校務研究（institutional research）已經在美國發展超過五十年。美國與許多西方國家的高等教育機構都會設置校務研究辦公室，其藉由提供有用的資訊以幫助學校的決策。本篇論文嘗試評估校務研究辦公室對高等教育機構的效益。我們採用三個資料來源來做此研究，分別為 IPEDS、HED 及 Forbes/CCAP 排名。本論文主要變數有二，其一為使用虛擬變數代表該學校是否具有校務研究辦公室，另一則為該辦公室的職員人數。此部分參考 HED 名的學校名單並逐一尋找學校網站以取得資料。我們的資料涵蓋 2010-11 到 2015-16 學年度的四年制（含以上）大專院校。結合許多不同的變數來代表機構的特徵後，我們的實證結果發現具有校務研究辦公室以及更多職員人數的學校，其留校率（retention rate）與六年畢業率（6-year graduation rate）會高於那些沒有辦公室或較少職員數的學校。然而，每位學生的研究經費（research expenses per FTE enrollment）在統計上不顯著。最後，具有校務研究辦公室以及更多職員人數的學校，其學校整體排名較佳。

The term “institutional research” (IR) has prevailed over five decades. Many postsecondary institutions in the U.S. and other western countries have established an IR office to help with decision-making by providing useful information. This paper attempts to quantify the benefits of running an IR office in higher education institutions. We take advantage of three data sources — IPEDS, HED, and Forbes/CCAP rankings of “America's Best Colleges.” In particular, the key variables, a dummy of running an IR office and the corresponding number of staff members in an IR office, are collected from the official website of each institution in HED. This study considers 4-year or above institutions in the period from 2010-11 to 2015-16 academic year. After incorporating many different variables to represent characteristics of institutions, our empirical results show that retention rate and 6-year graduation rate of the institutions with IR offices and more IR staffs are higher than those without or with less IR staffs. However, the result of research expenses per FTE enrollment is not statistically significant. Moreover, institutions with IR offices and more IR staffs are more likely to be in the front rankings. In this research, we provide a way to evaluate the influence of an IR office.

1 Introduction 1
2 Functions of Institutional Research 3
3 Data Sources and Variables 5
3.1 Data Sources 5
3.2 Definition of Variables 7
3.3 Descriptive Statistics 9
4 Econometrics Methods 11
4.1 Correlated Random Effects 11
4.2 Ordered Probit Model 12
5 Empirical Results 13
5.1 Student Outcomes 13
5.2 Finance 16
5.3 Rankings 17
5.4 Robustness Check 18
6 Conclusion 18

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