectiveness operation balancing compliance and strategic initiatives.
• Ensure timely submissions of external reports.
• Lead data governance including definitions and quality standards.
• Drive ongoing assessment and continuous improvement with evidence-based actions.
• Advance predictive analytics and forecasting to support student success.
• Develop dashboards, executive reports, and other decision-support resources.
• Present data and strategic progress to senior leaders and stakeholders.
• Coordinate annual and long-term planning with the President and executives.
• Oversee major initiatives with clear ownership and milestones.
• Establish review processes for strategic progress and coordinate institutional support.

Skills

Data governance

Cross-functional collaboration

Analytical thinking

Strategic planning

Forecasting

Education

Master’s degree

Doctorate degree (preferred)

Tools

Statistical software

Programming environments

Job description

Title: Associate Vice President of Institutional Effectiveness and Strategy

Agency: New River Community College

Location: Pulaski - 155

FLSA: Exempt

Hiring Range: $85,000 - $135,000, dependent on academic qualifications and previous work experience.

Full Time or Part Time: Full Time

Job Description

New River Community College is a two-year state institution of higher education operating under a statewide system of 23 community colleges. The college is located on a one-hundred plus acre site at the intersection of U.S. Routes 11 and 100 in Dublin, Virginia. The campus provides modern, well-equipped facilities for the career technical education programs as well as for the college transfer programs. Approximately 4,000 students comprise the student body.

The people employed by New River Community College promote the philosophy that all individuals should have an opportunity to develop and extend their skills and knowledge to increase awareness of their roles and duties as citizens. The college serves the educational needs of the public and assumes a duty to help provide the requirements for trained workers in the region through a combined effort with local industry, business, professions, and government. The college promotes equal opportunity for prospective students and employees.

In partnership with the President and executive leadership team, the Associate Vice President for Institutional Effectiveness and Strategy serves as the College’s senior leader for institutional research, analytics, strategic planning, and data-informed decision making. The Associate Vice President reports directly to the College President and serves as a member of the College’s executive leadership team. The position leads efforts to strengthen NRCC’s institutional capacity to collect, govern, analyze, and use data effectively in a proactive manner. This position is expected to serve in a central leadership position for the college as its senior institutional researcher, strategist, internal consultant, and continuous improvement leader as well as being the data-reporting liaison between the College and its external stakeholders.

Working in concert with the College President, this position leads the College’s strategic planning process and provides institution-wide coordination for major College and Virginia Community College System initiatives. By engaging stakeholders across the institution, the AVP helps establish meaningful measures of success, monitors progress toward strategic goals and milestones, and creates regular opportunities for leaders to assess implementation. While initiative leaders retain responsibility for leading their respective projects, the AVP helps ensure that major initiatives remain on schedule, barriers and needs are identified early, and that appropriate assistance or executive attention is brought to bear when needed. The AVP does not assume operational ownership of these initiatives but provides structure and visibility for these strategies and institutional support when data and results warrant a different approach.

Consistent with NRCC’s current student success philosophy, the Associate Vice President helps the College expand its understanding of student success beyond enrollment, persistence, and graduation to include students’ longer‑term outcomes. The Associate Vice President also leads the responsible exploration and use of predictive analytics, artificial intelligence, and other emerging tools that can strengthen institutional insight and improve student outcomes.

As a senior institutional thought leader, the AVP must combine strategic perspective with strong technical capability. Because NRCC has a lean institutional research operation, the AVP works through cross‑functional partnerships with academic and student‑services leadership, the IT and data team, programming experts, and assessment and accreditation professionals.

Duties

• Provide executive leadership for the College’s institutional research by developing an agenda aligned with its strategic priorities, student success goals, and institutional needs.
• Establish and manage priorities for a lean institutional effectiveness operation that balances recurring compliance and reporting obligations with strategic initiatives, assessment, continuous improvement, and analytical work.
• Ensure timely, accurate, and complete submissions of required federal, state, system, accreditation, and other external reports.
• Lead the College’s data governance process, including institutional data definitions, quality standards, and practices.
• Lead the College’s ongoing assessment and continuous improvement process, ensuring that practical evidence is collected and used to evaluate results, identify opportunity for improvement, and guide action.
• Advance the College’s capacity to use predictive analytics and forecasting to support institutional priorities and student success.
• Oversee the development of dashboards, executive reports, and other decision‑support resources.
• Present data, analysis, and strategic progress information to senior leaders, local advisory boards, state agencies, and local stakeholders.
• Lead the college’s annual and long‑term planning processes and partner with the President and the executive staff to translate those priorities into goals, milestones, and initiatives.
• Coordinate the College’s portfolio of major local and VCCS initiatives, maintaining visibility into timelines, milestones, responsibilities, and progress while leaving day‑to‑day leadership with designated initiative owners.
• Establish a regular process for reviewing strategic initiative progress with project leaders to identify barriers and coordinate institutional assistance when needed.
• Work evenings/weekends and travel within the region and across the state as needed.
• Perform related duties as assigned.

Minimum Qualifications

• A master’s degree from an accredited college or university.
• Progressively responsible experience in institutional research, organizational research, analytics, institutional effectiveness, or a closely related function.
• Demonstrated experience translating institutional priorities into measurable plans.
• Demonstrated ability to work across organizational boundaries and coordinate complex work involving multiple stakeholders.
• Demonstrated ability to extract, manipulate, and analyze institutional data using contemporary practices and tools.

Additional Considerations

• Working knowledge of one or more statistical or programming environments.
• Experience with IPEDS, SCHEV reporting, SACSCOC reporting, or other similar higher education data reporting responsibilities.
• Experience working in a higher education environment.
• A doctorate degree from an accredited college or university.
• A commitment to academic excellence, student success, and using institutional data in ways that lead to meaningful action.