NAGAP Perspectives Spring 2019

VOLUME 31 NUMBER 1 SPRING 2019

PERSPECTIVES A Newsmagazine for Graduate Enrollment Management Professionals

IN THIS ISSUE  2 From the President  4 Got International Transcripts and Diplomas? Build the Ultimate Resource Library… on a Budget!  8 Student Perspectives: An Unexpected Journey 10 Working with a Partner to Achieve Your Goal: A Partnership to Integrate Marketing Automation 12 It’s Time for an Honest Conversation about Graduate Admissions 14 The Use of Social Media and E-Marketing in Graduate Student Recruitment: An Investigation of Graduate Enrollment Management Practices 27 Working with a Partner to Achieve Your Goal: Making the Invisible Visible 30 2019 Annual Conference: Toronto, Canada 31 Eh, Canada? Fun Facts about Our 2019 Annual Conference Host Country 33 Book Review—The University of Nike: How Corporate Cash Bought American Higher Education 36 Reviewer Diligence and Responsibility in the Graduate Application Process 40 Higher Education Humor (Heh)!

www.NAGAP.org

FROM THE PRESIDENT Dear Colleagues, Welcome to the Spring 2019 edition of Perspectives.

As I write this and reflect on the past year, I am reminded of how fortunate I am to have colleagues across the country who are not only excellent at what they do, but also how they do it. I am referring to those who demonstrate compassion and kindness, while encouraging those around them. A career in higher education can be a challenge, especially in enrollment management, and a kind word can go a long way to helping someone feel valued.

I encourage you to identify individuals in your professional network who you can rely on for more than just words of advice. I also challenge you to be that source of support for others, either on your own campus or in your professional circles.

PERSPECTIVES A Newsmagazine for Graduate Enrollment Management Professionals

Editor, Raymond A. Lutzky, PhD Senior Director of Enrollment and Admissions Cornell Tech 2 West Loop Road New York, N.Y. 10044

Assistant Editor, Caela Provost

To say that I am humbled by the tireless efforts of your NAGAP Board and our amazing committee volunteers and chapter leadership would be an understatement.

Over the past few months we have offered professional development opportunities for GEM professionals through another successful Winter Institute, as well as our new monthly webinar series and podcasts. We have partnered with FFP EDU Media to offer our first-ever international recruitment tour to India this spring. Plus, our Research Committee is doing a great job of collecting and publishing significant data through the monthly Flash Feedback 60-second surveys. Thanks to everyone working on these initiatives!

In the coming months you will see some additional benefits of membership in NAGAP. For starters, we are beginning development of an online networking platform that will allow members to stay connected long after a conference or institute has ended. We also have several joint projects in process with industry partners that will conclude with white papers and/or presentations at Annual Conference. These efforts are a direct result of our strategic investment of resources based on the findings of our Member Needs Assessment completed in 2017.

Another new initiative you have probably heard about is our inaugural GEM-focused Leadership Academy scheduled for October of 2019. This intensive leadership development experience will include cohesive, experiential training that will integrate education, experience, feedback, and coaching. Featuring an opening residency hosted by Teachers College, Columbia University and a keynote presentation by Debra Noumair, this six-month program will culminate in a capstone project linking classroom learning to real-world issues and opportunities. Enrollment is limited, so if you are interested I encourage you to visit the NAGAP website to learn more.

I am also excited as we quickly approach our first international Annual Conference taking place at the Sheraton Centre Toronto from April 10-13, 2019. The preconference topic and educational sessions look amazing, but this conference is also an excellent time for NAGAP chapter meetings, networking with GEM colleagues, and learning more about the products and services available through our vendor partners. It is also a great time to put on your volunteer hat—or ribbon, as the case may be—to serve as a moderator or recorder. I am looking forward to spending several days in April with over one thousand of my NAGAP friends and colleagues!

North American Officer/U.S. Representative University College Cork 75 Arlington Street, Suite 500 Boston, Mass. 02116 NAGAPpublications@gmail.com NAGAP Perspectives is published three times per year (fall, spring, summer).

Articles of particular interest for publication are graduate enrollment management research/study results, how-to articles, success stories, reports of workshops/ seminars, book reviews, etc.

Submissions should be sent to the editor via email. Articles should be provided in Microsoft Word, with figures and photos provided separately as high-resolution TIF or EPS files. APA style is preferred for documenting sources. Submission deadlines: August 30, January 6, May 16.

Copyright © 2019 NAGAP NAGAP is committed to diversity and inclusiveness in all of its activities. This commitment embraces respect for differences including age, culture, disability, education, ethnicity, gender, life experiences, race, religion, and sexual orientation. NAGAP champions an open exchange of ideas in a collegial environment that embraces academic freedom, cooperation, mutual respect, and responsibility. NAGAP supports activities that promote and nurture professional development, best practices, research, and collaboration of a diverse and global community of graduate enrollment management professionals, encouraging dialogue that fosters professional growth among all of its constituents, in the U.S. and internationally.

continued on the next page

2

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

N

A

G

A

P

Finally, I want to highlight just a few of the articles you will find in this issue. In preparation for our trip to Canada, I encourage you to read the article with some interesting (and humorous) facts about the country hosting our Annual Conference!

I also think you will find the articles Building a Credential Library… on a Budget and Marketing Automation in GEM to be extremely insightful. You will also find an interesting piece entitled Reviewer Diligence and Responsibility in the Graduate Application Process written by JoAnn Canales at Council of Graduate Schools.

As always, thanks for your commitment to your students and the GEM profession.

If you have ideas for what we can do to better serve our NAGAP members or if you simply want to get involved in the association, please contact me or another member of the Governing Board. Have a great spring! n Keith Ramsdell NAGAP President

NAGAP Chapters

Join or Start a Chapter Today!

For those of you looking to get more involved with NAGAP, your local chapter is a great place to start. Chapters provide a wonderful opportunity to network, to participate in regional workshops and conferences, and to assume leadership positions.

They are also a great resource for learning more about GEM, especially if you are unable to attend the national annual conference.

NAGAP has eight regional U.S. chapters, one international chapter, and two special interest chapters. To find out which chapter your state is a member of, visit NAGAP’s Chapters page. Here you will find contact information for each chapter president, and a link to the chapter’s website or social media page. Most chapters have a “join” or “contact us” link right on the landing page.

If you find your state is not affiliated with a chapter, you may be interested in beginning a new chapter. For more information, review the How To Get Started overview. Questions?

Please contact us at info@nagap.org.

N

A

G

A

P

P E R S P E C T I V E S

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

3

GOT INTERNATIONAL TRANSCRIPTS AND DIPLOMAS? BUILD THE ULTIMATE RESOURCE LIBRARY… ON A BUDGET!

By Melody Ojeda, International Education Research Foundation (IERF) Educational systems around the world are often in flux and changing. For international admissions officers, locating and gathering the most accurate resources for credentials evaluations can be quite daunting. This is due in part to the fact that qualifications vary by country, field, and period of study. There exists no single book or online database that can provide a comprehensive source for every international credential. In fact, any one credential may require a variety of resources to fully understand its level and purpose to determine its equivalency and placement recommendation.

Resources include information on educational systems, institutional recognition, and academic programs.

However, due to limited funding, some admissions offices may not have developed a full library for credentials evaluations. Therefore, knowing the proper online tools and utilizing the right books can make the research process more efficient.

Before building a resource library, it is important to have a clear idea of how an institution’s international intake looks.

Are there any specific fields of study that are more common among international applicants, like engineering, medicine,

“Resources include information on educational systems, institutional recognition, and academic programs. However, due to limited funding, some admissions offices may not have developed a full library for credentials evaluations.

Therefore, knowing the proper online tools and utilizing the right books can make the research process more efficient.”

4

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

art, etc.? Are there any specific countries or regions that are more prevalent? Do these applicants tend to be more recent graduates, or is there a mix in periods of graduation? Asking such questions will better shape a resource library to its right purpose.

Online Resources The emergence of the internet has innovated the way admissions officers research international credentials, as it is the most efficient way to learn about educational systems. However, the internet can be cluttered sometimes with conflicting information, since anyone can contribute to the content posted online. An internet search on any single credential can display a list of results, some of which may outright contradict others. Therefore, it is important to know which online resources to use and when to use them.

Websites For information on specific university programs, especially for qualifications earned more recently, the most reliable online resources are the university websites themselves. Many universities will have pages of information on the programs they offer, including entrance requirements, program duration, year-by-year curricula, and career opportunities. Additionally, since many countries have a single governmental body overseeing education, they will often have their own ministry websites dedicated to providing relevant information on education within their countries. Depending on the region, these websites will even include current laws and decrees pertaining to educational decisions. For websites that are in the country’s native language, Google Translate may be needed.

One example is Brazil’s ministry website, e-MEC Instituições de Educação Superior e Cursos Cadastrados (Higher

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

Education Institutions and Registered Courses),1 which includes a list of Brazil’s recognized higher education institutions, along with their undergraduate and specialization programs. The website lists both current programs and those that were once recognized by the ministry but have now lost accreditation.

The Canadian Information Centre for International Credentials (CICIC)2 provides detailed information about education unique to each province and territory within Canada. Their website contains links to web pages of approved academic programs with information on their length and the credentials awarded upon completion.

A growing number of ministry websites will also include verification pages for studies at the secondary and postsecondary level. Verification portals are usually free but require specific codes that can only be provided by the students being verified. These codes will give access to the respective students’ academic histories. Chile’s ministry website3 provides a verification portal for graduates at the secondary level, which includes the credential awarded and any accompanying transcripts. Mexico’s ministry website4 has a verification page for all registered university degrees using an individual’s Cedula number, or degree registration number.

As time-specific information is key when researching foreign credentials, a useful online tool that can be used in conjunction with ministry and university websites is the Wayback Machine,5 an online repository of archived web pages.

Many websites have been archived by up to twenty years or more. Copying and pasting a website’s URL into the Wayback Machine will provide a timeline with links to archived pages of the website. In this way, an admissions officer can find more accurate or continued on the next page

N

A

G

A

P

GOT INTERNATIONAL TRANSCRIPTS AND DIPLOMAS? appropriate information for slightly older credentials, including any relevant name changes within university departments and faculties. However, it is important to note that not every ministry or university web page has been archived by the Wayback Machine. In addition, some universities may not have had a website during the applicable time of study.

Nonetheless, the Wayback Machine is a great online tool to use when looking into credentials earned within the last ten to twenty years.

Databases Other websites that provide reliable information pertaining to international education can include non-university or non-ministry sources. Several associations and agencies have created online databases that detail the educational systems in almost every country. For example, the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers (AACRAO) hosts the Electronic Database for Global Education (EDGE),6 where admissions officers can find country profiles, educational systems, academic programs, technical programs, university listings, grading systems, and sample documents. While this database requires a membership fee, it can be a useful resource when an institution receives international credentials from a wide range of countries. Similarly, the World Higher Education Database (WHED)7 is a free online portal created by the International Association of Universities (IAU), designed to provide detailed overviews of the educational systems in 186 countries, including any recent changes within their systems. It provides information on the structure of education in each country, along with a list of recognized universities and higher institutions.

systems. While these electronic publications have been produced to aid other countries for their own equivalency and placement recommendations, any institution can still benefit from the extensive information on the educational systems around the world that is included in these publications. For example, NUFFIC8 is an organization in the Netherlands that has a series of free electronic publications on international education. Each country has its own “module” that can be downloaded for free as a PDF. These country-specific modules include educational charts along with detailed descriptions of the various qualifications at each level of study. The International Qualifications Assessment Service (IQAS) in Canada has a series of international education guides.9 In addition to the educational overview of each country, this series also includes “credential templates” for each country with detailed information of each credential. Both NUFFIC and IQAS are free of charge and can be accessed easily on the organizations’ websites.

The NAFSA: Association of International Educators in the United States also publishes their own resources, including the “Guide to Educational Systems Around the World.”10 This series is free for members of NAFSA and only comes with a small price for those who are not members. These country guides include updates of various countries’ continuously evolving educational systems.

Print Resources

Some international organizations also issue electronic publications for understanding foreign credentials in relation to their own educational

Sole reliance on online resources is insufficient for research on older credentials. One common problem that many admissions officers encounter is that information found online is usually rather current. While plentiful, it may not always reflect the full scope of international educational systems as these have changed over time. In the last century, education has evolved significantly in many countries due to wars, revolutions, new country formations, and educational reforms.

Some countries have even begun to

N

P E R S P E C T I V E S

Electronic Publications

A

G

A

P

CONTINUED

adjust their educational systems to accommodate globalization and the growing popularity of international exchanges and study abroad programs.

For example, the Bologna Process is a current agreement among 48 European nations to harmonize their higher education credentials, making them “compatible” to one another. This allows students from a higher institution of one European nation to have their credentials more easily recognized by other institutions throughout Europe. While many European nations participated at the start of this agreement in 1999, others joined in years later. Some nations are still in the process of transitioning to the Bologna Process, and therefore continue to follow their older educational system as it gradually changes out. Thus, it is important to have a reference of a country’s older educational system.

“While print publication resources can potentially be costly for credentials research, they can also be the most significant asset.”

Publications While print publication resources can potentially be costly for credentials research, they can also be the most significant asset. Depending on the international intake of an institution, the information needed on foreign credentials may focus heavily on older studies or those specific to certain countries. It would then be useful to invest in a book—or series of books— that will focus on these exact needs.

The Association of Indian Universities has a series of University Handbooks11 with information on each Indian university’s programs of study, entrance requirements, duration of study, affiliated continued on the next page

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

5

GOT INTERNATIONAL TRANSCRIPTS AND DIPLOMAS? college listings, and more. This series is a useful tool for those institutions that receive many international students from India. Similarly, the National Association of Universities and Higher Education Institutions (ANUIES)12 in Mexico has their own series of publications of recognized higher institutions and programs of study within Mexico.

Both AACRAO13 and NAFSA14 began their own series of print publications on country educational profiles for a wide range of countries long before the internet surge. Their series, which were sometimes published jointly, include publications with extensive information on education around the world dating back to the early 1970s. Both AACRAO and NAFSA’s publications provide useful information on many countries’ credentials at the secondary and postsecondary level, such as entrance requirements, duration of programs, recognizing bodies, grading systems, and sample documents. The advantage of these older print publications is that they provide the most accurate information specific to the time of study of any older credential being researched.

Many foreign credentials evaluation agencies, such as the International

“It takes a combined approach-utilizing online, print, and primary document resources—to find the best equivalencies in the field of credentials research. With each international applicant, a resource library will become more useful, comprehensive and reliable.”

Education Research Foundation (IERF)15 and Educational Credential Evaluators (ECE),16 have also contributed their own publications on international education. ECE has several country specific publications that include detailed educational profiles. IERF’s publications contain U.S. equivalency recommendations to assist higher institutions that do their own foreign credentials evaluations.

There are also smaller non-series print publications that are helpful for international credentials research. Since there are too many to list here, and the needs of each institution can vary significantly, admissions officers should review the TAICEP Recommended Publications for a list of both older and newer print publications by country.17 While some of the older publications are officially out of print, some can still be found online, in libraries, or at used bookstores. Many of these older publications have also been digitized and can be found archived on the AACRAO EDGE online database so that researchers have access to both current and older international educational breakdowns.

In-House Resources Finally, admissions officers should utilize all academic records that are brought directly to the institution. Every time prospective international students submit their academic records for review, which may sometimes include a syllabus or curriculum outline, it is recommended to save and digitize these records.

All research and correspondence with foreign ministries or universities should also be archived. These primary source documents, along with the online and print resources mentioned

CONTINUED

above, are significant tools for a better understanding of international qualifications. They will assist when future international students come in with the same or similar credentials.

It takes a combined approach—utilizing online, print, and primary document resources—to find the best equivalencies in the field of credentials research. With each international applicant, a resource library will become more useful, comprehensive and reliable. n

Endnotes 1 emec.mec.gov.br 2 www.cicic.ca/2/home.canada 3 certificados.mineduc.cl/certificadosweb/mvc/validar/ingresarCodigo 4 www.cedulaprofesional.sep.gob.mx/ cedula/presidencia/indexAvanzada. action 5 www.archive.org 6 edge.aacrao.org/ 7 www.whed.net/home.php 8 www.nuffic.nl/en/subjects/educationsystems 9 www.alberta.ca/iqas-educationguides.aspx 10 www.nafsa.org/Professional_ Resources/Publications/ NAFSA_Guide_to_Educational_ Systems_Around_the_World 11 www.aiu.ac.in/publication/publication. asp 12 publicaciones.anuies.mx 13 www4.aacrao.org/publications 14 www.nafsa.org/Professional_ Resources/Publications 15 www.ierf.org/for-institutions/ierfpublications 16 publications.ece.org 17 www.taicep.org/taiceporgwp/ professional-development/resources/ reference-materials/publications continued on the next page

6

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

N

A

G

A

P

GOT INTERNATIONAL TRANSCRIPTS AND DIPLOMAS?

CONTINUED

Resources Type

Resource

Link

Cost

Website

University Websites

Varies

Free

Ministry Websites

Varies

Free

Wayback Machine

www.archive.org

Free

Database

WHED

www.whed.net/home.php

Free

Electronic Publication

NUFFIC Country Modules

www.nuffic.nl/en/subjects/education-systems

Free

IQAS International Education Guides

www.alberta.ca/iqas-education-guides.aspx

Free

NAFSA www.nafsa.org/Professional_Resources/ Guide to Educational Systems Around the World Publications/NAFSA_Guide_to_Educational_ Systems_Around_the_World

Free for NAFSA Members

IERF Index Index Index Index

www.ierf.org/for-institutions/ierf-publications

Free

of of of of

Secondary Credentials Educational Terms Academic Calendars & Dates Languages

Print Publication

AACRAO EDGE Print Publication Series

edge.aacrao.org

Free for AACRAO EDGE Subscribers

Web Library

IERF Credentials Vault

www.ierf.org/for-institutions/credentials-vaultlogin

Free

The NAGAP Experts Bureau The NAGAP Experts Bureau provides members, as well as outside media, with valuable and reliable resources in the matters of GEM. NAGAP members benefit from having well-respected colleagues within their organization who can confidently and respectfully respond to their best-practice questions or concerns.

Areas of expertise include but are not limited to: • Recruitment and Marketing • Grad & Adult Student Services • Ethical Issues in GEM • International Recruitment & Retention • Staff Professional Development

• Admissions Policies & Procedures and Operations & Technologies • Diversity and Inclusion in GEM • Academic Program Development • STEM, Biomedical, Medical School Recruitment and Retention

Questions, concerns, or feedback for the Experts Bureau may be directed to nagapmedia@gmail.com.

N

A

G

A

P

P E R S P E C T I V E S

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

7

STUDENT PERSPECTIVES: AN UNEXPECTED JOURNEY Four days before I started my doctoral studies, I was discharged from the hospital. With IV scars still healing on my arms, classes began. I had been living with Crohn’s Disease since I was 16, but my medical treatments were no longer keeping the autoimmune disease in remission. Now…the disease was back with a vengeance. During that first year of graduate school, I found myself in the emergency room at least once a week in debilitating pain. I knew more about the on-call doctors at the local hospital than I did about the other students in my cohort. Yet, I fought to make it to class, found a research advisor, and successfully completed my assignments on time. This isn’t how I imagined my next chapter would begin.

Soon I had two full-time careers: managing all aspects of my chronic illness and being a graduate student in a fast-paced, competitive program. In four years, I had five surgeries. Three of those surgeries required prolonged hospitalizations with major recovery periods that inevitably followed.

Alyssa Rollando, Ph.D. The first two years of my studies taught me how to compromise and prioritize. It was okay to take naps. It was okay to read literature reviews in bed. Like many overachievers who earn a place in a doctoral program, I wanted to do more. Identifying and understanding the adjustments I needed to make for my physical, emotional, and academic wellbeing was a substantial shift in my mindset. On days when I felt well, I almost felt like a normal Ph.D. student; I completed experiments, collaborated with my advisors, and sought out professional development opportunities. But on other days, I narrowly managed to sneak to and from class, then back home.

I completed most of my dissertation from the couch while recovering from my most recent abdominal surgery. I may not have been able to sit at a desk or carry more than eight pounds (easily the weight of my laptop), but I was determined to write and refused pain medication in order to maintain the mental clarity to do so. Finding ways to continue forward towards my degree, no matter how insignificant it felt at the time, is what kept me going on my toughest days.

My Ph.D. research did not look like my peers—and that was okay. I found ways to work that accommodated my chronic illness, rather than fighting against my disease. Sometimes those accommodations meant utilizing doctor’s appointments for opportunities to gain clinical feedback on the device I was working on. Other times it meant changing my research aims to include a project that could be completed without traditional bench work.

Simultaneously navigating multiple health crises and the “normal” pressures of grad school was challenging. There were days I doubted my ability to accomplish what I had set out to achieve. Yet, I prevailed. In just four years, I am proud to announce I not only completed a Master of Science and Doctor of Philosophy, but my disease is also in remission. While my chronic illness dramatically shaped my graduate school experience, it did not define me. It taught me how to be efficient, and to identify and prioritize the meaningful things in my life. And, if I’m being truly honest, I would not be the woman I am today or have learned those lessons without my Crohn’s Disease.

Alyssa Rollando, Ph.D.

Response by Denise Bridwell, NAGAP Publications Committee While only some of us may be able to relate with Alyssa having to navigate life with a chronic illness, I imagine we can all empathize with her story. We’ve likely experienced an illness, or maybe that of a loved one, which has pulled our time and attention away from our careers, if even for a short period of time. But how do we apply that experience to our careers? On what level does empathy turn into action?

8

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

Chances are, you won’t have any idea a student suffers from a chronic illness until s/he arrives and chooses to disclose it to you. It’s possible an applicant may disclose it should the right question be posed on a grad school application.

However, those questions (if they exist) generally relate to disabilities and many students may not see illnesses as disabilities, nor would students wish to disclose such a thing on the application.

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

So, what happens at that moment… that moment when a student confides in you and you’re not entirely sure how to respond? Start by saying “thank you.” It probably took some courage and discomfort for them to disclose something so personal. That probably means that they feel comfortable with you and trust you will not only keep their continued on the next page

N

A

G

A

P

STUDENT PERSPECTIVES

CONTINUED

“These students deserve our

That’s the doctor’s job…not yours.

Also, be mindful if a student shares a situation in which university staff or faculty may be acting in contradiction to the policy/law. It happens…probably more often than we’d care to admit.

Don’t diminish experiences and take action as necessary.

Ask them what they need

Respect student privacy

every university, but many more

Don’t make any assumptions. Maybe the student just needs a confidant, resources, or accommodations.

Whatever it is, let students articulate their own needs, or, at the very least, express their concerns so you can determine a strategy together.

It is okay to ask how a student is doing, but don’t pry. If students want to share they will. If they don’t, respect that. Be mindful of your surroundings and your projection, and always treat student stories with discretion and value. It may be necessary for the student to share this information with professors or with a campus office that assists students with accommodations. Again, let students take the lead and assist when necessary.

never get that far due to the

confidence, but also help guide them through this milieu of uncertainty. Kudos to you for being awesome! But, where do we go from there?

Don’t try to “fix” them

Be honest If you don’t have the answer, that’s okay.

Assure students you will help them find the answer and then follow through.

Identify relevant policy and resources This is a great opportunity for you to learn more about your campus community and all that it has to offer.

Don’t just pawn the student off on someone else to find the answers.

Remember, s/he came to YOU! Obviously, you can’t do everything, and in some instances you may have to recommend the student speak with an expert. However, you are probably much more familiar with the university hierarchy and know where/who/how to access the resources your students might need. Help translate policy and provide any tools necessary for success.

N

A

G

A

P

added time and attention. Don’t underestimate the value they add to our programs. Students like Alyssa are likely hidden within

barriers and the lack of a support system. Are we serving them well?”

that protect the student. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act all address pieces of these laws and their protections. I encourage you to do a brief search to equip yourself with a basic understanding of how to best serve this constituency of students. After all, we’re academics. Arm yourself with knowledge.

Be open Most of the time, the student is used to navigating life a little differently than we are. It’s okay to stray from our norm and determine creative solutions that still check all of the boxes. Maybe that means bringing a used sofa into the lab or purchasing a stand-up desk.

Maybe it’s alternative work hours or a change of scope on a project, or using adaptive technologies in the classroom allowing students to attend remotely.

Simple things like students sharing notes or delivering textbooks could be vital.

Whatever it may be, embrace it.

These students deserve our added time and attention. Don’t underestimate the value they add to our programs. Students like Alyssa are likely hidden within every university, but many more never get that far due to the barriers and the lack of a support system. Are we serving them well?

In a world where we are campaigning for diversity, think bigger. It is not about lowering standards for a degree, it is about providing a different set of tools to achieve it. Doing so makes us better educators and better humans. n

Furthermore, there are laws governing how we respond in many of these cases

P E R S P E C T I V E S

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

9

WORKING WITH A PARTNER TO ACHIEVE YOUR GOAL: A PARTNERSHIP TO INTEGRATE MARKETING AUTOMATION

By Ardis Kadiu and Mike McGetrick, Element451 When Ray Lutzky took the helm as Senior Director of Enrollment and Admissions at Cornell Tech the need for robust marketing automation came sharply into focus. His task was to recruit Ivy League caliber students for Cornell University’s new landmark graduate school in New York City. However, the technology he inherited wasn’t delivering the personalized communications required to engage and convert prospective students.

Nor was it providing vital analytics.

To overcome these challenges, Ray partnered with Element451 to adopt a platform that transformed Cornell Tech’s digital recruiting and reporting.

Ray’s situation is familiar to many of us in graduate enrollment. As the sole member of what would eventually become a four-person team, his resources were smaller in comparison to his high-profile undertaking. “I had to dig into the software like never before in my graduate enrollment career,” he explained.

The Salesforce CRM was handling applicant data. A different software, billing itself as marketing automation, was supposed to help generate leads and communicate with them through to enrollment.

The marketing automation product wasn’t implemented properly and mission-critical

“The technology he inherited wasn’t delivering the personalized communications required to engage and convert prospective students. Nor was it providing vital analytics. To overcome these challenges, Ray partnered with Element451 to adopt a platform that transformed Cornell Tech’s digital recruiting and reporting.”

10

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

features for graduate enrollment were missing. Additionally, the two systems didn’t work together as intended. For example, there were double entries for people in the database. One was created when they entered as a suspect or prospect and another when they applied.

Because the records couldn’t be merged, email marketing was compromised.

“You can have the best content and design in the world,” Ray told us, “but nothing will be achieved if your technology isn’t sound.”

Further complicating things was a lack of source tracking for leads. It was impossible to measure marketing ROI. That was a significant pain point for Ray who aimed to establish the Cornell Tech brand and instill confidence with internal stakeholders.

“After about a week of manually trying to get the programs to do what we needed them to do, I realized two things. One was the importance of a true marketing automation tool. The other was that it be tailored for higher ed.”

Ray worked with colleagues on an RFP process to find a technology partner with a marketing automation solution that would empower his team to nurture leads into enrolled students. The solution would be built on top of Salesforce, which would continue to be where Cornell managed applicant information.

Our company, Element451, and our admissions marketing CRM of the same name, was selected. In the summer of 2018 our partnership was forged.

What Do We Mean When We Say ‘Marketing Automation’?

As Ray searched for the right partner, he found that “marketing automation can mean different things to different people.”

One of the things we share with Ray is an understanding of what marketing

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

automation means for enrollment managers. At its most fundamental, it’s about building more personal relationships with students than can be achieved through traditional marketing, and doing it more efficiently.

That’s made possible by technology and data. Marketing automation delivers communications that connect student data points (an interest in studying entrepreneurship, for example) with unique attributes about your school (a path-breaking MBA with strong ties to the startup scene). It also puts as much as possible on autopilot and uses analytics as a feedback loop so you can continually improve.

A CRM with marketing automation is a great equalizer too. As Ray says, “It takes the same number of staff to manage 10 leads as it does 10,000.”

Personalization at Scale As you can imagine there’s a big learning curve to doing marketing automation. Ray’s team and ours started out with an essential ingredient: seeing software not as a static tool for blasting out messages on particular dates but as an intelligent machine that delivers the right message to the right person at the right time. “The right time,” often being where one is in the funnel.

To make it happen, Ray needed to give Element451 information about who Cornell Tech wanted to reach. So we worked together to develop personas.

Personas are descriptive snapshots of student types. The career changer, for example, and the recent college graduate.

The purpose of the personas was twofold. Writers used them to understand the motivations and topics that would interest prospects. (Our sister company, Spark451, developed the content.) Our implementation team used them to build continued on the next page

N

A

G

A

P

INTEGRATE MARKETING AUTOMATION out segments in Element451. Segments are like auto-generated contact lists of people who match certain criteria. For instance, college seniors majoring in business or economics who have taken the GMAT and started an application.

You may be thinking that writing multiple versions of every email in an entire student search campaign is crazy or even impossible under the tight deadlines of graduate admissions.

You’re right! This is where the magic of marketing automation comes in.

CONTINUED

Expanding the analytics further is something we’re both keen on doing. As more data is collected and prepared for analysis we want to work together on things like predictive modeling. Adding Element451’s application reading and application decision-making features is on the horizon too.

be. A small liberal arts school can do it just as well as a technology school like ours. Marketing automation removes the anxiety of wondering if everyone in the funnel is being communicated with, especially those you spent resources acquiring.”

Considering Marketing Automation or a New CRM? Ray’s Advice

An essential tip: “Get your IT team on board as soon as possible. They’ll be able to give you guidance and ensure that your systems talk to each other, which is a huge factor for success.” n

“Anyone who’s thinking about doing this is probably scared,” said Ray. “Don’t

Along with the personas, a framework was developed that allowed Element 451 to single out the parts of a message that would change depending on the persona—a photo, a paragraph, or a call-to-action button, for example.

We created different versions of those elements rather than of the whole message. Behind the scenes, Element451 combines the message components based on the segment who will receive the full message using what’s called dynamic content.

Results So Far and Looking Ahead At the time of writing (December 2018) it’s too early to tell how marketing automation has impacted the number of applications received and students who enrolled. Yet, we can share that our collaboration has yielded the transparency Ray sought.

“We’re a small school so there’s a lot of interest about where people are in the funnel and how they entered. I have instant access to that now. It also helps to validate our strategy and give us confidence that we’re focused on the right priorities.”

Analytics are also helping with content development, which Ray’s team has taken on for things like event management, another activity done through Element451. “We look week by week and make course corrections. Writing event descriptions differently, for example.”

N

A

G

A

P

Stop Recruiting, Start Engaging CBE, MARKETING AUTOMATION BUILT SPECIFICALLY FOR HIGHER EDUCATION Graduate and Professional Studies prospective students already have their masters in navigating your website.

Google Analytics tells you they’re there; but how do you influence them to apply when you don’t know who they are?

CBE helps you identify, communicate and influence stealthy grad students to take their next step toward enrollment.

SEE YOU IN TORONTO IN APRIL FOR NAGAP 2019!

UNTIL THEN, SUBSCRIBE TO OUR BLOG: CAPTUREHIGHERED.COM/BLOG

P E R S P E C T I V E S

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

11

IT’S TIME FOR AN HONEST CONVERSATION ABOUT GRADUATE ADMISSIONS

By David G. Payne, Educational Testing Service It’s time to have a critically important conversation about graduate school admissions. This conversation will require honest introspection and candid dialogue in the higher education community. Let’s start here: We are all united in the goal of improving diversity in and increasing access to graduate programs. We can also agree that we should collectively seek to employ research-driven and thoughtful solutions to get there. The current debate over higher education institutions moving to test-optional admissions is necessary and healthy. But, we caution faculty members and admissions committees against moving forward with any solution before addressing the hard work of analysis and self-reflection.

Many advocates for holistic file review would encourage admissions committees to consider a broad set of academic and nonacademic information, inclusive of GRE® scores and the critical information they provide about a student’s readiness for graduate-level work. Programs that have dropped the GRE test as a requirement are opting to make admissions decisions based on less information and practices that are susceptible to greater bias.

The challenge of improving diversity and adopting a holistic admissions process is more complex than one simple solution, such as changing a test requirement. Diversifying student bodies and objectively identifying academically prepared students who can succeed in graduate education requires careful consideration of all sources of information. Many programs consider GRE scores an important part of their holistic admissions practices, and use scores successfully to achieve their diversity goals. Eliminating bias in the graduate admissions process is challenging. Because the GRE test is standardized and is the only application component that is research based

12

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

students who are not academically prepared, which could lead to retention issues that have serious implications for the student and the program.

David G. Payne and adheres to fairness standards and reviews, it stands as the one objective measure to directly compare students from different backgrounds. Be wary of shortcuts and silver bullets.

ETS and the GRE program have always supported holistic admissions practices, advocating that a GRE score is only one piece of evidence to be used in admissions decisions. By dropping a GRE score requirement, committees are left to only consider measures that are subjective. This heightens the role that implicit bias plays in the review and selection process. Faculty members on admissions committees, being human, see the undergraduate institution on a transcript and their biases can come into play. They see a last name of an applicant and their biases can come into play. They see the author of a recommendation letter and their biases can come into play.

If faculty members are left to evaluate applicants based on nonstandardized measures, they are left with GPAs that are not comparable across all candidates, and letters of recommendation or writing samples written at varying levels of proficiency or eloquence of vocabulary. If GRE scores are removed from the admissions process, what’s left is not objective or comparable. In addition, dropping a GRE score requirement risks admitting

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

If we as a graduate community want to champion holistic file review as the equitable path forward, it must truly be holistic…no shortcuts. Dropping the GRE score requirement would be a mistake. Carefully considering how the GRE score requirement is used is essential. In fact, this careful analysis should apply to all components of the admissions process and not simply the quantitative measures.

The notion that meeting diversity and completion goals can be done with less information is flawed. It is misguided to think that equipping faculty for holistic, equity-minded graduate admissions can be achieved by simply removing the one objective measure that has served students and the graduate community well for nearly 70 years.

It’s time for admissions committees to have these discussions but we argue that GRE scores are only one part of that talk. Admissions officers will have to come to terms with their own human biases which is a more difficult discussion and will take more introspection, time and work. It is the talk we hope to lead and champion with our colleagues in the graduate community.

We’ve been having this talk with the GRE Board, an independent board affiliated with the Association of Graduate Schools (AGS) and the Council of Graduate Schools (CGS), which oversees GRE tests, services and research. “We too believe that the talk that should be happening on campuses nationwide must address how our own biases impact admissions decisions and how we can improve diversity with continued on the next page

N

A

G

A

P

IT’S TIME FOR AN HONEST CONVERSATION greater awareness of how we view admissions materials. The graduate community is ripe for this deep and challenging conversation and together, with you and ETS, we hope to move it forward,” said Janet Rutledge, GRE Board Chair, speaking on behalf of the executive committee.

We know, from the thousands of institutions the GRE program serves, that in many ways this conversation has already begun and we’d like to add some considerations.

• The GRE can provide tremendous value in helping institutions and programs achieve their enrollment goals, but to do so, programs need to require GRE scores from all applicants. The objective, comparative data that scores yield is especially helpful when comparisons are difficult to make, such as when evaluating applicants from unfamiliar undergraduate institutions or from countries with different educational

CONTINUED

and grading systems. ETS encourages programs to weight GRE scores more or less highly, versus other components of applicants’ files, based upon their institutional and program enrollment goals rather than making the test optional and disposing of the valuable data it provides.

• The GRE Program has consistently discouraged graduate programs from using GRE scores as the sole factor for making any decision. Doing so lessens the importance of other components of a candidate’s application such as desirable attributes like grit and conscientiousness resulting in a less diverse student body.

• What other measure does an institution plan to use that is common and objective, that undergoes a rigorous fairness review process and that yields comparative data? Why throw out another piece of information about your applicants? Isn’t it better to evaluate how scores are currently

being used and consider weighting them differently than to rely solely upon measures that can introduce a greater level of bias to the application review and selection process? For applicants who may be adversely affected by programs that drop the GRE test, the answer is yes.

In its early years, the GRE test served as a common, objective measure to fairly evaluate a large number of diverse applicants—from often-unknown undergraduate programs—who were interested in pursuing graduate education after World War II. The need for a fair way to evaluate candidates is just as important today and we will continue to advocate for researchproven solutions that support our collective efforts to improve diversity, equity and access.

For resources to begin an honest conversation at your institution, visit http://holisticadmissions.org. n

NAGAP Volunteer Opportunities NAGAP is a member-driven association, and there are many ways to get involved!

Check out the Volunteer Opportunities Page to learn more about the committees, organizational activities, and other projects for which you may volunteer your time.

N

A

G

A

P

For more information, or to talk to someone about ways to become more involved with NAGAP, you can email a member of the Leadership Cultivation & Elections Committee.

The Leader in Graduate Enrollment Management

We hope you will take the time to consider the opportunities for volunteer participation, and that you will discover a way to become more involved in NAGAP.

P E R S P E C T I V E S

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

13

THE USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA AND E-MARKETING IN GRADUATE STUDENT RECRUITMENT: AN INVESTIGATION OF GRADUATE ENROLLMENT MANAGEMENT PRACTICES

By Dr. Stanley J. Kania III, Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine

Introduction This article is a continuation of a previous article written by the author in the Fall 2018 of Perspectives titled Social Media and E-Marketing Practices in Graduate Student Recruitment: A Research Proposal. The previous article examined a research proposal for a quantitative study examining the use of social media and e-marketing practices in graduate student recruitment at four-year public and private nonprofit colleges and universities in the United States. A review of existing literature showed that social media and e-marketing practices are widely used in enrollment management.

Greenwood (2012) found that 92% of colleges and universities in the United States were using social networking, with 60.9% of them using 3-4 different social networking sites. The most widely used sites were Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube (Greenwood, 2012). Rogers (2014) found that one-third of college bound students indicated that social media had a strong influence on their college choice. In terms of e-marketing practices, Ivy (2008) highlighted the importance of having a mix of e-marketing practices to complement traditional marketing channels (i.e., print, radio, television). Nicolescu (2009) emphasized the importance of branding in higher education marketing, stating that the brand should highlight the institution’s reputation and image.

The researcher administered a survey to the NAGAP membership from May 2018 to August 2018 to collect data centered on social media and e-marketing practices used in graduate student recruitment. A Pearson Chi Square analysis was used to investigate differences among social media and e-marketing practices at these institutions. The researcher used a

14

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

95% confidence interval with a p<.05 to determine statistical significance.

Additionally, the researcher examined descriptive statistics of the sample and completed a supplemental analysis examining GEM marketing budgets and social media and e-marketing practices.

This article will examine the results of the study in detail. Results will show that few relationships exist among social media practices, but many relationships existed among e-marketing practices.

The discussion will look at ethical implications, recommendations for professional practice, and areas of future research.

“The researcher administered a survey to the NAGAP membership from May 2018 to August 2018 to collect data centered on social media and e-marketing practices used in graduate student recruitment.”

Response Rate This survey was distributed to members of the National Association of Graduate Admissions Professionals (NAGAP) membership (N= 649) at four-year public and private colleges and universities in the United States. Based on Krejcie (1970), the researcher’s goal was to obtain 148 respondents from four-year public colleges and universities and 152 respondents from four-year private colleges and universities. A total of 63 responses were collected. Twentysix (26) responses were incomplete and eliminated from the data, thus only thirty-seven (37) total responses were completed and collected for this

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

survey, which is a 5.7% response rate.

Responses that were eliminated from the data were comprised of respondents who began the survey, but never completed it. This could have been due to respondents who began taking the survey in their office and had to turn their attention to more pressing obligations (e.g., pulled into a meeting, attended to students/colleagues in need, etc.). Additionally, the low response rate could be attributed to professionals not wanting to share information on recruiting strategies with potential competing institutions. Some colleges and universities like to keep their “secrets” and recruiting tactics to themselves, so they can enroll a larger number of graduate students than competing institutions. The responses were comprised of 23 responses from four-year public and 14 responses from four-year private colleges and universities in the United States.

Demographic Information A majority of responses were collected from GEM professionals in California (N=6), New York (N=5), Pennsylvania (N=4), and Texas (N=4). Interestingly, all responses from private colleges and universities (N=14) report offering master’s degrees, and only 42.86% (N=6) of these institutions offer both professional and/or doctoral degrees.

In comparison, 91.3% (N=21) of public colleges and universities in the United States report offering master’s degrees and 82.61% (N=19) report offering doctoral degrees. Additionally, 26.09% of public institutions report graduate enrollment over 5,000 students and 65.22% (N=15) report a marketing budget below $25,000 annually.

Furthermore 42.86% (N=6) of private institutions report having a marketing budget over $75,000 annually and 50% continued on the next page

N

A

G

A

P

THE USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA AND E-MARKETING (N=7) have between 500-999 enrolled graduate students.

Results Social Media The researcher first examined social media use at public and private institutions respectively in the United States. Results show that most public institutions use social media sites such as Facebook (86.95%), Twitter, (69.56%), LinkedIn (51.17%), and Instagram (43.47%). Additionally, the most commonly used social media sites for four-year private institutions are Facebook (100%), Instagram (85.74%), Twitter (71.42%), LinkedIn (71.42%), and YouTube (50%). When examining social media differences among public and private institutions (see Table 1), the researcher found one significant difference, which is the use of Instagram (x2(1) =.011, p<.05).

Results of this study showed that 85.7% of private institutions use Instagram whereas only 43.5% of public institutions use this social media platform. There were no other significant relationships or trends among social media use at public and private institutions.

E-Marketing The researcher then examined e-marketing practices at four-year public and private institutions in the United

CONTINUED

States. Results show that the most used e-marketing practices at four-year public institutions are e-marketing practices include e-mail communication with prospects (95.65%), recruiting pages on the institution’s website (95.65%), website designed for mobile users (65.21%), and using a content management system to update websites (60.86%).

Furthermore, the researcher found the most used e-marketing practices at fouryear private colleges and universities include e-mail communication with prospects (100%), recruiting pages on the institution’s website (100%), online display advertising (78.57%), website optimized for mobile browsers (71.42%), listing on a college planning website (71.42%), and cookie driven retargeting (71.42%). When examining e-marketing differences among public and private institutions (see Table 2), the researcher found many significant relationships: pay-per-click ads on search sites, online display advertising, tailored information for students based on their public profile (i.e., Facebook, etc.), cookie driven retargeting, and special landing pages for e-mail campaigns.

ads on search sites (i.e., Google, Bing, etc.) whereas only 30.4% of public institutions use this e-marketing practice.

There was a significant relationship in the Pearson Chi Square analysis (x 2(1) =.044, p<.05) for pay-per-click ads on search sites. Results showed that 64.3% of private institutions use pay-per-click

There was a significant relationship in the Pearson Chi Square analysis (x 2(1) =.022, p<.05) for special landing

There was a significant relationship in the Pearson Chi Square analysis (x2(1) =.020, p<.05) for online display advertising. Results showed that 78.6% of private institutions use online display advertising whereas only 39.1% of public institutions use this e-marketing practice.

There was a significant relationship in the Fisher’s Exact Test (p=.021) for tailored information for students based on their public profile (i.e., Facebook, Google+, etc.). Results showed that 35.7% of private institutions use tailored information for students whereas only 4.3% of public institutions use this e-marketing practice.

There was a significant relationship in the Pearson Chi Square analysis (x 2(1) =.001, p<.05) for cookie driven retargeting ads. Results showed that 71.4% of private institutions use cookie driven retargeting ads whereas only 17.4% of public institutions use this e-marketing practice.

continued on the next page

Meet our #TravelNAGAP Contest Winner!

Congratulations to Paul Starcher from SUNY Fredonia for winning this year’s #TravelNAGAP fall recruitment travel photo contest! Paul, who shared multiple photos of his work abroad, won a $25 Amazon gift card.

Upcoming graduate recruitment trips or conferences planned? Continue to share your photos using #TravelNAGAP on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to be featured in our Facebook album.

Happy travels!

Paul Starcher, SUNY Fredonia

N

A

G

A

P

P E R S P E C T I V E S

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

15

THE USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA AND E-MARKETING pages for e-mail campaigns. Results showed that 64.3% of private institutions use special landing pages for e-mail campaigns whereas only 26.1% of public institutions use this e-marketing practice.

Additionally, there were some e-marketing practices that showed a trend: pay-per-click ads on social media sites and videos embedded on the campus website. There was a trend in the Pearson Chi Square analysis (x 2(1) p= .081) for pay-per-click ads on social media sites. Results showed that 64.3% of private institutions use pay-per-click ads on social media sites whereas only 34.8% of public institutions use this e-marketing practice.

There was a trend in the Pearson Chi Square analysis (x 2(1) p=.109) for videos embedded on the campus website. Results showed that 57.1% of private institutions use videos embedded on college websites whereas only 30.4% of public institutions use this e-marketing practice.

Supplemental Analysis— GEM Budgets and Social Media/E-Marketing Practices The researcher conducted supplemental analysis examining whether any relationships existed between graduate enrollment management (GEM) marketing budget funds and social media and e-marketing practices.

Table 3 shows the demographic responses for GEM marketing budgets for public and private institutions. The researcher conducted a supplemental analysis using the Pearson Chi Square and Fisher’s Exact Test. If the analysis violated the parameters of Pearson Chi Square, the researcher then used Fisher’s Exact Test to determine if any statistical relationships existed between the variables. The researcher examined the top five social media and top nine e-marketing practices according to responses from the survey to conduct this analysis. The top social media and e-marketing practices were identified by responses to the survey. The

16

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

supplemental analysis was conducted by transforming the budget variables into two categories: budgets up to $50,000 and budgets $50,001+.

First, the researcher conducted an analysis of social media and e-marketing practices based off the overall GEM marketing budget. After conducting the analysis, the researcher found a significant relationship between overall GEM marketing budget and the following social media sites: Instagram (p=.022), YouTube (p=.019), and LinkedIn (p=.022). There was a significant relationship in the Pearson Chi Square analysis (x 2(1) =.022, p<.05) for Instagram. Of the institutions that reported having an overall GEM budget of $50,001+, 84.6% use Instagram whereas only 45.8% of institutions with a budget up to $50,000 use this social media platform.

The researcher found a significant relationship in the Pearson Chi Square analysis (x 2(1) =.019, p<.05) for YouTube. Of the institutions that reported having an overall GEM budget of $50,001+, 69.2% use YouTube whereas only 29.2% of institutions with a budget up to $50,000 use this social media platform.

The researcher found a significant relationship in the Pearson Chi Square analysis (x 2(1) =.022, p<.05) for LinkedIn. Of the institutions that reported having an overall GEM budget of $50,001+, 84.6% use LinkedIn whereas only 45.8% of institutions with a budget up to $50,000 use this social media platform.

Similarly, the researcher found a significant relationship between overall GEM marketing budget and the following e-marketing practices: online graduate/professional school fairs (p=.040), search engine optimization (SEO) to improve search results (p=.040), and online display advertising (p=.001). The researcher found a significant relationship in the Pearson

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

CONTINUED

Chi Square analysis (x 2(1) =.040, p<.05) for online graduate/professional school fairs. Of the institutions that reported having an overall GEM budget of $50,001+, 76.9% use online graduate/professional fairs whereas only 41.7% of institutions with a budget up to $50,000 use this e-marketing practice.

The researcher found a significant relationship in the Pearson Chi Square analysis (x 2(1) =.040, p<.05) for search engine optimization to improve search results. Of the institutions that reported having an overall GEM budget of $50,001+, 76.9% use search engine optimization whereas only 41.7% of institutions with a budget up to $50,000 use this e-marketing practice.

The researcher found a significant relationship in the Pearson Chi Square analysis (x 2(1) =.001, p<.05) for online display advertising. Of the institutions that reported having an overall GEM budget of $50,001+, 92.3% use online display advertising whereas only 33.3% of institutions with a budget up to $50,000 use this e-marketing practice.

The researcher found a trend in the Pearson Chi Square analysis (x 2(1) p=.068) for analytic resources (such as Google analytics). Of the institutions that reported having an overall GEM budget of $50,001+, 76.9% use analytic resources (such as Google analytics) whereas only 45.8% of institutions with a budget up to $50,000 use this e-marketing practice.

“In conclusion, institutions which have graduate enrollment management marketing budgets $50,001+ use more social media and e-marketing practices compared to institutions with budgets under $50,000.” continued on the next page

N

A

G

A

P

THE USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA AND E-MARKETING The researcher then conducted an analysis of social media use based off social media marketing budgets.

The researcher found one significant relationship between social media marketing budget and LinkedIn (p=.015). There was a significant relationship in the Pearson Chi Square analysis (x 2(1) =.015, p<.05) for LinkedIn. Of the institutions that reported having a social media marketing budget of $50,001+, 100% use LinkedIn whereas only 50% of institutions with a budget up to $50,000 use this social media platform.

The researcher then conducted an analysis of e-marketing practices based off e-marketing budgets. The researcher found no significant relationships between e-marketing practices and e-marketing budgets. However, the researcher found two trends between the variables: online display advertising (p=.097) and search engine optimization (p=.072). The researcher found a trend in the Fisher’s Exact Test (p=.097) for online display advertising. Of the institutions that reported having an e-marketing budget of $50,001+, 85.7% use online display advertising whereas only 46.7% of institutions with a budget up to $50,000 use this e-marketing practice.

The researcher found a trend in the Fisher’s Exact Test (p=.072) for search engine optimization. Of the institutions that reported having an e-marketing budget of $50,001+, 85.7% use online display advertising whereas only 46.7% of institutions with a budget up to $50,000 use this e-marketing practice.

In conclusion, institutions which have graduate enrollment management marketing budgets $50,001+ use more social media and e-marketing practices compared to institutions with budgets under $50,000.

websites for students based on their public profile, cookie driven retargeting, landing pages for e-mail campaigns, and pay-per-click ads on search sites (such as Google, Bing, etc.). Many of these e-marketing practices are driven by a consumer’s previous web searches and website visits, thus delivering specific content to consumers based on searches may yield a higher interest in a particular product or service, which in this study is graduate education.

Additionally, combining social media with specific e-marketing practices, such as cookie driven retargeting and tailored information based on a public profile, can ensure that colleges and universities are delivering proper content and information to this targeted population (Hemsley-Brown & Oplatka, 2006; Ivy, 2008; and Nicolescu, 2009).

Certain retargeting ads, pay and e-mail campaigns send consumers to a specific landing page; therefore it is necessary that colleges and universities have a well-designed and user-friendly website (Kalyanman and McIntyre, 2002).

relationships in terms of e-marketing practices, such as online display advertising, tailored websites for students based on their public profile, cookie driven retargeting, landing pages for e-mail campaigns, and pay-perclick ads on search sites (such as Google, Bing, etc.).”

There were many significant relationships in terms of e-marketing practices, such as online display advertising, tailored

N

P E R S P E C T I V E S

Discussion

A

G

A

P

public institutions: cookie driven retargeting (71.42% private; 17.39% public), tailored information for prospective students based on social media profiles (35.71% private; 4.34% public), pay-per-click ads on social media sites (64.28% private; 34.78% public), and pay-per-click ads on search sites (64.28% private; 30.43% public).

Depending on the level and amount of e-marketing an institution is undertaking, costs may vary significantly. For example, Facebook ads on their social media site allow users to create and run paid advertising for as little as $1 per day (Facebook Business, 2018). These paid ads can target specific Facebook users based off demographic information from their public profiles, such as geographic area, interests, age, etc. There are also various e-marketing platforms and programs, such as Salesforce Marketing Cloud, that colleges and universities can use to focus on social media and digital marketing campaigns.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud is operated using a web-based platform that can create, disseminate, and track various e-marketing campaigns (e-mails, text messages, social media advertising, etc.) to specific target audiences (in this case, prospective students). Additionally, this software can be easily integrated into various customer relationship management (CRM) systems that colleges and universities use to track inquiries and applicants through the admissions funnel (among other uses) (www.getapp.com, 2018). Pricing for Salesforce Marketing Cloud begins at $400 per month and can go up to $1,250 per month depending on various plugins and programs being used within the platform (www.getapp.com, 2018).

“There were many significant

The descriptive results of the survey do show some interesting differences between four-year public and private colleges and universities in the United States in terms of e-marketing practices.

First, four-year private colleges and universities use more of the following e-marketing practices than four-year

CONTINUED

One reason why private institutions may utilize these e-marketing practices more than public institutions is because they need to stay competitive in terms of recruiting students. Generally speaking, public institutions, such as the plethora continued on the next page

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

17

THE USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA AND E-MARKETING of state colleges and universities, typically receive a larger amount of student applications annually compared to private institutions for a number of reasons (i.e., public college tuition is cheaper than private college tuition, public institutions offer a larger selection of academic majors and programs compared to private institutions, public institutions offer greater amounts of funding and financial aid compared to private institutions, etc.). According to the National Center of Education Statistics, the average cost of graduate tuition and fees in 2012-13 at public colleges and universities in the United States was $11,617 and graduate tuition and fees costs $26,551 at private colleges and universities (National Center of Education Statistics, 2018).

Therefore, private colleges and universities need to conduct a greater deal of personal communication and target marketing to prospective students to be among some of their possible college choices. However, there are some large private institutions, such as Ivy league institutions, that would be an exception to this as they see a large applicant pool annually due to their reputation and prestige. Therefore, it makes sense that 42.85% (N=6) of private colleges and universities report having an e-marketing budget between $25,001-75,000 annually because they need to use these tactics in order to effectively market to graduate students in the higher education industry.

After analyzing the data, the researcher discovered that few differences do exist in both social media and e-marketing practices between four-year public and private colleges and universities in the United States. The only social media difference among four-year public and private colleges and universities included the use of Instagram. Results showed that more private colleges and universities (85.7%; n=12) are using Instagram compared to public colleges and universities (43.5%; n=10). Additionally, results from

18

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

the supplemental analysis showed that institutions with larger graduate enrollment management (GEM) marketing budgets ($50,001+) use Instagram, YouTube, and LinkedIn more compared to institutions with smaller GEM marketing budgets (up to $50,000). The descriptive results of this study show that popular social media platforms, such as Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn, are being used more by private colleges and universities compared to public institutions (see Table 1).

The top three social media sites used by institutions in Greenwood (2012) were Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.

Omnicore Agency, a digital marketing research firm, reports that Instagram currently has over 1 billion monthly active users, which is significantly more than active monthly users on Twitter (335 million) and LinkedIn (63 million) (https://www.omnicoreagency.com, 2018). Facebook and YouTube have the most active monthly users with 2.23 billion and 1.9 billion respectively (https://www.omnicroeagency.com, 2018). Additionally, Omnicore Agency (2018) reports that 59% of all Instagram users are between the ages of 18-29, while only 36% of Twitter users in the United States are between ages 18-29. The large amount of monthly Instagram users shows that this social media platform is becoming more popular with a younger demographic.

With the competitive landscape of graduate student recruitment, private institutions need to maximize exposure to prospective students in order to sustain a fruitful applicant pool, which may explain why Instagram is being used more by private colleges and universities compared to public institutions.

Additionally, Omnicore Agency (2018) reports that 87 million Millennials have a LinkedIn profile. Millennials were born roughly between 1982-2002, which put them between the ages of 16-36 (Rickes, 2009). LinkedIn is a social media platform where user

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

CONTINUED

profiles are created in a “resume style” listing academic and professional background among other experiences and individual skillsets. Approximately 61 million LinkedIn members are listed as “senior-level influencers” in key decisionmaking positions (Omnicore Agency, 2018). Many working professionals use LinkedIn as a professional networking tool to find employment and various volunteer opportunities. This social media platform lends itself well to colleges and universities recruiting graduate students for numerous reasons. First, working professionals are always looking to advance their careers. Aside from work experience requirements, some professional positions may require an advanced graduate degree in order to be a qualified candidate. Colleges and universities can target LinkedIn members based off specific keywords or phrases (such as industry, job title, company name, etc.) and deliver specific content about a graduate program that would help them advance their career. These paid ads should be short and quickly draw the user’s attention. For example, a company manager may be attracted to an Executive MBA program as it will allow him/her to further develop their business and leadership skills. The ad this individual may see on their LinkedIn homepage or banner may read, “Earn Your MBA Online in 12 Months.”, or “Executive Online MBA: Learn Today to become a Leader Tomorrow.” These examples would spark the attention of the user and prompt them to click on the ad, which would take them to the institution’s website and provide more information on the program. As seen, social media is a widely used and popular mode of communication that needs to be used more strategically in strategic graduate enrollment management plans by public and private colleges and universities to recruit graduate students.

Furthermore, it makes sense that institutions with larger overall GEM continued on the next page

N

A

G

A

P

THE USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA AND E-MARKETING marketing budgets ($50,001+) are using social media sites and specific e-marketing practices more compared to institutions with lower budgets (up to $50,000).

Advertising on certain social media sites is inexpensive and similar in operation.

For example, YouTube, LinkedIn, and Instagram allow users to set their own budget that will target a specific audience (i.e., a number of people in a defined area over a period of time). Users can establish a budget where they will be billed on a per day, per-week, or per month basis (www.business.linkedin.com, 2018; www.youtube.com, 2018; www.business. instagram.com, 2018). The more money allocated towards their daily, weekly, or monthly budget will increase the number of consumers who view these ads. Also, users can set up various social media marketing campaigns where they are billed a cost per view (CPV) or cost per click (CPC) versus a flat amount. The large amount of active monthly users of these popular social media platforms, such as YouTube, LinkedIn, and Instagram, coupled with low costs for paid advertising on these sites allow for institutions to increase the amount and frequency of their ads to their target audience (i.e., prospective graduate students). Moreover, the low costs associated with social media marketing can allow for institutions to increase GEM marketing and recruitment efforts in particular markets and areas where they currently do not recruit students (i.e., geographic and budget constraints limit in-person recruiting/travel to specific areas for graduate student recruitment).

sites, users can create their own budget for Google ads and, based off of the budget amount and duration (daily, weekly, monthly), these ads will reach consumers based off of demographic criteria established by the user (i.e., geographic region, search keywords, etc.). Costs will vary based off the length of time ads run, the position listed within search results, and consumer clicks on your advertisement (www.ads. google.com, 2018). Also, the cost of analytic resources varies from program to program. As mentioned previously, Salesforce Marketing Cloud begins at $400 per month and can go up to $1,250 per month depending on programs used within the software (www. getapp.com, 2018). Google Analytics is a free service from Google that tracks website visits, online searches, and click rates for users (www.analytics. google.com, 2018). However, users can purchase Google Analytics 360 that will integrate their search and display ads into the program to track customer acquisition costs and rates, funnel analysis, and state-of-the-art reports and analyses (www.analytics.google.com, 2018). These types of online advertising and analytic resources allow colleges and universities to maximize online marketing exposure to recruit a larger number of graduate students.

In terms of overall GEM marketing budgets and e-marketing practices, institutions with larger budgets ($50,001+) are using the following e-marketing practices more than institutions with smaller budgets (up to $50,000): online graduate/professional school fairs, search engine optimization (SEO), and online display advertising.

According to Google, Inc. (2018), users can launch paid advertising on the Google search engine according to their own budget. Similar to social media

Online graduate/professional school fairs are another way institutions can increase their exposure to a wide range of prospective graduate students. CareerEco is a company that operates an online platform for virtual graduate/professional school and career fairs. An examination of their website shows that the average cost to register for an online graduate/ professional school fair is between approximately $300-400 per event.

The cost associated with attending an online graduate/professional school fair may be more cost effective compared to sending an admission counselor to attend an in-person graduate/professional school fair (after factoring in the cost for event registration, travel and hotel

N

P E R S P E C T I V E S

A

G

A

P

•

CONTINUED

accommodations, food and mileage expenses, etc.). Additionally, online graduate/professional school fairs allow institutions to increase their recruitment efforts in various markets and geographic areas where they may have been unable to create exposure in the past due to budget and/or staff constraints.

“When examining ethical implications of higher education, professionals need to ensure they are keeping the best interest of the student in mind.”

Finally, results of the supplemental analysis show that 50% (n=7) of private colleges and universities have overall GEM marketing budgets of $50,001+ while only 26.09% (n=6) of public colleges and universities have an overall GEM marketing budget of $50,001+ (see Table 3). These findings are consistent with the researcher’s earlier discussion regarding tuition and fees at public and private colleges and universities in the United States. Annual graduate tuition and fees at public institutions was $14,937 less than graduate tuition and fees at private colleges and universities for the 2012-2013 academic year, which shows that, based only on tuition) it is more than twice as expensive to attend graduate school at a private institution versus a public institution (National Center of Education Statistics, 2018).

Therefore, the results of the supplemental analysis make sense that private colleges and universities in the United States would need a larger overall GEM marketing budget compared to public institutions in order to strategically use social media and e-marketing practices to effectively recruit graduate students.

When examining ethical implications of higher education, professionals need to ensure they are keeping the best interest of the student in mind. Stefkovich and O’Brien continued on the next page

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

19

THE USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA AND E-MARKETING (2004) speak about the “Best Interests” model. It is the duty of the institution and professionals therein to ensure that rights, responsibilities, and respect are at the forefront of guiding ethical decisions surrounding the best interest of the student (Stefkovich and O’Brien, 2004). Within the realm of GEM, NAGAP, The Leader in Graduate Enrollment Management, has a set of guidelines for best practices among graduate enrollment management professionals. These practices include “fairness and non-discrimination,” “maintain prospective and current students’ information in confidence and respect the private nature of these data…,” and “treat each student as an individual in developing a fundamental educational plan” (p. 1) (NAGAP, 2018). Additionally, these guidelines also state that GEM professionals should present clear and transparent information to prospective students through all communication channels, including social media. When advising prospective students, GEM professionals should always be acting in the best interest of the student. Students should be guided to programs and institutions that fit their personal, academic, and professional needs. Sometimes, graduate students may be “undecided” or unclear as what direction to go in order to enter a certain industry or gain employment. When this occurs, GEM professionals should inform students of all program options available. For example, if a student informed a Graduate Admissions representative that he or she was interested in pursuing a career in higher education, the student should be informed of the variety of academic programs available to help enter the higher education field (e.g., Higher Education Administration, Student Affairs Administration, etc.). Not every institution is going to have academic programs to fit a student’s academic and professional goals, thus colleges and universities should never guide a student to enroll into a dissimilar program at their institution solely to enroll one more student.

When using social media and e-marketing practices in graduate

20

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

student recruitment, content and program information should not lead students with false promises, such as “guaranteed admission” or “guaranteed scholarship/financial aid.” These statements may be attractive to some prospective students causing them to click on these advertisements and/or apply to these programs. This unethical practice allows institutions to see higher metrics on the success of social media and e-marketing campaigns, as well as increased inquiries and applicants in the admissions funnel. Examining the best practices of GEM professionals according to NAGAP (2018), reveals that there is very little mention of social media and e-marketing communications used in graduate student recruitment.

Limitations of the Study Limitations of the study include: the published survey instrument did not have any reported validity and reliability statistics. Therefore, the researcher was required to seek assistance from a panel of experts to verify the validity and reliability for the survey instrument.

The researcher was also limited by the response rate of the survey. Due to a low response rate, the findings of this study cannot be generalized to all fouryear public and private colleges and universities in the United States.

Implications This research lends itself to numerous implications for professional practice.

First, the results of this study highlight specific social media and e-marketing practices that colleges and universities should examine and explore implementing within their strategic enrollment management marketing plan. Previous literature and research show that high school students are using various modes of social media throughout the college search process.

The information delivered to students via social media is unique, can be accessed quickly and easily, and delivers the specific message(s) colleges and universities want to convey to

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

CONTINUED

prospective students. It will only be four years before these high school students begin the college search process for graduate schools. Since these students are already familiar with using social media in the undergraduate school search process, they will most likely revert back to what is familiar to them and repeat the same steps when searching for graduate and professional school. There is no reason to “reinvent the wheel” in this case. Students will stick to what is familiar with them and products they know how to use well.

Thus, colleges and universities should look towards mirroring undergraduate recruitment social media marketing practices and strategies to be used for graduate student recruitment.

“The information delivered to students via social media is unique, can be accessed quickly and easily, and delivers the specific message(s) colleges and universities want to convey to prospective students.”

Additionally, colleges and universities will not only be able to see what social media and e-marketing practices are being used within the industry, but they will be able to take these results and determine the proper enrollment management marketing budget needed to increase their prospect applicant pool in future recruiting cycles. These results show what social media and e-marketing practices are being used within the higher education industry today.

Colleges and universities can take these results and compare them with their own social media and e-marketing recruiting strategies to see what can be changed, implemented, and/or revamped. This will allow them to determine the appropriate amount of financial resources and budget needed to implement changes continued on the next page

N

A

G

A

P

THE USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA AND E-MARKETING or enhancements to social media and e-marketing practices.

While generalizability is somewhat limited, the researcher suggests that colleges and universities conduct a SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) analysis on their current social media and e-marketing practices to see where improvements can be made in order to increase and sustain a fruitful applicant pool. The SWOT analysis should be conducted by the appropriate office(s) responsible for maintaining and delivering graduate enrollment management social media and e-marketing content (i.e., graduate admissions division, marketing/ communications department, etc.). This analysis should be conducted every two to three years in order to ensure the institution is keeping pace with industry changes and enhancements in social media and e-marketing technology and

practices. This will further ensure that colleges and universities can maintain a competitive advantage within this crowded marketspace.

It is also recommended that colleges and universities allocate increased budget resources to e-marketing and social media recruitment practices and initiatives. The days of mailing out program catalogs and bulky, lengthy brochures to students are almost gone, but some colleges and universities believe this is a great way to send a large amount of information to students.

A majority of this content has been digitized by colleges and universities and is now housed on their websites. Costs for sending materials through traditional mail have increased exponentially over the years. It would be more cost effective if institutions chose to take money from a “mailing budget” and shift those

CONTINUED

resources towards social media and e-marketing practices. Many prospective students receive bulky mailings from numerous colleges and universities they aren’t even interested in simply because that institution purchased prospect names and contact information from test providers, such as SAT and GRE names.

A majority of those mailings received by students are then thrown away because they view it as junk mail. It is shown that colleges and universities with larger graduate enrollment management (GEM) marketing budgets have greater uses of various social media and e-marketing practices. By reallocating budget resources to social media and e-marketing practices, colleges and universities can become more strategic in delivering specific, relevant content and information to prospective students continued on the next page

There’s no substitute for quality and integrity.™ WHO is NACES? NACES is a trade association whose members are independent organizations providing international credential evaluation services.

WHY Choose a NACES member?

Since 1987, NACES has been the leader in establishing professional standards for the industry.

Clients of NACES' members can be assured that evaluations performed are of the highest quality and will meet their credential evaluation needs.

For a list of Current Members, visit www.naces.org/members

N

A

G

A

P

P E R S P E C T I V E S

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

21

THE USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA AND E-MARKETING whom they have a better chance of recruiting compared to sending mass mailings to a purchased list.

Finally, the researcher noted that NAGAP (2018) mentions very little on the use of social media and e-marketing practices in communication with prospective graduate students. The ethical implications of serving the “best interest of the student,” according to Stefkovich and O’Brien (2004), should be integrated into social media and e-marketing practices at colleges and universities by ensuring the validity and integrity of communication with prospective students. Therefore, the researcher recommends that NAGAP revisits these best practices and develop ethical guidelines for social media and e-marketing use within graduate enrollment management.

Future Research The researcher has identified several areas for future research. First, future research can be conducted on social media and e-marketing practices of various departments/divisions within colleges and universities in the United States. It would be interesting to see if there are specific social media and e-marketing practices used by specific departments/divisions (e.g., engineering, science, medicine, law, business, etc.) and how they impact graduate student recruitment. Additionally, research can be conducted on the use of social media and e-marketing practices on international student recruitment.

International students are a growing population of interest for student recruitment at colleges and universities in the United States. It would be interesting to see if there are any social media and e-marketing practices that better impact international student recruitment compared to domestic student recruitment.

Additionally, a similar research study can be conducted looking at social media and e-marketing practices at four-year private for-profit colleges and universities in the United States. Including institutions from the for-profit higher education sector

22

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

may increase the response rate and allow for comparisons to be made between for-profit and colleges and universities in the United States in terms of social media and e-marketing practices in graduate student recruitment. Finally, research can be conducted to measure the impact of social media and e-marketing practices on graduate school applications. This research can investigate how much impact social media and e-marketing content influenced the student’s decision to apply and enroll into a particular college/ university. This will be able to better quantify a return on investment (ROI) of budget money spent towards social media and e-marketing practices in graduate student recruitment.

Conclusion The aim of this study was to investigate the use of social media and e-marketing practices in graduate student recruitment at colleges and universities in the United States. The researcher examined if relationships existed between social media and e-marketing practices at four-year public and private colleges and universities in the United States.

Results of this study found that few significant relationships and trends exist between social media practices, however many significant relationships and trends exist between e-marketing practices among the respondents of this study. Four-year private colleges and universities were using Instagram more compared to four-year public colleges and universities. A trend among using student blogs showed that more fouryear private colleges and universities were using this social media mode compared to public institutions in this study. Additionally, the results of this study found many relationships and trends among e-marketing practices between four-year public and private colleges and universities in the United States. Results showed that private institutions were using specific e-marketing practices more than public institutions, such as online display advertising, tailed information based on students’ public profiles,

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

CONTINUED

cookie driven retargeting, landing pages for e-mail campaigns, and webcasts.

Trends in e-marketing practices found that more private institutions were using student searches via e-mail and payper-click advertising compared to public institutions in this study.

Since there is a very limited amount of research published in the field of graduate enrollment management, this study helps lay the foundation for future research studies within this field of higher education.

As stated earlier, colleges and universities need to think creatively and strategically to gain and sustain a competitive advantage within the crowded higher education market. Current undergraduate students are turning to social media and digital content to conduct their college search process and will most likely continue to use those same communication channels when searching for graduate school. It is vital for the success of any strategic graduate enrollment management plan to integrate social media and e-marketing practices into their recruitment strategy and marketing plan in order to meet and/ or exceed annual recruitment and student enrollment targets. n

References GetApp (2018). Salesforce Marketing Cloud Pricing, Features, Reviews, & Comparison Alternatives. https://www.getapp.com/ marketing-software/a/exacttarget/, Accessed October 26, 2018.

Greenwood, G. (2012). Examining the presence of social media on university web sites. Journal of College Admission, 216, 24-28.

Google (2018). Get your ad on Google today. Retrieved from https://ads. google.com/. Accessed on 11/1/2018.

Google (2018). Google Marketing Platform. Retrieved from https://analytics. google.com. Accessed on 11/1/2018.

Hemsley-Brown, J., & Oplatka, I. (2006).

Universities in a competitive global marketplace: A systematic review of the literature on higher education marketing.

International Journal of public sector management, 19(4), 316-338. continued on the next page

N

A

G

A

P

THE USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA AND E-MARKETING Instagram (2018). Build your business on Instagram. Retrieved from https:// www.business.Instagram.com/ advertising/#buying-options. Accessed on 11/1/2018.

Ivy, J. (2008). A new higher education marketing mix: the 7Ps for MBA marketing. International Journal of Educational Management, 22(4), 288-299.

Kalyanam, K., & McIntyre, S. (2002). The e-marketing mix: a contribution of the e-tailing wars. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 30(4), 487-499.

Krejcie, R.V., and Morgan, D. W. (1970).

Determining sample size from for research activities. Educational and Psychological Measurement, 30, 607-610.

LinkedIn (2018). How much do LinkedIn ads cost? Retrieved from https:// business.linkedin.com. Accessed on 11/1/2018.

National Center of Education Statistics (2018). Average graduate tuition and required fees in degree-granting post-secondary institutions, by control of institution and percentile: 1989-90 through 2012-13. Retrieved from https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/ d13/tables/dt13_330.50.asp. Accessed 11/1/2018.

NAGAP The Leader in Graduate Enrollment Management (2018). Best Practices for Graduate Enrollment Management Professionals. Retrieved from http://nagap.org/documents/ BestPracticesforGraduateEnrollment ManagementProfessionals 10-28-09_2_.pdf. Accessed 11/29/2018.

Nicolescu, L. (2009). Applying marketing to higher education: Scope and limits.

Management & Marketing, 4(2), pp.

35-44.

Omnicore Agency. Internet Stats. www.omnicoreagency.com/category/ internet-stats/, accessed 9/20/2018.

Rickes, P. C. (2009). Make way for millennials. How today's students are shaping higher education space.

Planning for Higher Education, 37(2), p. 7-17.

Rogers, G. (2014). How students (really) decide. Journal of College Admission, 223, 49-50.

Stefkovich, J., and O’Brien, G.M. (2004).

Best interests of the student: an ethical model. Journal of Educational Administration, 22(2), pp. 197-214.

YouTube (2018). YouTube advertising.

Retrieved from https://www.youtube. com/yt/advertise/pricing/. Accessed on 11/1/2018.

CONTINUED

About the Author Stanley J. Kania III, Ph.D, M.B.A., is a higher education professional with over seven years of graduate enrollment management (GEM) experience who currently works at Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine as the Enrollment Management Recruiter in Scranton, PA. Additionally, Dr. Kania is an Adjunct Instructor of Business at Marywood University and Wilkes University, both in Northeast Pennsylvania. Dr. Kania holds a Ph.D in Administration & Leadership and a Master of Business Administration, both from Marywood University. He is a published researcher in the fields of GEM and business management and has presented his research at various national and statewide conferences.

Dr. Kania is also a recipient of the 2018 NAGAP Graduate Student Research Award and served as PAGAP Chapter President from 2016-2018. His research interests include social media and e-marketing practices in GEM, higher education leadership, and models of student retention in GEM.

Table 1 Social Media Use at Four-Year Public & Private Non-Profit Colleges/Universities in the United States (N=37)

Social Media Type#

Public (n=23)

%

Private (n=14)

%

Facebook

20

86.95

14

100.0

Twitter

16

69.56

10

71.42

LinkedIn

12

52.17

10

71.42

Instagram

10

43.47

12*

85.74

YouTube

9

39.13

7

50.00

Admissions Blog

3

13.04

1

7.14

Student Blog

1

4.34

3

21.42

Faculty Blog

1

4.34

1

7.14

Snapchat

0

0.00

1

7.14

Pinterest

0

0.00

1

7.14

Vimeo

0

0.00

1

7.14

# Respondents could select more than one answer. *p<.05

N

A

G

A

P

continued on the next page

P E R S P E C T I V E S

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

23

THE USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA AND E-MARKETING

CONTINUED

Table 2 E-Marketing Use at Four-Year Public & Private Non-Profit Colleges/Universities in the United States (N=37)

E-Marketing Practice Used#

Public (n=23)

% (n)

Private (n=14)

% (n)

E-Mail Communication with Prospects

22

95.65

14

100.0

Recruiting Pages on Website

22

95.65

14

100.0

Website Optimized for Mobile Browsers

15

65.21

10

71.42

CMS Used to Update Website

14

60.86

6

42.85

Online Graduate/Professional Fair

13

56.52

7

50.00

Analytic Resources (e.g., Google Analytics)

12

51.17

9

64.28

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

11

47.82

9

64.28

Online Display Advertising

9

39.13

11*

78.56

Listing on College Planning Site

9

39.13

10

71.42

Webcasts

9

39.13

6

42.85

Online Net Price Calculator

8

34.78

3

21.42

Skype, Facetime, Google Hangout

8

34.78

5

35.71

Pay-Per-Click Ads on Social Media Channels

8

34.78

9

64.28

Pay-Per-Click Ads on Search Sites (e.g., Bing)

7

30.43

9*

64.28

Virtual Tours

7

30.43

4

28.57

Videos Embedded on Website

7

30.43

8

21.62

Interactive Campus Map

6

26.08

3

21.42

Instant Messaging/Live Chats

6

26.08

3

21.42

Special Landing Pages for E-mail Campaigns

6

26.08

9*

64.28

Mobile Apps

5

21.73

2

14.28

QR Codes

5

21.73

2

14.28

Webcam

4

17.39

2

14.28

Cookie Driven Retargeting

4

17.39

10***

71.42

Personalized Homepages for Prospects

4

17.39

5

35.71

Student Searches via E-mail

4

17.39

6

42.85

Mass Text Messaging

3

13.04

4

28.57

Tailored Info for Students Based on SM Profiles

1

4.34

5*

35.71

# Respondents could select more than one answer * p<.05 *** p≤.001

24

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

continued on the next page

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

N

A

G

A

P

THE USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA AND E-MARKETING

CONTINUED

Table 3 Demographic Characteristics of Study Sample: GEM Marketing Budget (N=37)

Variable

Public (n=23)

%

Private (n=14)

%

Approx. Budget for GEM Marketing

<$25,000

15

65.22

3

21.43

$25,001-50,000

2

8.69

4

28.57

$50,001-75,000

0

0.00

1

7.14

>$75,000

6

26.09

6

42.86

Total

23

100.0

14

100.0

<$25,000

21

91.30

7

50.0

$25,001-50,000

0

0.00

2

14.29

$50,001-75,000

2

8.70

5

35.71

>$75,000

0

0.00

0

0.00

Total

23

100.0

14

100.0

<$25,000

21

91.30

8

57.14

$25,001-50,000

0

0.00

1

7.14

$50,001-75,000

1

4.34

5

35.71

>$75,000

1

4.34

0

0.00

Total

23

100.0

14

100.0

Social Media Marketing Budget

E-Marketing Budget

N

A

G

A

P

P E R S P E C T I V E S

â&#x20AC;¢

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

25

MEET OUR 2019 GRADUATE STUDENT RESEARCH GRANT WINNERS The NAGAP Research Committee received many outstanding applications for our Graduate Student Research Grant this year.

The grant program is designed to encourage emerging knowledge and understanding of the complexities of graduate enrollment management including all aspects of admissions and recruitment, enrollment, retention, and graduation in higher education.

The award includes cash award, a free year of NAGAP membership, and travel/registration to the NAGAP Annual Conference where they will be recognized for this significant accomplishment. Please join the Research Committee in congratulating our 2019 recipients and honorable mentions!

Grant Recipients

Virginia Byrne

Zid Mancenido

University of Maryland, College Park

Harvard University

Studying How Formative Feedback Can Support Graduate Student Instructors: Using Feedback to Develop as a Reflective and Effective Teacher

Recruiting a Better Teacher: Policies to Improve the Quality of Incoming Graduate Students in Teacher Education

Honorable Mentions

26

S P R I N G

Rebecca Gavillet

Andrea Kunze

The University of Texas at Austin

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Exploring MBA Curricular Innovation Through the Eyes of Influential Stakeholders

Understanding STEM Graduate Students’ Racial Climate Perceptions: A Perspective-Taking Intervention

2 0 1 9

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

N

A

G

A

P

WORKING WITH A PARTNER TO ACHIEVE YOUR GOAL: MAKING THE INVISIBLE VISIBLE

By Jack Klett, Capture Higher Ed and Rebecca Demski, Thomas Jefferson University Capture Higher Ed and Thomas Jefferson University recently celebrated the oneyear anniversary of their partnership.

Capture, a technology-enabled, higher education services company, specializes in empowering colleges and universities with key data regarding prospective students and prospective donors. For Jefferson, the partnership has been an important element of their graduate enrollment strategy.

“Capture Higher Ed and Thomas Jefferson University recently celebrated the one-year anniversary of their partnership. Capture, a technology‑enabled, higher education services company, specializes in empowering colleges and universities with key data regarding prospective students and prospective donors.”

A Top-of-Funnel Challenge Rebecca Demski, Senior Associate Director of Recruitment at Jefferson, is no stranger to graduate enrollment. She has served several roles at Jefferson focused on the marketing, recruitment, and enrollment of graduate students to the university. For Demski, one problem she was experiencing was not new. “Our greatest challenges in graduate enrollment are centered around timing and the stealthy nature of prospective graduate students,” she said. “We aim to discover and nurture the right students at the right time in their lives. Making contact when they are engaged, excited, and ready to pursue a graduate education. That’s the goal, but it is easier said than done.”

Jefferson is certainly not alone in the challenge of identifying graduate student interest prior to application. Most institutions have experienced a decline in responders to traditional graduate student search. CRM’s often require numerous data points in order to create an inquiry in the system. This necessitates lengthy inquiry forms that website visitors are often wary to complete.

P E R S P E C T I V E S

P

Increasing Conversion

Many institutions use Google Analytics to collect and analyze data on an institution’s website traffic. Google Analytics can measure the number of unique visitors to the .edu, as well as measure the traffic to specific pages. The duration of visits to these pages can provide insights as to the quality of content and interest in particular graduate programs. While this is all wonderful data, it does not reveal who is visiting these pages.

N

A

“Purchasing advertising and driving people to our website is only half of the job,” states Demski. “Capture takes it from there by building a bridge between the prospective student and us. Their services make it easy for prospective students to take action and raise their hand, and for us to take action and communicate with them in a more personal way.”

Demski admits that finding an external partner to make the invisible graduate inquiry visible was something Jefferson had not considered. “We like partners who bring something new and different to the mix. We didn’t even know that we needed Capture’s services until they showed us what they could do!”

Capture Higher Ed created a unique software, Capture Behavioral Engagement (CBE). A string of CBE code was placed

G

Jefferson provides the inquiries generated by CBE a unique source code in order to track the conversion of these prospects to application. Like most other institutions, organic inquiries have the highest conversion rate at Jefferson. Organic inquiries are defined as those submitted via their “Request Information” form embedded on their website. The inquiries identified via CBE are performing just a few points behind Jefferson’s organic inquiry rate.

Identifying the Stealth Graduate Student

Stealth behavior further complicates this issue. It is difficult to deliver the right message at the right time to prospective A

on Jefferson’s website. This code enabled several ways to identify these unique visitors. One method of identification is the use of Progressive Identification forms.

These forms, a type of automated dynamic content, do not launch on the site until such time as the visitor’s identity is provided.

graduate students when they do not identify their interest. “History shows that nearly 20% of our graduate applications come seemingly out of the blue. We often wonder how many additional applications we could have received if we had the opportunity to give all of these stealth prospects a little nudge.

It’s a challenge when we don’t know who they are. Particularly, in a time when graduate enrollment is lagging in the U.S., we don’t want to leave any potential applicants on the table.”

Jefferson has a multi-faceted approach to making meaningful connections with prospective graduate students. By leveraging digital advertising, engaging web content, formalized communication flows and utilizing one-on-one counselor outreach, Jefferson deploys best practices for the recruitment of graduate students. Yet, the timing of these messages has been an open question.

Now that Demski’s team can identify individual visitors to graduate web pages, they can also see what information is desired by each prospective student.

This enables Jefferson to tailor messages based on each prospective student’s unique visit history. continued on the next page

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

27

MAKING THE INVISIBLE VISIBLE “To support outreach efforts for those who we know in the pool, our graduate counselors review their personal Capture dashboard and use it to inform their communication strategy. Let’s say an accepted student isn’t answering emails about placing their deposit, but the counselor sees that this student is very active on financial aid pages. Maybe finances are holding them back? The counselor can give them a call to talk about how to finance their graduate education.”

“We now deliver emails from faculty that are triggered based on a prospective student’s behavior on our website. The emails have higher open rates than our established communication flows, and serve as an opportunity for meaningful communication between the student and faculty.”

An Inclusive Approach As a managed service, Demski works with a Capture enrollment advisor.

Each month they meet to review content strategy and set various triggers for dynamic content delivered via CBE’s marketing automation. “By serving content on our site, via pop-ups and toasters, we can invite unregistered prospects to specific events, drive them to apply through application fee waiver campaigns, trigger program-specific content via faculty profiles or student stories. And this can all be done based on their behavior on our website. We can even survey the prospective student to determine what might be holding them back, and then respond accordingly.”

Demski highlights the value of the partnership in this way. “Capture provided a way for us to work our entire graduate pool, whether we knew who was in that pool or not. Now we use our website to uncover and actively convert interested students to hand-

28

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

CONTINUED

raising prospects and applicants. CBE has helped us to better communicate with stealth prospects, uncover new prospects and move them into our nurture campaigns quickly, and build a sound strategy around prospect and application pool management.”

Faculty engagement with prospective graduate students is a key factor in a student’s desire to attend. The challenge for many institutions has been how best to leverage faculty time in the enrollment effort. With CBE, Demski knows which prospective students are most engaged.

This has allowed for a much more meaningful interaction between the faculty and prospective students, a far better approach to cold-calling. “We now deliver emails from faculty that are triggered based on a prospective student’s behavior on our website. The emails have higher open rates than our established communication flows, and serve as an opportunity for meaningful communication between the student and faculty.”

Jefferson recently renewed their partnership with Capture. “As Graduate Enrollment Management professionals, we want data we can use: data that helps provide more meaningful connections between the student and graduate stakeholders throughout our community. The data we get from Capture Behavioral Engagement enables these types of connections.”

2018–20 NAGAP GOVERNING BOARD Officers President Keith Ramsdell Assistant Dean and Director of Graduate Enrollment

Bowling Green State University

Bowling Green, Ohio

(419) 372-2209

kramsde@bgsu.edu Vice President Jeremiah Nelson Wake Forest University School of Business Treasurer Andrew Kim Memorial University of Newfoundland (Canada) Secretary Teisha Johnson

Illinois College of Optometry Immediate Past President Julia B. Deland Harvard Graduate School of Education Executive Director Dana VanMeerhaeghe NAGAP, The Association for Graduate Enrollment Management

From Capture’s perspective, there could not be a better partner than Jefferson. “Thomas Jefferson University continues to be one of the most innovative institutions that Capture has the pleasure of working with,” says Jamie Gleason, Senior Enrollment Advisor for Capture Higher Ed. “My work with Rebecca, and the rest of the Jefferson team is fun for me because they want to use data in ways that are new and different. The power is in the collaboration—putting our heads together to deploy even better campaigns. Year One was good, but it’s going to be a great Year Two.” n •

P E R S P E C T I V E S

The Leader in Graduate Enrollment Management

N

A

G

A

P

Directors Paula Baker

University of Minnesota Katherine Beczak

Rochester Institute of Technology Colleen L. Gabauer

Purdue University Marcus Hanscom

Roger Williams University Jennifer Kulbeck

Saint Mary's College of California Raymond Lutzky

Cornell Tech Amanda Ostreko

University of Kansas Sara Pettingill

Bellarmine University Naronda Wright

Georgia Southern University

Flash Feedback Surveys began in August 2018—Have you completed one yet?

Did you know?

• 28 percent of your peers have recently revised or removed sex, gender and/or sexual orientation questions from their admissions applications.

• Student record access is currently the number one legal issue encountered across the GEM cycle.

• The biggest challenge your peers say they face in social media usage is finding time to create and post meaningful content.

These are a few of the take-aways from Flash Feedback Surveys, short surveys based on member-suggested topics since August 2018.

They take only a minute to fill out, with cumulative results displayed on-screen immediately after survey completion.

Publications Committee Denise Bridwell

University of Kansas

Keep an eye out for future surveys in NAGAP News and on the NAGAP Facebook page. To see summaries of Flash Feedback Surveys to date, or to complete the most recent survey, visit the NAGAP Flash Feedback web page.

Dave Fletcher

Barry University Marianne Gumpper

Fairfield University Kate McConnell Pennsylvania State University Great Valley

Check out the NAGAP ONLINE RESOURCE CENTER

Kittie Pain

McDaniel College Caela Provost

University College Cork (Ireland) Troy Sterk

Seattle University

Featuring a database of holistic admissions resources as well as archived book reviews, GEM articles, webinars, doctoral research, and more. nagap.org/online-education-resource-center

UPCOMING PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT OPPORTUNITIES 2019 Annual Conference April 10-13, 2019 • Toronto, Canada nagap.org/32nd-annual-conference

N

A

G

A

P

P E R S P E C T I V E S

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

29

2019 ANNUAL CONFERENCE: TORONTO, CANADA

By Joshua Walehwa, Washington University in Saint Louis, 2019 Annual Conference Marketing Chair We are thrilled to be hosting the 2019 NAGAP Annual Conference aptly titled Global Outlooks: Reaching Beyond Borders in the City of Toronto in Ontario, Canada! This year’s planning committee has collectively pulled together your feedback along with best practices to design the best conference experience for all attendees.

Careful consideration continues to take place in consideration of our keynote and plenary sessions as well as this year’s education sessions. From Recruitment & Marketing to Strategic Planning to Personal Development, this year’s event will provide opportunities for new insights and perspectives.

We encourage you to consider

30

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

what planning approach makes the most sense for your experience.

Be sure to take advantage of the Conference Planning Committee’s regular communications on helpful hints in arranging your travel to taking advantage of the many educational opportunities.

While at the conference, find new ways to get involved! Whether it means participating in this year’s Fun Run/ Walk or volunteering as a conference recorder, there are many ways to get more involved with NAGAP. Attend every session possible, network-networknetwork, and share your experience.

This is an opportunity to learn and exchange ideas. And remember…

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

information about chapters, committees, and other opportunities can always be found on our website.

Finally, make sure to stay in touch with your new or renewed relationships in the field. Consider staying a little longer for the optional tour as an additional opportunity to connect with others.

Follow up, provide feedback, and find ways to increase your involvement with NAGAP…we’d love to stay connected.

With so much to experience and gain from this year’s Annual Conference, we are confident that you will find ways to maximize your experience. Travel safely, and we look forward to seeing you in Toronto! n

N

A

G

A

P

EH, CANADA? FUN FACTS ABOUT OUR 2019 ANNUAL CONFERENCE HOST COUNTRY

By Denise Bridwell, University of Kansas In a world where we tend go about our day-to-day business unbeknownst to the world around us, how well do we know our neighbors? I’ll be the first to admit that I could certainly do a better job of getting to know mine. As the case is, the good ole’ USA has one of the friendliest and hospitable neighbors that a country could ask for in its neighbor to the north, Canada, and yet most Americans don’t even know how many provinces it has (it’s ten, by the way…with three more territories.) NAGAP has a sizeable membership from Canada and very soon we’ll be embarking on a journey to her gateway city of Toronto. This is a great opportunity to pour out into our figurative streets and get to know one another.

O CANADA!

The Place • Canada is the second largest country (outsized only by Russia), but has the 4th lowest population density in the world.

• The country has the largest coastline in the world.

• 90% of the population lives within 100 miles of the US border.

• Canada has more lakes than the rest of the world combined and is the leader in hydro-electricity.

• The coldest temperature ever recorded was -63C (-81.4F) in 1957. (Roughly the same temperature as Mars.) YIKES! • The border between Canada and the US is known as the International Boundary and is the world’s longest unprotected border.

• The country has 10% of the world’s forest making timber: its primary export.

range, and basketball (Rock Chalk!

Sorry y’all, I can’t resist).

• Insulin and stem cells were first discovered in Canada.

• A mere 8 countries are deemed to be less corrupt than Canada.

• Canada is the most educated country: over half its residents have college degrees.

• The literacy rate in Canada is 99%.

• There is no federal education department or education system; education in Canada is provincially managed.

• School is mandatory until 16 in all provinces except Manitoba, Ontario, and New Brunswick where the age is 18.

The Food

• Life expectancy in Canada is 81 years.

• Almost half of the country’s population was born in other countries.

• Canadians invented Trivial Pursuit, Hawaiian pizza, the telephone, the snowmobile, the electric cooking

N

P E R S P E C T I V E S

A

G

A

P

• “Porky’s” is the most successful Canadian film ever made.

• License plates in the Northwest Territories are shaped like polar bears.

• Canada is the largest source of Cesium and producer of Uranium in the world.

• The US buys more oil from Canada than any other country.

• Residents of Churchill, Canada leave their cars unlocked to offer an escape for pedestrians who might encounter polar bears.

• After the attack on Pearl Harbor during WWII, Canada declared war on Japan before the United States did.

• Canada’s official phone number is 1-800-O-CANADA. • Canada and Denmark have been fighting over an uninhabited island since the 1930s by leaving each other bottles of alcohol and changing their flags.

• It’s illegal to carry a product designed for personal protection against a human attack (including pepper spray).

• It’s against the law to have comics that depict criminal acts.

• Residents and visitors to the City of Nanaimo race bathtubs in an annual event held since 1967.

The Education

• Canadians consume more doughnuts, macaroni and cheese, and fruit juice per capita than any other country, and each consume an average of 23.4 pounds of cheddar cheese annually.

• It has a strategic maple syrup reserve to ensure global supply in case of emergency.

• 80% of all alcohol consumed in Canada is beer.

The People

The Random

continued on the next page

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

31

EH, CANADA?

CONTINUED

The Lingo • The famous interjection “eh” is actually listed in the Oxford Dictionary as a valid word.

• $1 and $2 coins are called “loonies” and “toonies”.

• Canada officially a bi-lingual country: Montreal is the largest French-speaking city next to Paris.

• In Saskatchewan, a hoodie is called a “bunnyhug”.

• A “tuque” is a knitted hat used to keep the head warm.

• A backpack is not a backpack… it’s a knapsack.

• The phrase “Timbits and a large double double” means doughnuts and an oversized coffee with two creams and two sugars. (I’m certainly logging this in the memory bank for our trip!)

So…now that we’ve gotten to know each other a bit, don’t hesitate to stop by and say hello every now and then.

A bientôt, mes amis! n

References 1 https://hikebiketravel.com/145-weirdfun-interesting-facts-canada/ 2 https://www.factslides.com/s-Canada 3 https://www.kids-world-travel-guide. com/canada-facts.html 4 https://www.statista.com/topics/2863/ education-in-canada/ 5 https://o.canada.com/ entertainment/50-insane-facts-aboutcanada-we-bet-you-didnt-know 6 https://theplanetd.com/ the-great-canadian-word-uniquephrases-and-words-of-canada/

Connecting Graduate Admissions Practices with Program Goals Start the conversation with our free discussion guide and more at: holisticadmissions.org

Copyright © 2018 by Educational Testing Service. All rights reserved. ETS, the ETS logo and GRE are registered trademarks of Educational Testing Service (ETS) in the United States and other countries. 40962

32

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

N

A

G

A

P

BOOK REVIEW Reviewed by Daniel J. Bennett, World Education Services (WES)

The University of Nike: How Corporate Cash Bought American Higher Education Joshua Hunt Brooklyn, Melville House Publishing, 2018 A number of books I’ve reviewed for Perspectives focused on the public university’s response to a reduction of state and federal money over the last several decades, and the sometimes pernicious effects of the pursuit of alternative funding sources. This issue continues to grow in importance.

Indeed, when the Chronicle of Higher Education recently invited selected scholars to name the most influential book published in the past 20 years, one of the books I reviewed on this topic, Paying for the Party: How College Maintains Inequality (Harvard University Press, 2013), was cited by Amy J. Binder, a professor of sociology at the University of California, San Diego. Binder notes the book “already has had a major influence on how we think about higher education and its complicated relationship to social mobility and a bleaker cousin, social reproduction.” In that book the authors show that Indiana University promoted a party environment to attract less than stellar students from out of state who would pay high nonresident tuition, in the process sacrificing academic quality and a learning environment that promotes the welfare of all students.

Joshua Hunt, journalist and former foreign correspondent for Reuters in Tokyo, spent four years pursuing this story that began with the alleged gang rape of a female student at the University of Oregon by three of the school’s basketball players in early 2014. He writes that early attempts by the university to cover up the alleged crime unraveled when “the Eugene Police Department released a graphic twenty-four-page police report the victim had filed, sparking intense media coverage that led to the suspension of the players and, several months

N

A

G

A

P

later, the resignation of the university’s president, Michael Gottfredson.” Hunt asks, “Why had the school recruited one of these players despite the fact that his previous college had suspended him for sexually assaulting a fellow student? Why were the players allowed to keep playing basketball with such serious charges hanging over their heads? And why did the school ignore federal laws [e.g., the Clery Act] requiring them to notify the public when crimes of this nature were reported to campus police?”

The author found that the university’s move years before to accept large sums of money from the Nike corporation was influencing all kinds of decision-making by campus administrators, including the way it would handle this case. “The University of Oregon, which was once a cash-strapped liberal arts college, had been transformed into a college football powerhouse with an increasingly competitive basketball program. The change was so swift and dramatic, and so obviously tied to [Nike’s Phil] Knight’s largesse, that Oregon’s rivals gave it the derisive nickname the University of Nike—an image it has now embraced.”

Nike’s relationship with the University of Oregon (and many others) was mutually supportive: college athletics apparel contracts for basketball and expanding influence into college football that helped Nike obtain more licensing deals with NFL teams; the university received funding for buildings, supplements to salaries for coaches and staff (even the university president), and more.

It was confluence, not conspiracy, that Knight went looking to invest in a university just as Oregon’s oldest and most prestigious institution of higher learning found itself in need of a wealthy benefactor.

But it was hardly an accident of history given that Nike’s rise was aided [through a variety of tax breaks] by the same small group of conservatives who engineered the University of Oregon’s decline. Could the end result of sowing boundless contempt for public institutions be anything but unchecked dependence on private institutions?

The danger, Hunt shows, is that Nike could dangle or withdraw support if things didn’t go its way such as when the university’s president Dave Frohnmayer signed on to make the university a member of the Worker Rights Commission (WRC), a move opposed (and eventually reversed) by Mr. Knight

What makes the Oregon case seminal is that the state was one of the first to dramatically decrease financial support for public education through Ballot Measure 5 passed in 1990 at a time when, according to Hunt, “no

P E R S P E C T I V E S

other state in America was seeking to significantly reduce its level of financial support for colleges and universities.

These institutions had, after all, proved to be as important for allowing residents to increase their earning power with relatively affordable degrees. This social mobility was among the first casualties of Measure 5’s deep cuts to highereducation funding in Oregon.” Within a few years 10,000 less students who had graduated from Oregon high schools were enrolled in Oregon universities, and the University of Oregon relentlessly recruited domestic out-of-state and international students for non-resident tuition. At the same time Nike profits were soaring:

continued on the next page

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

33

BOOK REVIEW

CONTINUED

whose company was under attack for alleged sweatshop labor conditions around the world.

Hunt begins his narrative with Oregon but moves on to a larger story. In addition to the states’ withdrawal of support for public education, there was a decline in federal funding for research, “The shift in funding was dramatic: in 1965, the federal government was responsible for financing more than 60% of all the research and development taking place in the United States, while four decades later the reverse would be true, with 65% of this same work being funded by various private interests.” Of course, when the federal government was generously funding university research there were other notable conflicting interests, chiefly the connection the studies had to the Cold War and the military-industrial complex that developed during the post-WWII era. The CIA, FBI, et al., are quite capable of endangering the academic freedom of universities today, as Daniel Golden outlines in a recent study (see References).

The author notes that in 1980, the passage

by Congress of the Bayh-Dole Act: …gave universities and professors automatic ownership of the federally funded research they produced, as well as the right to sell and market that research. More than anything else, the Bayh-Dole Act changed the avenues that academic research took on its way to industry. Prior to 1980, academic knowledge was monetized openly, through publications, conferences, and consulting that was more or less transparent.

Since Bayh-Dole, university research has been quietly patented and licensed, creating more direct, less transparent financial ties between universities, professors, and the corporations to which they license their patented discoveries.

34

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

Pharmaceutical, chemical, food, and other companies moved in so that within 20 years corporate funding of university research was a $2 billion annual enterprise. Hunt emphasizes that, “Today, America’s public universities are a veritable banquet on which corporate interests dine at their discretion.”

Unsurprisingly, a good deal of the results of that research favor corporate products and interests.

Corporate influence on university sports programs kept growing. For example, by 2011, following the signing of a new television contract with ESPN and Fox, “which guaranteed massive yearly payouts and increased national exposure, with the number of televised conference events rising from 550 to 750 per year,” Pac-12 Conference schools went on a $1 billion building spree at the same time that academics fell in priority at many of these campuses.

For Hunt, the final turning point at the University of Oregon took place in October 2016 with the announcement of the “Knight Campus”: The University of Nike was born, in spirit, the moment Dave Frohnmayer withdrew the University of Oregon’s membership in the WRC; in a more practical sense, the transformation was complete once Knight showed he could have university employees hired or fired; in an absolute sense, the takeover will not reach it apotheosis until the coming decade, with the opening of the Phil and Penny Knight Campus for Accelerating Scientific Impact.

I found few reviews of this book in the months following its publication. I agree with one by Richard Crepeau, who notes, “Hunt’s overall argument is compelling, although the presentation is at times chaotic.” No doubt related to its genesis from many pieces of reportage

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

over the years, the book’s narrative jumps from topic to topic, place to place, and the reader is never sure in what decade one is in without going back to check. While this deficiency may limit readership, it does not detract from the serious findings, based on over 100 interviews and substantial research.

Concerns will increase as politicians pursue a public narrative critical of higher education, and state and federal governments place more burdens on individual students through loan debt and on institutions through the need for more corporate funding.

In 2016 the University of Oregon settled a suit against it by the student who alleged rape for $800,000. However, Mr. Hunt believes the ultimate price the university and the state of Oregon are paying for corporate cash is much higher: Over the years, Knight’s increasingly generous gifts brought athletic acclaim, brand recognition, and lucrative television and licensing deals to the University of Oregon.

But they failed to bring a sense of stability to the school, and in some ways obscured the fraught reality of an institution constantly on the brink of peril.

Frohnmayer and his successors relied on a crude but effective model for shoring up funds to replace declining state support for higher education: they used Knight’s money to build Oregon athletics into a regional and national powerhouse, then leveraged the power of that brand to attract more out-of-state students, who pay higher tuition than Oregon residents. This worked so well that between 2004 and 2014 the percentage of Oregonians entering the school’s freshman class declined from 68 percent to just under 50 percent. n continued on the next page

N

A

G

A

P

BOOK REVIEW

CONTINUED

References “The New Canon: What’s the Most Influential Book of the Last 20 Years?”

The Chronicle of Higher Education, November 5, 2018, https://www. chronicle.com/interactives/influentialbooks Armstrong, L. A. and Hamilton, L. T. (2013), Paying for the Party: How College Maintains Inequality, Cambridge/ London, Harvard University Press Crepeau, R., “Review of University of Nike: How Corporate Cash Bought American Higher Education,” New York Journal of Books, October 23, 2018, https://www.nyjournalofbooks.com/ book-review/university-nike

Golden, D. (2017), Spy Schools: How the CIA, FBI, and Foreign Intelligence Secretly Exploit America’s Universities, New York, Henry Holt and Company Leef, G., “How Nike Transformed the University of Oregon,” December 19, 2018, https://www.jamesgmartin. center/2018/12/how-nike-transformedthe-university-of-oregon/1 Williams, J., “Tell Us 5 Things About Your Book: College Athletics and Its Corporate Sponsors” https://www.nytimes. com/2018/10/21/books/university-ofnike-joshua-hunt-interview.html2

of Oregon could not have flourished without Nike’s support and believes that some belt-tightening by administrators would have worked, he agrees with Hunt that Nike’s influence has been corrosive at the University. However, Leef—a selfdescribed economic libertarian—balks at the notion that “corporate cash” is by definition damaging to institutions of higher learning. He believes that “better governance systems to rein in presidents before they get hooked on outside money” are the solution.

2 In this interview Hunt indicates that the initial stories he wrote about this case became his master’s project at Columbia University’s Journalism School, from which he graduated in 2015.

Endnotes 1 While Leef is skeptical that the University

EdD in HIGHER EDUCATION LEADERSHIP & ORGANIZATIONAL STUDIES BE A CATALYST FOR CHANGE • 100% online, cohort-based courses (with 3 on-campus

weekend immersion experiences) • Complete in 3-4 years • Coursework incorporates case studies, self-assessment, professional development workshops • Conduct action-focused research • Receive one-on-one mentoring and coaching • Financial aid is available Applications now being accepted.

Review of completed applications begins in early April.

Classes begin October 21, 2019

Learn more at baypath.edu/helos

N

A

G

A

P

FOR A CONSTANTLY CHANGING WORLD

P E R S P E C T I V E S

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

35

REVIEWER DILIGENCE AND RESPONSIBILITY IN THE GRADUATE APPLICATION PROCESS

By Dr. JoAnn Canales, Texas A&M University—Corpus Christi The graduate application process is born out of a necessity to make swift determinations, frankly, about complete strangers. Those involved in the process are well aware that these decisions are both an art and a science. While the evidence submitted in an application package may never give the full picture, being explicit about what evidence you expect to find in each component of the application and being aware of the benefits and limitations of each can help keep the process as equitable as possible in working to achieve your program enrollment goals.

Following are some considerations worth revisiting and discussing in admissions committee meetings.

“While the evidence submitted in an application package may never give the full picture, being explicit about what evidence you expect to find in each component of the application and being aware of the benefits and limitations of each can help keep the process as equitable as possible in working to achieve your program enrollment goals.”

Undergraduate Transcript & Grade Point Average • Purpose: The undergraduate transcript and grade point average (GPA) are two inseparable data points that can serve as an indication of specialized experience and academic ability.

• Benefits: Transcripts can indicate several intangibles that are key to evaluating an applicant, including growth over time, pursuit of challenging coursework, passion for particular

36

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

subject matter, well rounded behavior and cross-discipline interests.

• Drawbacks: Comparing GPAs between applicants is a challenging exercise that can result in misleading conclusions. The exact meaning of GPA can differ from applicant to applicant, as it can be skewed by grade inflation and varying institutional rigor.

• Mitigation: While the measure is not standardized, when examined in context with the transcript, reviewers can still make valuable determinations. With transcript and GPA, it’s important to read in between the lines and look for evidence that an applicant is seeking challenging coursework, while excelling or showing significant academic growth.

GRE® Scores • Purpose: The GRE® General Test (GRE test) is an assessment designed to evaluate the cognitive skills of an applicant. It seeks to measure whether applicants possess the verbal reasoning, quantitative reasoning, and critical thinking and analytic writing skills necessary for mastering graduatelevel concepts and succeeding in graduate-level coursework.

• Benefits: The GRE test can serve as an objective, common benchmark to compare applicants who have widely varying backgrounds and experiences.

Like most standardized tests, the GRE test is a “moment in time” assessment that gives all applicants an equal opportunity to exhibit their abilities independent of their transcript, GPA, country of origin, or the prestige of their undergraduate institution.

• Drawbacks: Since the scores are so easily compared across applications, reviewers can place too much weight on them, perhaps even using them to create cut-off scores. Additionally, individuals preparing for the GRE test have varying amounts of time and

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

resources to invest, which can affect the scores they receive.

• Mitigation: Given these factors, it is critical reviewers consider the scores for the measure(s) that are most relevant to their program requirements—versus using only the total score—to determine eligibility for admission. Readers may find this correlations table (https://news.ets. org/stories/if-youre-not-using-greanalytical-writing-scores-you-might-bemissing-out/) useful in deciding how much emphasis to place on the Verbal Reasoning, Quantitative Reasoning, and Analytical Writing components of the GRE test.

Personal Statement: • Purpose: The personal statement is an opportunity for the applicant to showcase their passions, personality, and potential in the program.

• Benefits: The personal statement serves to put a face to the more objective and quantitative credentials a candidate submits. The statement reminds reviewers that applicants are individuals with unique experiences, backgrounds, and points of view that can enrich and contribute to the graduate program’s broader objectives of maintaining diversity of thought. It also helps reviewers learn more about the applicant’s intent and suitability for the program.

• Drawbacks: The personal statement is an especially subjective application component that can be perceived very differently depending on the reviewer’s background, preferences or values. Compounding this effect is that language used by the designers of the application can be open to interpretation. If the wording of the prompt isn’t highly explicit, applicants may accidentally misinterpret and not supply the expected information. continued on the next page

N

A

G

A

P

REVIEWER DILIGENCE AND RESPONSIBILITY • Mitigation: To mitigate the potential for misinterpretation of the language used in the application directions, it is good practice to have several reviewers—including some students— read the application directions to ensure they are explicit and sufficient.

To lessen the chance that bias will be a factor in decision making, consider having multiple reviewers read the personal statement to gather multiple perspectives. Although it’s impossible to completely avoid the effects of implicit bias, using a descriptive rubric delineating the specific criteria sought, i.e., passion, commitment, experience, reflections, writing mechanics, etc. will help minimize the effects of implicit bias and enable reviewers to evaluate the personal statement more objectively.

people they know or from prestigious institutions, which introduces another form of bias into the process.

• Mitigation: It’s important for reviewers to pay special attention to the language used and specific examples provided—and keep their own biases in check—while deciding how much weight to place on LORs. These biases can be also be abated by either having specific dispositions to be addressed and requesting related examples as evidence or providing a standard form asking recommenders to rate the applicant

CONTINUED on a set scale and then provide examples to support the ratings.

Resumes & Research Experience: • Purpose: Resumes and research experience show reviewers how applicants have practically applied ideas and concepts learned in the classroom.

• Benefits: Undergraduate and postgraduate research helps show reviewers that applicants possess the skills and dispositions needed to conduct extensive research and continued on the next page

Letters of Recommendation: • Purpose: In the graduate application process, the letter of recommendation (LOR) is unique because it is the express third-party endorsement of a candidate’s attributes, ability to succeed in graduate school, and potential to contribute to the field.

• Benefits: Former professors, employers, and colleagues’ endorsement of a candidate can not only provide authentic perceptions of a candidate’s previous achievements and potential to succeed, but they can also help to provide concrete examples of the subjective traits described in the personal statement and other elements of the application.

• Drawbacks: Like the personal statement, LORs are highly subjective and tend to have positive bias, especially as applicants will actively seek professors or managers with whom they have a positive relationship. Professors and employers who receive many such requests may write them out of courtesy rather than passionate endorsement, or request that the student draft the letter for their signature. Reviewers tend to favor letters that come from

N

A

G

A

P

P E R S P E C T I V E S

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

37

REVIEWER DILIGENCE AND RESPONSIBILITY make substantive contributions to their selected fields. Likewise, professional degree seekers’ resumes and past work or internship experiences provide proof of practical skills that can be advanced in the classroom.

• Drawbacks: The ability of an applicant to perform extracurricular research or take unpaid or lowpaying internships requires a certain level of privilege not afforded to all applicants. Factors such as financial resources, family obligations, urbanrural location, strength of social network, type of undergraduate institution attended (e.g., liberal arts college, community college, research university) and the availability of funding all deeply impact the opportunity applicants have to gather relevant experience.

• Mitigation: It’s important for reviewers to understand the role of privilege and its impact on resumes.

Some applicants may question whether their work experience is directly relevant to their graduate school pursuits and thus, not fully provide pertinent information. As with the other application materials, it is important to be explicit and transparent regarding the information to be included in the resume. For ease in reviewing the resumes, it is helpful to provide a consistent format for applicants to follow.

Despite the pressures of time and resource limitations, we owe each applicant dedicated attention to each component of the application process and a keen understanding of the nuances hidden within each application. It is essential to be mindful of the intended purpose, benefits and drawbacks of each element to make fair, consistent and goal-oriented admissions decisions. The more admissions

A Fresh Perspective on International Education

®

CONTINUED applications processes can be holistic, explicit, transparent, and consistent, the greater the opportunity to enroll in a talented, well-rounded and diverse graduate class. n

“Despite the pressures of time and resource limitations, we owe each applicant dedicated attention to each component of the application process and a keen understanding of the nuances hidden within each application.

It is essential to be mindful of the intended purpose, benefits and drawbacks of each element to make fair, consistent and goaloriented admissions decisions.”

PARTNER WITH US. We provide evaluation reports that help you make prompt, well-informed decisions regarding admission and transfer credit for students who hold international credentials. All reports completed in 5 working days. (upon receipt of all necessary documentation)

edperspective.org | 312.421.9300 Educational Perspectives is a member of the National Association of Credential Evaluation Services (NACES)

38

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

N

A

G

A

P

extend the participants’ learning beyond the facilit so they can immediately apply lessons learned on

NAGAP Leadership Academy We are excited to announce the launch of our inaugural NAGAP Leadership Academy, to be held October 16-18 in New York City at Teachers College, Columbia University.

This unique training will provide graduate enrollment management (GEM) professionals an intensive leadership development experience that includes cohesive, experiential training that integrates education that is GEM-focused, and includes, experience, feedback, and coaching. These elements compliment and extend the participants’ learning beyond the facilitated classroom sessions so they can immediately apply lessons learned on their campuses.

Participants will be guided by expert faculty through a multi-component, sixmonth program that includes two in-person seminars, webinars, leadership assessments, and coaching.

Wha

Virtual Orientation Session

360 Degree Assessment

Leadership Coaching Sessions

Seminar 1 3 Days

Seminar 2 1 Day

The N multi-c Two in by mo asses culmin are pa journe comp

Monthly webinars are coupled with online assignments and capstone project work; participants are encouraged to work with peers in a community of practice

2 participate in the NAGAP Leadership Academy?

Who should • Candidates from any aspect of the GEM lifecycle (recruitment, admissions, financial aid, student services, advising, alumni affairs, or general administration) aspiring to advance in their careers • Early and mid-career managers seeking to improve their effectiveness supervising and mentoring their teams • Enrollment managers who are interested in building a GEM network and/or model on their campuses.

• GEM professionals interested in developing the skills to lead change in their organization.

This program is the perfect choice for NAGAP members looking for a transformative professional development experience. Consider joining us for the inaugural cohort!

Space is limited, and registration/pricing information will be available online in early 2019 at www.nagap.org.

N

A

G

A

P

P E R S P E C T I V E S

•

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

39

HIGHER EDUCATION HUMOR (HEH)!

In our Fall 2018 issue, we launched a humor submission section of Perspectives, and we are back! This feature is intended to be a celebration of humor and an attempt to give professionals joy in their work (in no way do we seek to be embarrassing or mean spirited with this content). All comments are presented anonymously and submissions with identifying information that are private communications are either anonymized or excluded to avoid unpleasantness.

We take aim at our fellow GEM professionals and their humorous interactions with staff and students!

Please continue to send us some of your humorous moments. While keeping up to date with the latest technologies, working your way down the enrollment funnel, after a late-night application processing session (pizza party!), we could all use a smile, help NAGAP give you a little chuckle and put a smile on our faces. Submit your comments and posts today to nagappublications@gmail.com!

“

Cutting remarks from the director of a GEM office in the mid-Atlantic region:

More money, more problems from a recruitment coordinator in the Midwest:

“Our division has a door decorating contest for the holidays. My Dean (my boss) is a talented glass cutter. He started designing his glass door insert as a glass-cut Grinch design. I walk in and exclaim “This is SO you!” followed by “I mean, the glass-cutting, not the Grinch” by that time it was too late. He’s made fun of me for a week now.”

“A few weeks ago I received an email from a student with “gimmee that fee waiver” as the only wording. No caps, no punctuation, no salutation or sign-off. My recruiting email was sent to students who are applying to graduate school for their doctorate degree… and the email was for applicants interested in a prestigious doctoral fellowship. Needless to say, I was a bit confused!”

Have you heard something you want to share?

Send it to nagappublications@gmail.com for our next issue!

40

S P R I N G

2 0 1 9

•

P E R S P E C T I V E S

N

A

” G

A

P