In the not-too-distant past, the admissions calendar could be divided into four blocks. In the Fall we travel to recruit prospective students to apply. In the late Fall-late Winter we read those applications to decide who to offer admission. In the Spring we work to convince them to choose our school and in the Summer, we breathe and squeeze in a vacation. Those days are long gone. The cycles overlap… Read More »Yield season now lasts all year

The pressure to grow enrollment and retain students isn’t going away.  Colleges are therefore increasingly looking to one-stop shops to improve service to students and reduce issues that negatively impact enrollment. The assumption is that locating offices like Financial Aid, Bursar/Cashier, Registrar and even Admissions in one location, magic will happen and students will be happy. I call this the “We’re all in one building” approach to the One Stop.… Read More »All One Stop shops are not created equal

That was the title of a conference session I delivered back in 2012 at a joint SACAC and PACAC conference in Washington DC. We had just completed a series of assessments in our office and struggled to get beyond headcounts and satisfaction surveys. Admissions is a numbers business so we like to count. How many students attended your visit at high school X today? How many families came for a… Read More »How do you know what you’re doing is doing what you want it to do?