Your Institutional Research Agent Answers Data Requests While You Plan
The Institutional Research Agent takes the data requests that pile up from every department so your IR analysts are not building the same report for the third time this term. The AgentWorks Institutional Research Agent logs each request, clarifies what is needed, checks whether an existing report answers it, pulls the data from your systems and drafts the answer for an analyst to review, while your IR team works on the analysis that shapes decisions.
What it takes off your plate
Every IR director knows the queue. The provost wants retention by program. Admissions wants yield by region. A dean wants course completion for an accreditation visit. Each request arrives by email, in a hallway or through a form, and each goes into the same backlog.
Data lives in the SIS, the LMS, HR and finance systems, and none of them are integrated. An ad hoc report takes days to build. The same queries are run over and over because there is no self-service layer and no record of what was answered last time. Strategic decisions wait on data that arrives too late to matter.
The cost is analyst time spent on repeat pulls, departments that stop asking, and leadership deciding without the numbers. Two offices that pulled the same figure with different definitions bring conflicting answers to the same meeting, and the argument becomes about the data instead of the students.
What the Institutional Research Agent does, step by step
The Institutional Research Agent starts with the communication:
- Takes the request. By email or form, it logs who is asking, what they want and when they need it.
- Clarifies it. It asks the requester the questions an analyst would: which term, which student population, which definition of retention, and what decision the data is for.
- Checks the library. If an earlier report already answers the question, it sends it with a note on when it was run, and asks whether that is enough.
- Pulls the data. For new requests, it pulls from the student information system such as PowerSchool, the LMS and the HR and finance extracts, following your institution's data access rules.
- Drafts the answer. It builds the table or chart in Excel or Google Sheets with the definitions stated, and sends it to an analyst. Student-level data and anything sensitive go out only after an analyst approves.
- Delivers and follows up. It sends the approved report to the requester and asks whether it answered the question.
Then the data work: every request, its definitions and its final report are saved in a shared library, and requests that repeat are flagged to become standing reports.
Where the work is recorded
An agent that cannot record its results is a chatbot. Every request, question and delivery the Institutional Research Agent handles is logged on the requester's record in the CRM your team already sees: who asked what, when it was delivered and what it was used for. The reports and their definitions live in Google Workspace, where anyone with access can find the last answer before asking again.
The next morning, the IR director sees one queue: new requests with their deadlines, drafts waiting for review, reports reused instead of rebuilt and the questions that keep coming back. Good data helps the offices that serve students plan, from checking every schedule change to keeping prospective families engaged.
What your people do instead
Your IR analysts spend their time on the studies leadership needs: retention, equity gaps, program outcomes. Your deans and directors get answers while the decision is still open. Your advisors and enrollment staff get the numbers they need to support students without waiting a week.
Students and families benefit from an institution that decides on evidence and acts in time, whether that means adding a section of a full course or reaching a group of students before they stop out.
Customer service and student satisfaction are the human job. The AgentWorks Institutional Research Agent keeps the requests, the pulls and the drafts moving so your people can focus on the students in front of them.
One next step
Not sure whether data requests are the first workflow to hand over? The free Industry Assessment looks at your enrollment, compliance and student services work and shows which workflow an agent should take first. You can see every education agent on the education industry page.
See where the Institutional Research Agent would start in your education business.
I'm Olivia, the Education ambassador here. The free Industry Assessment reads your website and asks how calls, follow-ups and records happen today, then shows the first workflow worth handing to an agent like this one — and what your team gets back. Leave your email and I'll send the link.
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