Why data is a cost saver, not a cost center

College and university leaders today have to make tough decisions about spending. With every line item under scrutiny, it can be tempting to cut investments that don’t seem immediately essential. There’s one area where cuts can be especially shortsighted: data and analytics. Far from being a cost center, data is the tool that helps leaders understand what’s working, what’s not, and where to focus limited resources for the greatest impact.

This blog post features a story from SUNY Old Westbury, an EAB partner I’ve worked closely with, to illustrate how a data platform can improve decision-making around resource allocation. Celebrating its 60th anniversary, SUNY Old Westbury is a small public liberal arts university set on a scenic 604-acre wooded campus on Long Island, just outside New York City.

Enrollment and IR take on an unexpected data challenge

When the state of New York introduced Free Application Week in 2023, it opened doors for thousands of prospective students by removing application fees. While this policy was a win for access, it brought a new set of challenges for New York campuses.

SUNY Old Westbury, in particular, saw a dramatic 58% increase in application volume from 2022 to 2024. This surge placed enormous pressure on existing data systems and processes, as staff scrambled to coordinate information across admissions, student information systems, and housing. The result was a tangle of data quality issues—duplicates, mismatches, and information gaps—all landing on the desks of an Institutional Research (IR) team that was already stretched thin.

The platform behind the pivot

SUNY Old Westbury didn’t want their approach to this new challenge to rely on manual tracking, a slow, error-prone approach that would lead to missed opportunities and delayed application decisions. Instead, they partnered with EAB to implement Rapid Insight, a self-service analytics solution that allowed their team to systematically pull and merge records from multiple systems, quickly flag and resolve discrepancies, and create unified, query-ready datasets. This automation not only reduced manual errors and “Excel sprawl,” but also allowed the team to deliver real-time, leadership-ready dashboards without hiring additional staff.

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What the numbers showed (and why they mattered)

The benefits of this approach were tangible and immediate. Over two years, the campus processed 3,500 more applications and secured 417 additional deposits from freshmen and transfer students—a significant boost for a campus of just under 5,000 students. These enrollment gains translated directly into increased tuition and fee revenue, providing a much-needed financial cushion.

Beyond the numbers, the insights generated by the IR team helped marketing and recruitment teams target their messaging and optimize the timing and structure of events like open houses. These insights also helped focus faculty and staff efforts on the most responsive prospective students.

Lessons for leaders under budget pressure

Perhaps most importantly, having data immediately accessible fundamentally changed how the institution made decisions. With clean, cross-functional data always at hand, campus leaders could respond quickly to urgent questions and requests. Gaps in the data became opportunities to improve future collection efforts, allowing the institution to better understand the needs of specific student groups, majors, and financial aid recipients. For the IR team, automation freed up valuable time for deeper analysis and strategic planning, instead of just assembling spreadsheets.

Looking ahead, the same data infrastructure that helped SUNY Old Westbury navigate a policy-driven enrollment surge will be critical for ongoing strategic planning and cost efficiency. With the help of Rapid Insight, SUNY Old Westbury’s IR team can do more analyses with less manual labor than ever before. Specifically, they’re using their campus data to:

• Identify gaps in student outcomes: SUNY Old Westbury now disaggregates key metrics by student demographics to uncover and address disparities in enrollment, retention, and graduation.
• Support accreditation with evidence-ready reporting: The IR team can quickly generate disaggregated data reports to meet Middle States Commission on Higher Education (MSCHE) accreditation requirements and demonstrate institutional effectiveness.
• Deliver leadership dashboards across finance and academics: Centralized data workflows now feed real-time dashboards that inform strategic decisions across academic and administrative units.
• Assess financial aid distribution by demographic segment: The team can analyze aid patterns by student group to ensure equitable distribution and support data-driven financial planning.

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The case for continued investment

In times of financial constraint, colleges and universities need more insight, not less. Data and analytics platforms empower leaders to prioritize programs, improve outreach, and ensure a return on every investment. As SUNY Old Westbury’s experience demonstrates, the question isn’t whether you can afford to keep your data tools; it’s whether you can afford to lose the insights they provide.