Centralizing the Student Lens: Design and Evaluation of a Learning Analytics Dashboard for Academic Advising in Higher Education

Abstract

This paper presents SASP (Socioeconomic and Academic Student Profile), an institution-wide learning analytics dashboard developed and deployed at Universidad de los Andes (Colombia) — embedded within No estás solx, the university’s existing student support platform — designed to improve the quality of academic advising in engineering education. SASP addresses a persistent challenge in higher education: student information relevant to advising is often fragmented across multiple institutional systems, limiting timely, consistent, and evidence-based support. SASP was created through a year-long iterative co-design process with the Vice Dean’s Office for Student Affairs in the School of Engineering and integrates academic performance, course history, socioeconomic context, scheduling, and institutional support records into a single interface. The dashboard embodies four design principles: (1) multi-dimensional centralization; (2) per-academic-level context switching; (3) subject-area filtering as a cross-cutting analytical lens; and (4) embedding within an existing, trusted portal. To evaluate its contribution, we gathered survey data from 117 academic advisors and nine months of behavioral telemetry. Results show strong institutional adoption (94.9% of respondents had used SASP; 72.7% were returning users) and positive perceptions of its value for advising. Data centralization was the highest-rated feature, 91% of respondents who used SASP during counseling sessions found it useful, and advisors reported that the dashboard improved access to relevant information, facilitated understanding of students’ academic trajectories, and supported the identification of at-risk cases. Advisors also rated SASP as sufficiently complete to serve as the primary tool during a counseling session. These findings suggest that integrated learning analytics tools can strengthen the quality, consistency, and timeliness of academic support in engineering education when they are embedded into real institutional workflows. Beyond the specific system, this study contributes empirically grounded design principles for scalable advising infrastructures in higher education.

Slides

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Details

Author: Santiago Martínez Novoa, Federico Melo Barrero, Mariana Ruiz Giraldo, Sofia Velásquez Marín, Nicolás Carvajal Chaves, Marcela Hernández Hoyos, Juan Pablo Reyes Year: 2026 Publication Type: Paper accepted at the World Engineering Education Forum, WEEF (IFEES & GEDC) 2026, Cartagena de Indias, Colombia, September 22-25, 2026
Presented: Oral presentation, September 23, 2026

Citation

Martínez Novoa, S., Melo Barrero, F., Ruiz Giraldo, M., Velásquez Marín, S., Carvajal Chaves, N., Hernández Hoyos, M., & Reyes, J. P. (2026). Centralizing the Student Lens: Design and Evaluation of a Learning Analytics Dashboard for Academic Advising in Higher Education. To appear in Proceedings of the World Engineering Education Forum, WEEF (IFEES & GEDC) 2026, Cartagena de Indias, Colombia.