Five Reasons to be Wary of Playing the Enrollment Game

Colleges are under increasing pressures to fill seats in their freshman class to balance their budgets. Many institutions had to boost their marketing efforts and tuition discounts to meet their enrollment goals even when the number of high school graduates was still going up. With both demographic and economic trends now running against them, there are serious risks in trying to meet these challenges by just stepping on the gas of the traditional enrollment management engine.

#1: Those new students may not be there

Everybody is chasing “out of state” students – whether that means from another state in the US or from other countries (primarily China). The University of Iowa provided a recent example of this trend when they announced a 5 year goal of recruiting 4,000 new students. The number of high school graduates is declining nationally; and in those states where it is growing, the growth is not in student populations that are likely to enroll or pay the level of tuition needed. The enrollment growth strategy can work for only a minority of institutions. Is your college ready to win that competition?

#2: Shifting composition of student populations has implications

Enrolling whatever students you can find is likely to have unexpected educational or political implications. International students pose different language and cultural challenges that play out in the classroom. And public universities may face even tougher home state political, budgetary and other challenges if they dramatically increase the percentage of students from outside of the state. Purdue hit 48% out of state and Indiana-Bloomington is above 43% and is drawing legislative concern.

#3: More competitive institutions may be coming after your students

Your plans for enrolling students from new places will face stiff competition. Stanford is talking about an undergraduate enrollment increase that could be as high as 25%. Yale will grow by 800 students and, as mentioned above, Iowa (a top public research university) is looking to expand by 4,000 students. In a declining enrollment market, these new students will be taken away from other colleges. This could have a cascading effect as each tier of competitiveness takes students away from institutions just below them – so the plans at elite institutions can trigger a chain reaction that ultimately affects everyone.

#4: Students and parents may get admission competition fatigue

The competition for students (and the parallel student competition for colleges) could reach a breaking point in terms of student and parent fatigue over what is increasingly looking like a game. A cluster of recent articles show signs that this is becoming a hot topic. Frank Bruni writes about the drive to increase applications for competitiveness rankings. Kevin Carey crunches the numbers that expose the hyper-competitive bubble around elite institutions as something of a mirage – unless you’re one of those who think that your life was ruined by having to go to Amherst after getting rejected by Harvard. And the story behind start up College Abacus rips some of the veils off tuition discounting and the fear of transparency.

#5: Does all of this really fit your distinctive mission as an educational institution?

Don’t get me wrong – enrollment management is a critical ingredient in creating a successful campus and learning environment. But it can’t be just about filling the seats and meeting the tuition goals. Are you recruiting and admitting students who are good fit for your campus and your mission? Do you want to be known for great enrollment marketing materials and savvy tuition discounting, or for the lifelong value of the educational opportunities you create? Many of these strategies work. But you can stretch them to the breaking point both in terms of bottom line results and your reputation among possible future students.

Many colleges are facing the toughest enrollment and budgetary challenges in many, many years. The continuing value of higher education will create pathways to success in this challenging environment. But that value is not enhanced for institutions if prospective students think this is all just a game.