Recruiting Intelligence

Admissions teams are working a little harder this admissions season, thanks to a few external inputs. We’re looking at you Supreme Court and FAFSA. That’s not to mention the many conversations we know you’re having on standardized tests. Just a bit more to add to your standard workload of actually recruiting, admitting and enrolling students. So, if you’re a little (or a lot) behind on your Recruiting Intelligence reading, then this is the post for you. We’ve compiled all our top news from Q1 2024 into this one spot.  

• IMPORTANT NOTE: HAPPENING TODAY  “Shattering Accessibility Limits in Digital Learning,” a Chronicle of Higher Ed-hosted webinar. Featuring Gallaudet President Roberta Cordano and ansrsource CEO Rajiv Narayana. Register here. (All registrants will receive the recording even if they cannot attend.) 

Let’s talk international student enrollment at the upcoming AIRC Spring Symposium on April 30, 2024. This one-day event in beautiful Niagara, Canada, will explore best practices in developing, managing, assessing, and sustaining the many partnerships that are so foundational to international enrollment success. While there, be sure to attend Intead's session all about student recruitment marketing budgets – we've got some great new insights to share. Register today! 

And look for us at these other industry events coming around the bend: 

• ICEF North America in Niagara, Canada, May 1-3, 2024. 
• NAFSA 2024 Annual Conference and Expo in New Orleans, May 28-31, 2024.  

Hope to see you soon! 

ICYMI: What we were posting about this quarter:  

• STEM OPT – personal narratives and growing demand 
• LMS “learnability” – accessibility is not the same as learnability 
• Shortcut tools (AI anyone?) – how to take a template approach wisely 
• Vietnam as a top student source – and not just for US institutions 
• Budgeting framework tools – a free download to help your team plan ahead 
• Audience segmentation – why cultural nuance matters 
• Social media – a looksee into what your peers are up to online 
• And more 

 All really good stuff. Read on… 

Today, an important and fascinating aspect of how EdTech is evolving for higher ed. Little discussed, but hugely valuable to your student success efforts. We are focusing on both aspirational and pragmatic approaches to solving specific digital accessibility challenges that are likely not on your radar. 

We’ll start here: Learning Management Systems (LMS) are designed to help faculty and students connect effectively. But what happens when the vast amount of content housed on those tools is not given full accessibility considerations?  

Today’s digital classroom embraces the talents and perspectives of learners with neurodivergencies, aural impairment, visual impairment–including students who are partially or fully colorblind–and those for whom English is not their primary language, among a range of other diversities and learning differences.  

But while the online classroom roster of tools has evolved, the digital content thrown into your LMS has largely failed to keep up. In fact, our current digital content is unable to provide full access to as many as 1 in 5 students in the US. And the Department of Justice is taking notice as an increasing number of institutions are facing legal challenges to “digital accessibility.”  Non-compliance has consequences as seen in a number of significant lawsuits making headlines. 

Join This High-Value Webinar

“Shattering Accessibility Limits in Digital Learning,” a Chronicle of Higher Edhosted webinar with visionary panelists: Gallaudet University President Roberta Cordano, DREDF Senior Staff Attorney Ayesah E. Lewis, and ansrsource President and CEO Rajiv Narayana. The webinar will be moderated byReporter Kelly Field, who covers, in detail, education and disability access for the Chronicle of Higher Ed, among other media outlets.

Register HERE.  (no cost to attend and registrants will receive the recording)

Digital accessibility stopped being about just a Dark Mode toggle a long time ago, and the content passively or casually “thrown onto” your LMS by faculty with competing priorities often overlooks accessibility accommodations. The current state simply isn’t going to cut it.

Today, digital accessibility includes formatting and presenting content in a way that accommodates the vast variety of student needs. Providing alternative text for images, closed captions for videos, and text transcripts for audio content are just a few of the features that help your learners learn. 

Read on for a few valuable, actionable tips and an institutional assessment process that may help you make smart decisions and engage your colleagues … 

The future is digital. We’ve heard that in so many ways that we don’t really hear it any more.

Well, here’s a reminder: the future is digital.

We now hold so much computing power in the palm of our hand. Here’s an indicator: if you used a time machine and took one of today’s mobile devices back to 2010, just 10 years ago when the first iPad came out, and showed the development team what you could do with it, what and how you can connect with others around the world, most would be wowed.

Yet, a few would respond with, “That’s it?”

Leaders saw all of this coming and took the steps to usher it into reality.

Last week we discussed the increasing number of university and college closings. These institutions had a very hard time being even slightly nimble. Their leadership teams somehow misread economic trends and the difficulties we are all grappling with became insurmountable.

If you're seeing the warning signs we mentioned last week, our global research is a great resource to tap into and we're always here to help. This week we launched a new, highly affordable Intead Plus subscription option. Check out what the new Intead Plus Bookshelf Membership has to offer and get back to us. 

What we all need are more visionaries to help us navigate to the future. We need the folks who are thinking far ahead, envisioning future opportunities and then developing the executable plan to get us there.

Are you up for it?

Read on for some tips on maintaining a future focus for long-term growth.

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Last February, we talked about the intense and growing competition within the EdTech industry and new ways of delivering educational content, like the immersive learning experiences of augmented reality and virtual reality. These simulative experiences as of 2017 garnered $3.1 billion in investments, and those numbers are set to grow.

You know by now that digital marketing and student recruitment go hand-in-hand. And as those industry tech terms and acronyms get thrown around at meetings, it helps to be in the know. Here's a useful primer to keep you in the loop when everyone starts talking alphabet soup.

“Make learning more affordable and effective (and perhaps addictive) – Learn until you understand, not fail.”   Most of us involved in education, would generally agree with such overarching goals, right?

How do we achieve these goals? Ryan Craig answers this question in the forthcoming book College Disrupted (March 2015). We will summarize the the themes of this book here.