Lightcast is a labor market analytics company. They collect millions of job postings and career profiles daily to provide near-real-time insight into the labor market. Their database contains more than 1 billion job postings and career profiles and data from multiple other sources.
What is the University's relationship to Lightcast?
The University of Minnesota Twin Cities Campus subscribes to the Lightcast Analyst tool, allowing us to perform customizable searches on the job market based on a variety of variables (location, period of time, education required, occupation, and many more) and access information on an educational program’s competition and job market outlook based on its Classification of Instructional Programs (CIP) code or the Standard Occupational Codes (SOC) for aligned occupations.
What can it do for us?
Lightcast data provides us real-time access to the current job market for graduates or participants in our programs. It allows us to see where the jobs are, expected employment growth, skills and credentials that are in demand, and more. The data is useful for the University in many ways including:
- analysis of the market for new programs;
- review and optimization of current program portfolios;
- researching keywords and content for marketing;
- understanding the needs of employers so that we can adapt curriculum to meet their needs;
- identifying, building and strengthening employer partnerships; and
- helping to prepare job-seeking students to present themselves in the best possible light to employers.
Who has access?
Our current contract for four seats is administered by the Office for Distributed Learning (ODL). ODL partners with the College of Continuing and Professional Studies (CCAPS) to pull reports for Twin Cities campus units that are considering new online programs or evaluating new programs. Additionally the Carlson School of Management, the School of Public Health, and the College of Design have identified a need in their unit to have direct access to the tool and elected to each pay for one license. Additional seats can be made available for other units on the Twin Cities campus who want to have direct access to the data.
How do I request a report?
Twin Cities units considering a new online program(s) or reviewing an existing online program can request a report using the Lightcast Report Request form. If you represent a campus other than the Twin Cities, please contact Fritz Vandover directly at [email protected].
What kinds of reports are available?
- Program Overview Report: An overview of the demand for a program with data related to competitive landscape, job postings, skills, target occupations, and more.
- Industry Overview: An overview of an industry with data related to jobs, growth, earnings, demographics, and more.
- Occupation Overview: An overview of an occupation with data related to jobs, earnings, demographics, and more.
- Regional Reports: An overview of a regional economy and demographics.
- If your data needs do not fit into one of the categories above, please select “other” on the form and describe what you are looking for.