Summary
It is important to note that when GSI dashboard tables are built, the programmer decides what options are available for users to manipulate column data. By right-clicking on a column of a GSI table, you may find options such as sort column, exclude column, include column, and move column. Remember, these options are NOT available on all tables.
The purpose of this tutorial is to explain how these GSI table or column options work.
Before You Start
To get started, ensure that you have the following:
1. A valid NetID@genesee.edu email address: This is typically assigned to students, faculty, and staff at Genesee Community College.
2. Access to a computer that is connected to the Internet.
3. You will need access to GSI. These steps will help you log in.
Steps
For this tutorial, we will look at GSI Dashboard “Factbook-Enrollments”, tab “Course Enrollment”, table “Enrollment by Course and Term” where:
- Dashboard Prompts are set as follows:
- Term Description (Fall 2012 forward): Fall 2023 and Fall 2024
- Census Final: Final
- Discipline: ACC and ECO
- Course Campus Description: left defaulted to “All Column Values”
- CourseID: left defaulted to “All Column Values”
- Be sure to click the “Apply” button located under the “Course Campus Description” prompt
By default, the following columns are displayed in table “Enrollment By Course and Term”:
- Term
- Term Code
- Census Final
- Discipline
- CourseID
- Count of course registrations
- Count of sections
The table is sorted in Ascending Order by Term, Census Final, Discipline, and then by CourseID.
Sort Column
Table “Enrollment by Course and Term” is defaulted to sort in Ascending Order by Term, Census Final, Discipline, and then by CourseID.
We will look at changing the sort for Term from Ascending to Descending. There are two options you can choose to sort a GSI table column.
Remember: Be careful when sorting by Term when you have selected multiple Terms. Column “Term” is the alphabetic representation of the term, whereas column “Term Code” is the numeric representation of the term.
- If you sort by alphabetic Term, Winterim will follow the Summer term for an academic year.
- If you sort by numeric Term Code, Winterim will correctly follow the Fall term in an academic year.
- Recommendation: When sorting by term, sort using numeric column “Term Code”.
- Each of GCC's 4 terms have a numeric value that can be used for proper sorting. Spring (02) is followed by Summer (06) which is followed by Fall (09) which is followed by Winterim (12).
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Alphabetic “Term”
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Numeric “Term Code” (yyyytt: where yyyy is the year and tt is the term)
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Term Note
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Fall 2023
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202309
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“09” is the numeric for Fall
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Winterim 2023
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202312
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“12” is the numeric for Winterim
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Spring 2024
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202402
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“02” is the numeric for Spring
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Summer 2024
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202406
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“06” is the numeric for Summer
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Option A: Right-click on the column header of the column you wish to sort
For this example, right-click on the “Term Code” column header. Click on “Sort Column” and then click on “Sort Descending”.
The “Term Code” column is now sorted in Descending Order. The table is now sorted by “Term Code” in Descending Order and then in Ascending Order by “Census Final,” “Discipline,” and “CourseID”.
Option B: Use column header up and down sort arrows
Column sort triangular arrows (up and down) appear next to the column header label (e.g. Term Code) when you hover over the column header.
- If you click on the triangular up-arrow, the column is sorted in ascending order by Academic Year.
- When sorted ascending the columns’ sort up arrow will be darkened
- If you click on the triangular down-arrow, the column is sorted in descending order by Academic Year.
- When sorted descending the columns’ sort down arrow will be darkened
Exclude a Column
A GSI table may hold more columns than you need.
Excluding a column removes the column from the table. In our example, table “Enrollment by Course and Term” has both the “Discipline” and ”CourseID” columns. The student count data is grouped by “Term”.
In this example we want to exclude the “CourseID” column so the table will only show data broken down by “Discipline”.
Right-click on “Course ID” column header and choose “Exclude Column.”
The “CourseID” column becomes hidden. The table data now shows the student count data grouped by “Discipline” (without a ”CourseID” breakdown).
Include a column
Many GSI tables only show some of the available data columns.
Including a column adds a data column to the table (by unhiding that column). Our example table, “Enrollment by Course and Term”, by default, has student counts for course registrations and sections.
For this example, we want to include the “Course Campus” column so the table will include counts in campuses and this new field/column will be placed after the “Discipline” column.
Right-click on “Discipline” column header and choose “Include Column”. You will be presented with a list of all the data columns that could be added to the table. Click on “Course Campus”.
The “Course Campus” column is now added to the table. The table now shows student counts in campuses broken down by term and discipline.
Move a Column
You may want to rearrange (change the order of) table columns by moving them to the left or right. However, if you want further breakdowns of data counts you can also move a column to either prompts or sections.
Remember: Pay attention to the table data when Moving Columns. If you are not understanding the data, please email IR@genesee.edu for assistance.
Rearrange Columns
There are two options for rearranging or moving placement of columns in a table:
- Right-click on a column to move it to the left or right
- Drag a column to move it left or right
Option A: Right-click to Move Column Left or Right
In this example, we have column “Course Campus” in our table “Enrollment by Course and Term” which is located following the “Discipline” column. We will move it to the left so it precedes the “Discipline” column.
Right click on “Course Campus” column header. Click on “Move Column”, then click on “Left”.
The “Course Campus” column is now moved to precede the “Discipline” column.
Option B: Drag Column to Move Left or Right
When you hover over a column header, a stippled bar appears above it. When you hover your cursor over the column header’s stippled bar, the cursor changes into a 4-point crosshair (displays with 4 arrows at 4 sides). Click and hold the crosshair cursor to drag the column header stippled bar to the right or left as desired. Releasing or unclicking the cursor completes the column move.
In this example, we have column “Course Campus” in our table “Enrollment by Course and Term” which is located following the “Discipline” column.
We want to move the “Course Campus” column to precede the “Discipline” column.
Hover your cursor over the “Course Campus” column header stippled bar until the 4-point crosshair cursor appears.
Click and hold the column header stippled bar and drag it until it precedes the “Discipline” column. A gray bar will appear in the table indicating where the dragged column will be placed.
When you release or unclick the mouse, the column is moved to that location.
Move Column to “Prompts”
You may need further breakdowns of column data. By right-clicking on the desired column, you can select “Move Column” and then select “To Prompts”. Once a field is moved to a “prompt” its values are displayed in a drop-down list for selection, you can select a desired value to limit the table data by.
In this example, table “Enrollment by Course and Term” has the Term, Term Code, Census Final, Course Campus, Discipline, Course ID, Count of course registrations, and Count sections columns.
The “Discipline” column is no longer in the table and a new “Discipline” prompt is now located above the table.
Remember: Pay attention to the table data when Moving Columns to Prompts. Table sort orders will switch back to the default if you have done your own sorting. In this case, we had changed “Term” to sort Descending and after moving a column to prompt, “Term” went back to be sorted Ascending. Simply change the sort order of columns as desired. If you are not understanding the data, please email IR@genesee.edu for assistance.
If you click on the dropdown list on the “Discipline” prompt, you are presented with the various Discipline values you can select from (e.g. ACC, ART, ECO, ENG, etc.).
- Remember, the list of course disciplines were initially determined via prompts at the top of the dashboard page.
For this example, we selected discipline “ACC” from the Discipline prompt’s dropdown selections.
The table now only shows the student counts for the “ACC” discipline.
If you want to move the prompt back to be a column in the table, you can right-click on the “Discipline” prompt. From the options list, hover over “Move Column” and then click on “To Columns”.
Remember: When a prompt is moved to a column in the table, it may not be placed in the desired column order.
In this example, “Discipline” was placed as the first column of the table. Placement of the column does NOT impact the counts being displayed, but it may be confusing.
For this example, we can choose to move the “Discipline” column to follow the “Course Campus” column.
Move Column to “Sections”
Sometimes you want to add further breakdowns of the column data into separate tables. By right-clicking on the desired column, you can select “Move Column” and then select “To Sections”. Once a column is moved to “Sections”, a table is created for each value of the selected column.
In this example, we have column “Course Campus” in our table “Enrollment by Course and Term” which is located following the “Census Final” column.
By adding “Course Campus” to sections, you will be presented tables of counts for each Course Campus value.
Right-click on “Course Campus” column header and a list of options displays. Hover your cursor over “Move Column” and from the next list that opens, click on “To Sections”.
You’ll now be presented with a new set of tables, one table for each “Course Campus” value (e.g., Advanced Studies, Albion Campus – Orleans, Arcade Campus – Wyoming, etc.).
If you want to move the section tables back to be a column in the original table, you can right-click on a “Course Campus” prompt. From the options list, hover over “Move Column” and then click on “To Columns”.
Remember: When a section prompt is moved to a column in the table, it may not be placed in the desired column order.
In this example, “Course Campus” was placed as the first column of the table. Placement of the column does NOT impact the counts being displayed, but it may be confusing.
For this example, we can choose to move the “Course Campus” column to follow the “Census Final” column.
Remove a Column
Certain dashboards in GSI can be organized by using additional steps. The GSI Program Dashboard, tab “Course Grade Distribution,” can also be manipulated to display specific data that you are looking for. Once a column or data value within a column is removed, it cannot be added back to the table. You must leave the dashboard by clicking on a different dashboard, and then returning to Program Dashboard, Course Grade Distribution tab. You will also need to re-enter any prompts.
- Dashboard Prompts are set as follows:
- Term Description (Fall 2012 forward): Fall 2023 and Fall 2024
- Course: ACC101
- Student Program: (All Column Values)
- Be sure to click the “Apply” button”
Tables “Grade Count Summary” and “Grade Passing Rate Summary” are sorted in Ascending Order by Term. Table “Grade Count Summary” is located on the left-hand side of the dashboard. Table “Grade Passing Rate Summary” is located on the right-hand side of the dashboard.
A GSI table may hold more data columns than you need. Removing a column removes the column from the table. In this example, we want to remove the withdrawn count of students from table “Grade Count Summary” and from the table “Grade Passing Rate Summary”.
Right-click on the “Withdrawn” column header on either table, then select “Remove”.
This example shows the “Withdrawn” column being removed from the table “Grade Count Summary”.
This example shows the “Withdrawn” column being removed from the table “Grade Passing Rate Summary”.
The “Withdrawn” Column is removed and no longer visible. The table “Grade Count Summary” and the table “Grade Passing Rate Summary” data now shows the student count data grouped by passing and failing grades.
This training is complete. Thank you!
If you:
- Have any questions on using GSI
- Need data you are not finding
- Are not understanding the GSI data you find
- Have any suggestions for instruction improvements
Please send an email to IR@genesee.edu and someone from the Institutional Research and Planning Office will get back to you.
Additional Resources