At Lee College, predictive analytics meets hands-on advising. Edvise identifies students who may need extra support, giving advisors the insights to act more strategically. Early feedback shows this combination of data and human connection is driving more intentional outreach and stronger student engagement.
Introduction
At Lee College, a public community college in Baytown, Texas, supporting student success means more than helping individuals earn degrees – it’s about expanding opportunity across the region. With over 8,000 students enrolled in more than 100 programs, Lee College serves a diverse population across multiple counties. Its mission is clear: to create “an ideal student experience […] to ensure that all students have what they need to be successful.”
But ensuring success for every student is no small feat, especially when resources are limited and student needs are complex.
The Challenge
Lee College set out to improve its retention and on-time graduation rates. Campus leaders understood that while intensive advising and student support services can make a significant difference, these resources are finite – and advisors often manage large caseloads. To maximize impact, the college needed a way to identify which students would benefit most from additional support.
“We really want those resources going to the students who are struggling and need help in order to be successful,” said Dr. Douglas Walcerz, Provost of Lee College.
At the same time, the college was navigating a growing volume of student data – from academic performance to engagement metrics – but lacked the tools to translate that data into clear, actionable insights. “We didn’t really have a path forward,” Dr. Walcerz explained. “We were just operating with the best information we had.”
That’s when Lee College partnered with DataKind to implement Edvise, a data-driven platform designed to help institutions proactively identify students in need of extra support.
Why Edvise
Lee College needed a solution that could turn their existing student data into meaningful, actionable insights – without requiring a major overhaul of systems or budgets. Edvise was designed with exactly these needs in mind: helping mission-driven institutions translate data into smarter advising decisions.
Thanks to a partnership with Zogotech, the platform utilizes data from existing systems without requiring additional exports. Zogotech has been an exceptional partner to Lee College and DataKind because their expertly designed data schema streamlined the entire data pipeline, making it easy for DataKind to ingest data and conduct sophisticated feature engineering and modeling. At the institution level, Edvise analyzes that data to build, train, and deliver results from a predictive model – always with the human-in-the-loop safeguards to ensure quality and trust.
By working with their own data, Lee College could generate forecasts tailored to their specific students, programs, and patterns – something generic, off-the-shelf tools can’t provide. Without this customization, institutions often rely on broad benchmarks or incomplete snapshots that miss critical nuance. With Edvise, Lee College could see not just which students might need extra support, but also when to act – making interventions both more timely and more effective.
As a nonprofit, DataKind built Edvise to align with its broader mission of using data science and AI for good. For Lee College, that meant gaining a powerful, cost-effective tool to help ensure that no student falls through the cracks.
How They’re Using Edvise
Using Edvise, Lee College’s advising leadership developed a proactive outreach plan to directly support its goal of improving on-time graduation. Advisors now receive curated lists of students who may need extra support, refreshed every two weeks, along with the data behind each forecast. This allows them to prioritize outreach, intervene earlier, and better keep students on track toward graduation.
“We curated a smaller, manageable list for academic advisors to engage intentionally every other week,” explained Dr. Sarah Tidwell, Director of Advising & Transfer Programs, Lee College. “That helps us intervene with students in a more targeted way.”
Rather than replacing advisors, Edvise strengthens their work – empowering them with timely insights and clear context so they can focus their time where it matters most: building relationships and helping students succeed.
Early Impact
From the start, Lee College’s team has praised DataKind’s collaborative approach.
“I was really impressed with the process of getting the initial data sets and then refining the model,” said Walcerz. “When you gave us results, we recognized them. I can validate them.”
This validation built confidence in the system – not just for technical accuracy, but for building trust that the insights could be put into practice. That trust translated into action: advising teams began engaging with Edvise more actively than with past initiatives. “We’ve seen a much higher engagement rate than I had previously on different sorts of initiatives,” noted Tidwell.
The early success wasn’t just about the numbers – it was about the process. “The most exciting piece about this partnership is that you gave us a strong foundation to start with,” Tidwell added. “Being a part of that process, being able to go back to my team and let them know about the care and intent that was put behind it, and all the checks, to make sure it felt right.”
Edvise’s predictive analytics models are tailored to each institution’s unique context, drawing on student performance, enrollment intensity, and other persistence indicators. This customization ensures that insights are not only accurate but also meaningful and actionable. Early results confirm that DataKind’s approach is helping Lee College move closer to its student success goals – with confidence and clarity.
Looking Ahead
The next year will be critical as Lee College tracks retention and graduation outcomes. But even in these early stages, promising signs are emerging. Preliminary data suggests that students identified by Edvise – and contacted by advisors – enrolled in more credits the following semester. That kind of engagement is an encouraging step torward on-time completion.
Lee College’s leadership is already preparing to study these effects more closely, using data not just to measure impact, but to guide ongoing strategy. For DataKind, this partnership reflects a long-term commitment: to help institutions harness their data in service of student success, equity, and opportunity.
A Model for What’s Possible
At Lee College, Edvise is already helping advisors focus their time where it matters most – on students who need extra support. Interested in exploring how it could support student success at your institution? Connect with us!
DataKind Edvise was made possible with support from a Google.org grant and fellowship. Learn more.
Images above courtesy of Lee College.
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