Recruiting Intelligence

To our colleagues and friends, we'd like to wish you a very happy holiday season. We hope that the coming weeks will bring you time for rest and reflection. We look forward to sharing fresh, exciting blogs with you in 2014. We'll be back on January 7, 2014. Until then, warmest wishes for a relaxing and enjoyable holiday season and happy 2014!

Recruiting international students is hard work. There's no doubt about it: Traveling internationally, meeting students and parents over the span of back-to-back (to-back-to-back) 12, 14 or 16 hour days, all while keeping up with home office responsibilities. Thank goodness the rewards are great. Well, the personal rewards are great, that's why we are in this line of work. But what about the organizational rewards. How are we doing there?

If you are reading this, chances are you have a vested interest in higher education. You believe strongly in the importance of education for all people, all ages, all backgrounds and ethnicities. Lately the media and many authors have focused on the demise of higher education, the unnecessary time and money spent in receiving an education, and the overall downfall of higher education. While we believe that higher education administrators will find ways to improve the current state of higher education in the US, we also believe in the fundamental importance of higher education. We're going to take on that negativity with something positive-- we want to show why education matters.

Every month the 2nd and 4th Thursdays will be devoted to highlighting our library of podcasts. We believe stongly that information can be conveyed in a number of ways. We hope that you will continue to read our blog and also take advantage of the opportunity to listen to our podcasts at your desk, the gym or during your commute. Through 20-30 minute podcasts we hope to introduce our readers/listeners to a variety of compelling topics related to international higher education. We hope you enjoy our podcasts and, as always, we welcome your feedback.

Where were you during the Great MOOC Panic of 2012?

The definite answer is maybe. Commission-based student recruiters are not a panacea. They require support, monitoring and consistent attention to deliver results. 

Will the use of commission-based recruitment by U.S. higher education grow dramatically in the near future? We are wondering this, of course in part, because of the decision by NACAC to tolerate the use of commission-based recruitment by their members. Universities may feel less constraint to admit that they are using agents and encouraged to add this recruitment channel. Furthermore, more universities are increasing their emphasis on international enrollment as an additional revenue source. And yes, everybody is looking to diversify their student body as well.