PS&L Blog

I’ve had two conversations over the past 3 weeks with colleges needing to build enrollments. The scenarios are similar: they need to meet or exceed fall 2010 new student enrollments goals because they missed the mark the last 2 years and had worse than planned (hoped) for retention.

So I was thinking, Tiger Woods? I had to chime in on this, as everyone else is taking shots at him since he painted a big red target on his back that said “thoughtless dummy.” I’m sure many of you are asking yourself, “where’s the link here, Dave?” (Don’t worry, I promise there’s a correlation.)

Based on the conversations with the colleges, it appears that they didn’t stay true to themselves or their missions.

In an effort to build enrollments, they targeted, admitted, and enrolled students who did not match their profile of successful students. Yes, challenging financial circumstances did play a role in some students not returning after a year. But the other apparent issue is that these colleges took their eye off of what made them successful in the past and attractive to students and parents. Search purchases and high school visits were greatly expanded into relatively new territories, with a tempting increase in inquiries, apps and admits. But the lure of growth in these new areas became a distraction for the admissions team.

Now please understand, I am in no way against calculated, strategic expansion of a college’s market area if its based on solid research and planning. It’s part of doing business. My concern is that they stretched resources and staff to the point where focus on the primary markets, their “bread and butter markets” if you will, did not receive nearly as much attention as they had in the past. Under-prepared students from the new markets were admitted to get the numbers up. These same students also received a little bit more aid. In studying the data, they visited the campus at a much lower rate than those from the primary markets.

So the surprise should have been minimal when retention for students from the new markets dropped substantially. Now the staff needs to really bust it out to hit goal this year as the drop in overall enrollments is putting enormous strain on the budget.

The reminders:
➢ Know your sweet spots, the primary and secondary markets. Work them. Sure, many institutions are experiencing a drop in high school students in these markets. That just means you need to be more focused on maintaining market share.
➢ Know your students. What do the successful ones “look like?” Find more like them.
➢ Know the prospective students. Not their files — them. Talk with the students and their parents.
➢ Know how the staff is going to present the institution in the new markets. Staff may need guidance on differentiation in the new markets against new competition.
➢ Know your staff. Where are their strengths, what do they do best? How do they fit that into the core of their activities? Provide direction to improve their weak areas.

Don’t be a Tiger. Stayed grounded. Be yourself. Understand what works for the college and what doesn’t. Keep your eye on the ball. Avoid distractions that look good on the surface, but hold little chance of meaningful returns.