Lightcast FAQs
What is Lightcast?
Lightcast is a company that gathers and integrates economic, labor market, demographic, education, profile, and job posting data from dozens of government and private-sector sources, to create a comprehensive and current dataset that includes both published data and detailed estimates with full United States coverage.
What resources are available for Lightcast?
Lightcast offers a knowledge base
that provides resources, such as glossary, data methodology, and FAQs.
Alumni Pathways FAQs
How does Lightcast gather alumni information?
Lightcast matched labor market data compiled from various sources (e.g., government agencies, job postings, online profiles/resumes) to a CSUF database of student records from 1967-2020 (both graduates and non-graduates). To count as a matched record, a profile has to match the institution’s past student information on the name and at least one of the following: contact information or award information (such as graduation year, program name, etc.).
What specific information does Alumni Pathways provide?
The Alumni Pathways tool provides the following information: occupation, job title, employer, location, industry, estimated wages, self-reported skills, certifications, and other schools they attended.
What can Alumni Pathways be used for?
The Alumni Pathways tool can be used for various purposes, such as program review, employer engagement, grant writing and fundraising, academic and career advising, marketing and recruitment, or alumni engagement.
With the purpose of understanding how our alumni are using their education in the real world, some questions that the tool can help programs answer are:
- Where do graduates work and what are their job titles?
- Which employers are hiring your grads?
- Are alumni employed in fields related to their program of study?
- What are their estimated earnings?
- What skills do they have?
- Are they staying in-state or migrating out of state?
- Which other institutions have your alumni attended?
Is Alumni Pathways available to all staff?
OIEP has the sole license. However, OIEP has designed a Tableau dashboard
that provides alumni data and can be accessed by all CSUF staff using their university login.
How does Lightcast decide if alumni are working in the field of study?
Lightcast compares the SOC code of a profile’s most recent job to our custom CIP-SOC mapping to determine whether the job is in or out of the field of study indicated by the CIP code the institution provided. The mapping is based on the NCES CIP-SOC crosswalk and the experience of Lightcast’s Professional Services team. In cases where no determination is possible, web reports indicate “out of field.”
Analyst FAQs
What specific information does Analyst provide?
Lightcast Analyst is a comprehensive labor market analysis tool that provides labor market data useful for aligning programs with market demand. Analyst provides the following information and trends: industries, occupations, job postings, skills, academic programs, and demographics.
What can Analyst be used for?
Similar to Lightcast Alumni Pathways, the data can be used for various purposes, such as program review or development, employer engagement, grant writing and fundraising, academic and career advising, marketing and recruitment, or alumni engagement.
Is Analyst available to all staff?
OIEP has the sole license. However, OIEP will work with you to provide labor market data that you need.
How do I request Lightcast Analyst reports?
Submit a request for reports using the Data Request Form
on the OIEP website. To view all variables that may be included in a report, please reference the
Lightcast Analyst Tables/Variables Guide
.
