There will be a new face in Iowa State’s Office of Institutional Research this summer.

Gebre Tesfagiorgis, director of Institutional Research and Planning at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, will take over as Director of Institutional Research at Iowa State.

The former director, Elizabeth Stanley, announced her intent to retire in February 1999 and retired at the end of June 1999.

“This position has been open for some time, and we did a national search, and he presented excellent credentials,” said Rabindra Mukerjea, assistant to the president. “The selection committee recommended him very highly, and he was also favored over a lot of other candidates. He met the criteria very well.”

Tesfagiorgis has a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and was senior policy and planning analyst at the University of Wisconsin before going to Nebraska. He will begin as director June 1.

Mukerjea said many candidates applied, and Tesfagiorgis was selected out of the four who were interviewed.

“He really comes with absolutely excellent credentials,” he said. “We are very pleased that he is coming.”

Tesfagiorgis will direct the Office of Institutional Research, which is a division of the Office of the President.

Mukerjea said the new director would work with him and the Office of the President in preparing regents’ governance reports for a “variety of institutional data, data gathering and analysis to facilitate planning decisions for the university.”

Tesfagiorgis will direct all of the data selection analysis that goes with those reports.

“What we do primarily is provide information for management decisions for the university,” said Lynn Zwagerman, analyst in the Office of Institutional Research.

She said the department does research on, for example, students and staff, but not on agriculture.

“We provide a lot of information to the Board of Regents,” she said. “It’s one office that can provide comprehensive information to the university.”

Mukerjea said the data analysis is also compared to similar universities.

“Institutional research functions include quite a wide range of data analysis,” he said. “This includes data analysis not only at Iowa State, but also in comparison with many other national institutions.”

Mukerjea said he is very pleased with the new director.

“We are very happy he is coming,” he said. “He is clearly an excellent candidate and was viewed as such. We believe he could be a tremendous addition to the staff.”

Zwagerman also expressed excitement about the new director.

“He seems very well qualified,” she said. “We’re looking forward to working with him.”