Memo To:
The Campus Community
From:
Darren Johnson, Assistant Dean of Planning, Accountability and Advancement
Date:
9/9/2011
Re:
Communications Strategies and Updates for 2011-12
Please note: This memo was aimed to be sent before September 1 with implementation of these initiatives set for the start of classes and training provided during Faculty Institute Week and Student Orientation. As Hurricane Irene rolled in, we decided to postpone these initiatives to provide continuity during a critical time. With Information Technology, we will set up training sessions for late September and early October. Until then, we will maintain a link to the old web site home page with traditional links to services such as Angel.
Introduction As my first year here organizing the communications efforts of SCCC comes to a close, it has been my pleasure to have had such a hardworking and capable staff and the help of so many departments on campus to transition and modernize our communications efforts. This memo will highlight some of the changes coming for the 2011-12 academic year.
SCCC Student Media Use Study At Open Houses and similar Admissions events, we have been polling prospective students as to the ways in which they hear about SCCC. A trend was developing over the course of the surveys – over time, a majority of the students had heard about SCCC simply by going to sunysccc.edu, our web site. We then decided to poll our current students with four pages worth of questions, getting a very healthy response. This polling was done live, on paper, as opposed to the web, as not to skew the results away from students who may be less technologically proficient. As well, morning, afternoon and evening students were polled. We figured what communications strategies worked with this demographic would also work in efforts ranging from recruitment to retention. The results of the survey are here, http://www.sunysccc.edu/pdf/student-media-use-survey-highlights.pdf, and helped form the initiatives mentioned further in this memo. The short of it is, students have changed a lot in recent years as far as their communications preferences go, and we must change with them.
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