The Data Analytics program offers a robust academic foundation for students looking to develop expertise in collecting, organizing, analyzing, interpreting, and presenting data.
Students gain the essential skills and knowledge needed to work with large data sets, make data-driven decisions, and effectively communicate insights, patterns, and relationships.
The program integrates theoretical learning with hands-on experience, requiring students to apply their knowledge to real-world business and industry scenarios.
Completion of a data analytics associates degree opens doors to various careers with the title of analyst and numerous other job titles that use analytical skills.
Data skills will be critical in the age of AI. According to NH long term labor market projections data science employment will experience a growth rate of 40% through 2032 and is expected to be one of the strongest growth areas for professional jobs in the state.
Within the data analytics degree students select from three pathways depending on their goals and interest: data science, business analytics, and healthcare applications.
Most courses are available online and the entire degree program is available fully online. However, several courses have additional sections offered in person on the Nashua campus for interested students.
This program has multiple articulation agreements for transfer options to local public and private colleges for completion of four-year degrees.
In addition this program awards transfer credits (up to 12) for prior learning for Google Analytics professional certificate holders.
DATA ANALYTICS DEGREE PATHWAYS
Data Science
The Data Science pathway emphasizes a solid foundation in higher mathematics and computational skills. Students learn to analyze complex data—both structured and unstructured—using advanced techniques in predictive modeling and programming languages like Python and SQL. This pathway is ideal for students who plan to pursue advanced studies in data analytics and related fields such as statistics, machine learning, and artificial intelligence, at the baccalaureate level and beyond.
Business Analytics
The Business Analytics pathway focuses on applying data to inform decision-making in both public and private sectors. The course content is regularly updated based on input from local employers to ensure students develop relevant, marketable skills. Graduates are prepared for entry-level analytical roles such as business intelligence analyst, marketing analyst, and human resources analyst, while also having the foundation to pursue further studies in business analytics.
Healthcare Applications
The Healthcare Applications pathway integrates study of data analytics with key areas of public health, medical terminology, U.S. healthcare systems, and healthcare IT, including Electronic Medical Records (EMR) applications. This pathway equips students with the skills needed for data-intensive roles in the healthcare sector (research assistant, health insurance analyst, healthcare quality analyst, and other data-focused positions) or to pursue further study in healthcare administration, public health, and related fields at the baccalaureate level and beyond.
Students in the data analytics degree program will select one of three pathway options to follow.
All pathway options result in the awarding of a data analytics major for the associates degree and share common data analytics courses and overall program outcomes.
The pathways differ in application area according to student interest.
Data Science
Business Analytics
Healthcare Applications
Upon the completion of the degree in Data Analytics, graduates will be able to:
- Identify data sources, types of data, and data structures, including structured and unstructured data.
- Remediate raw data as appropriate before analysis including cleaning and restructuring data using software tools and programming skills.
- Collect and combine data from multiple sources using database programming (SQL) and related skills.
- Use analytical tools to identify patterns and relationships in data sets including time trends, cluster analysis, association analysis, classification, and statistical associations and relations.
- Apply data analytics to address real-world problems and communicate results to stakeholders
- Visually communicate patterns and relations in data applying best practices of data visualization.
- Identify legal and ethical issues in analyzing data and adhere to ethical standards.
The data analytics degree program is open admissions and has no prerequisites for students to begin coursework. Students are required to have a computer meeting the technical specifications necessary to run analytical software. Most software packages used in the program are open source, provided by the college or available at nominal cost to students. When possible, freely available open educational resources are utilized in coursework thus minimizing student cost.
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