A traditional academic transcript offers a narrow view of student achievement—mostly limited to course titles and grades. But at the University of Notre Dame, that’s not nearly enough to reflect the breadth and depth of a student’s educational journey.
From service projects and global experiences to research and leadership roles, today’s students engage in learning that extends far beyond the classroom. That’s why Notre Dame is building a Comprehensive Learner Record (CLR): a dynamic, data-rich representation of the full student experience.
We heard from Chuck Hurley, Assistant Vice President and University Registrar at Notre Dame, about how the institution is shaping a CLR strategy that’s inclusive, collaborative, and built on a strong data foundation.
At the top of the list for us was the fact that we talk a lot at Notre Dame about how we offer an unsurpassed undergraduate education. The fact of the matter is, the transcript doesn’t represent the holistic experience of a Notre Dame student. The transcript is a very important tool, a critical tool, but it’s not the only component of the learner record. We knew we could do better. We knew we could represent more information about a student’s time at Notre Dame. The learner record for students is expanding, which is a really good thing and, frankly, long overdue. The CLR offers an opportunity for us as an institution to grow along with that expansion of the learner record.
Chuck Hurley
Assistant Vice President & University Registrar
The first group we engaged was the Office of the Provost, as we report to them and needed their buy-in. They were immediately excited about the opportunity and could see the benefits for students. We also went to the Office of Research and the Office of Student Affairs and Student Activities to gauge their reaction and to understand their capabilities. It was also critical for us to talk with The Institute for Social Concerns, which oversees community engagement for our university community. They help students with all kinds of volunteer opportunities in the local region. They have been wanting something like this for years, but didn’t really know how to vocalize it. The same is true for Notre Dame Global. They are the office responsible for international experiences and had been considering opportunities to showcase the wonderful things that our students do in overseas programs, but they didn’t know how to express that. Overall, people were very excited about it. The buy-in has been universal and folks really thought it was long overdue.
It’s an interesting question because the transcript is going to come from your Student Information System. With the CLR, data is being pulled from multiple data sources across the institution. For most institutions, those data sources are not integrated. At Notre Dame, we were very fortunate that about a decade ago we started a data warehouse project and have spent a tremendous amount of resources on that project. It was slow going for the first few years, but today, we have a tremendous repository of valuable data. Most importantly for us and the CLR project, all of the core components that we’re looking to put on CLR are in the data warehouse. Frankly, it made the project a lot more achievable for us.
Part of our advising plan going forward will be for advisors to look at the CLR with students and consider the options students have, whether it be study abroad, volunteer activities, clubs, research with faculty. Students can play to their own strengths, interests and hopefully build that CLR out over an academic career. We don’t want it to be a set of check boxes, where students feel the need to fill out each section. That’s not the point of it. The purpose is for the student to really be able to tell their own story about their holistic development during their time at the University of Notre Dame and to exhibit leadership and experiential learning.
Want to hear more from leaders putting CLRs into action? Watch the on-demand webinar Why (and How) Two Institutions Pursued Comprehensive Learner Records, featuring further insights from the University of Notre Dame.
Notre Dame’s Comprehensive Learner Record initiative demonstrates what’s possible when institutions look beyond the traditional transcript to capture the full scope of student growth. By aligning cross-campus collaboration with a strong data infrastructure, they’ve created a record that doesn’t just document learning—it empowers students to own their story.
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