Practical Strategies for Enrollment Management

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Practical Strategies for Enrollment Management

• Cheryl Brown, Director of Admissions
• Peter J. Partell, Director of Institutional
  Research
• Binghamton University
• State University of New York
• June 2001

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Why Institutional Researchers Should Care About
Enrollment Management

• A way to contribute to one of your colleges or
  universitys primary strategic goals.
• It allows you another avenue to be involved in
  influencing policy and decision making on campus.
• It is interesting and fun (read stressful and
  anxiety-producing).

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Definitions of Enrollment Management

• Enrollment management is an organizational
  concept and a systematic set of activities
  designed to enable educational institutions to
  exert more influence over their student
  enrollments. Organized by strategic planning and
  supported by institutional research, enrollment
  management activities concern student college
  choice, transition to college, student attrition
  and retention, and student outcomes. --Don
  Hossler

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Definitions of Enrollment Management

• Enrollment management is the coordinated effort
  of a college or university to influence the size
  and characteristics of the institutions student
  body... enrollment is managed through a variety
  of strategies including admissions, pricing,
  financial aid, and advising. Well designed and
  well executed institutional research is the key
  to successful enrollment management.--Craig
  Clagett

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How do you do Enrollment Management?

• The key is to use the data that you currently
  have at your disposal and look at it in different
  ways.
• Analyses need to be guided by your institutions
  strategic plan so that all the offices involved
  work towards the same goals.

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Identify the Strategic Goals of Your Institution

• Increase campus revenue?
• Improve (maintain) quality/selectivity?
• Change demographics? (diversity geographic and
  race ethnic, talent, programs, schools,
  non-traditional, traditional, e-learners,
  freshmen, transfer, graduate, etc.)
• Goals have to be aligned with the reality of your
  campus - can your institution support the
  students it is trying to attract?

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The Enrollment Funnel
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IRs Role in Enrollment Management

• Spearhead analysis, reporting, and data
  collection that is about how to move prospective
  students (and then students) through the various
  stages of the enrollment funnel.

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Some Tools

• EPS - Enrollment Planning Service
• CIRP - Cooperative Institutional Research Program
• Alumni Surveys (e.g., AOS)
• Student Opinion Surveys (e.g.., SOS)
• College Board -- Admitted Student Questionnaire,
  Admitted Class Evaluation Service

• National Student Clearinghouse
• Surveys (e.g., US News, Kiplingers, Wired) and
  articles -- What are they saying about your
  institution?
• Campus data files

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Building Your Inquiry Pool Feeding Your Funnel

• You cant enroll without adequate inquiries. As
  there is pressure to grow, the inquiry pool must
  be large enough to sustain the growth. This is
  true by market segment.
• Example -- Our goal for Engineering School was
  set too high because we asked only half the
  questions - can you teach more students? Should
  also have looked at the funnel.
• Build Inquiries based on the segments you would
  like to enroll and their fit with your
  institution - what do you know about who
  succeeds? (grades, retention, etc.)

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Feeding Your Funnel (continued)

• Identifying Target Markets
• Analyses aimed at shaping your inquiry pool to
  ultimately enroll the students that meet your
  strategic goals.
• Result will assist in deciding which names to
  buy, places to travel, ads to place -- using
  resources most effectively.
• Sources to tap
• High school market research (identify target
  schools that graduate the types of students you
  want)
• Population projections (e.g., high school grads
  by state/county)
• Local data bases (identify feeder high schools or
  community colleges)
• Prospects/Name buys (e.g., ETS, Phi Theta Kappa,
  etc.) .
• U.S. Census

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Locations of Targeted High Schools
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Segmenting Targeted Markets

• Buy names from the markets you identified based
  on how you choose to segment them (again,
  strategic goals)
• Examples may include - gender, geography, income,
  schools/programs, race/ethnic and socio-economic
  diversity, SAT/ACT Scores, GPA

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Mining Local Databases

• Feeder schools
• Understanding which schools give you the highest
  numbers of students and which could give you more
  - analyze through the lens of the funnel
• Shape the message to each high school (CIRP ASQ)

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Turning Inquiries Into Applicants Qualifying
Your Inquiry Pool

• Are you collecting inquiry data? Are you
  collecting appropriate/useful inquiry data?
• How interested is the student?
• How often and in what form have they inquired?
• Inquiry Source - self-initiated v. school
  initiated - Would you expect there to be a
  difference?
• What are your yield rates based on inquiry type?

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Distribution of student interest
Least likely to enroll at your school no matter
what you do.
Most likely to enroll at your school no matter
what you do.
Influence
C
A
B
Students falling in this area will not enroll
unless the institution does something to
influence their decision.
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Turning Inquiries into Applicants - Marketing

• Understanding why students apply. What they
  respond to (Academic Programs, Financial Aid and
  Scholarships, etc.) Who does not apply and why?
• How do students learn about colleges?
• Data on success, strengths, e.g., grad rates,
  placement rates, surveys, rankings, USP,etc.
• Understanding who will persist or succeed.
• Arm your admissions recruiters to the teeth.

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Turning Applicants into Admitted Students

• Who should be offered admission to shape your
  class (strategic goals of size, quality,
  diversity, etc. ) -- projection, projections,
  projections.
• Example Always tuned to the quality of our
  freshmen, yet our forecasting of yield did not
  involve quality at all -- only school of
  application -- our actions were not in synch with
  one of our strategic goals.

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Admissions Index

• College qualification -- often based on
  combination of
• high school performance (GPA, Rank, etc)
• test scores (SAT, ACT, TOEFL)
• rigor of high school coursework (AP?)
• applicants interest in attending? (see Wall St.
  Journal 5/29/2001).

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Why Use an Admissions Index? to influence the
size and characteristics of the institutions
student body - Claggett

• It ties your strategic goals to your admissions
  decisions because what the index should be built
  based on what matters to your institution.
• Aids in more consistent admission decisions
  across counselors.
• Gives you a more accurate yield analyses/class
  projection.
• Allows for the control and tracking of the
  students you want.

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Turning Offers into Enrolled Students Analyses
to Assist with Yield

• What do we mean by yield? -- deposits versus
  enrollment - which should you use?
• General rule the more refined your look at the
  yield data, the better able you are to directly
  impact your strategic goals Go to spreadsheet
  example
• Be careful that analysis not too refined so as
  numbers are too small to be meaningful.
• Who are your competitors?
• Again, may vary by your target groups!!!

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Competitors Sample of data from Enrollment
Search (National Student Clearinghouse)
Remember Your competitors are likely to be
different for different types of students
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Enroll (yield)

• Turning offers into enrolled students.
• Financial Aid
• Who you can and cant impact
• How much money it takes to affect a students
  decision.
• Monitoring deposits melt rates

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Financial Aid and Yield
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Enroll (yield)

• Deposit Analysis - monitor deposit rates to
  determine whether youre on track to yield the
  class (Summers are hot, whos melting?)

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One last point on yield

• Segmented Marketing Messages
• Unique Selling points
• IR as PR
• defining your image
• defining your message
• using data to reinforce your image

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Analyzing and Supporting Retention

• Identify who left and why - use data! Do not
  rely on conventional wisdom
• Example - IUT denials leave - internal pressure
  was based on conventional wisdom - data didnt
  support
• Analysis may incorporate
• National Student Clearinghouse
• Surveys (homegrown, CIRP, SOS - verify
  reliability - Recent SOS Results)
• Exit Interviews/Focus Groups
• Look at impact of financial aid
• Look for courses - Killer Courses

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Analyzing and Supporting Retention

• Identify who stays and why - analyze your
  satisfaction ratings, your alumni surveys.
• Benchmark your results against peer norms
• Provide the right people with the data to help
  them build on institutional strengths (read
  satisfaction) and take steps to address
  institutional weaknesses.

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Conclusion

• Enrollment Management is at the heart of success
  for every type of institution
• Analysis of data provides the keys to successful
  enrollment management
• Who has the potential to impact data collection,
  analysis, and dissemination to the people who
  make decisions Institutional Researchers

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Conclusion

• Become the campus expert on the available tools
• Analyze data with an eye towards marketing and PR
  and the enrollment funnel
• Work to develop and support a campus culture of
  shared information and shared goal setting
• Be recognized as THE resource for enrollment
  management expertise
• Insist that IR is at the table when key decisions
  are made.

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Thank you!

• Contact us
• Cheryl Brown
• Director of Admissions
• cbrown_at_binghamton.edu
• Peter J. Partell
• Director of Institutional Research
• partell_at_binghamton.edu
• Binghamton University
• State University of New York
• June 2001

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Resources

• CIRP Freshman Survey Offered by HERI 
• CIRP Cooperative Institutional Research Program
•  Higher Education Research Institute (HERI)
• Graduate School of Education Information
  Studies
• University of California, Los Angeles
• 3005 Moore Hall, Box 951521
•  
• Phone [phone] Fax [phone]
  E-Mail HERI_at_ucla.edu
•  
• Website http//www.gseis.ucla.edu/heri/heri.htm
  l
•  -------------------------------------------------
  --------------------------------------------------
  ---------
•  Alumni Outcomes Survey Student Opinion Survey
  Both offered by ACT
•  ACT - American College Testing
•  American College Testing
• 2201 North Dodge Street
• P.O. Box 168
• Iowa City, Iowa 52243-0168
•  
• Phone [phone]

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Resources

• The Enrollment Planning Service (EPS) and
  Admitted Student Questionnaire (ASQ) are offered
  by the College Board  
• Middle States Regional Office
• 3440 Market St.
• Suite 410
• Philadelphia, Pa 19104-3338
• Phone [phone]
• Fax [phone]
• www.collegeboard.org
•  
• The contact information for ETS is
•  
• Corporate HeadquartersEducational Testing
  ServiceRosedale RoadPrinceton, NJ 08541
  USA(609) 921-9000FAX [phone]E-mailmoets
  info_at_ets.org
• www.ets.org
•  
•  

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Resources

•  
• National Student Clearinghouse
• National Student Clearinghouse2191 Fox Mill
  Road, Suite 300Herndon, VA 20171-3019
• Phone [phone]
• Fax [phone]
• Email service_at_studentclearinghouse.org
• http//www.studentclearinghouse.org/
•  
•