By Kimberly McNair, EdD, Associate Senior Vice President for Strategic Enrollment Management, Montgomery College, Live from SEM 2024
If you are experiencing "initiative fatigue," perhaps you can utilize the influence of your SEM champions to optimize the work already in progress on your campus. Dr. Keambra Pierson and Beth LaForest of Schoolcraft College, a community college in Michigan, shared how their institution leveraged its champions during a session at the 2024 SEM Conference in Boston. The framework used to combat initiative fatigue, ensure strategic alignment, reduce redundancies, and encourage communication and collaboration also helped highlight and acknowledge the good work already being done. You’ll find the process and takeaways from the session “Utilizing Existing Initiatives for Dynamic SEM: Schoolcraft College's Journey” outlined below.
The Inventory, Teams, and Themes
Schoolcraft conducted an inventory from more than 80 submissions of initiatives to identify existing campus initiatives to support strategic enrollment management efforts. They created a core team, a consistent set of questions to ask about the initiatives, and a scoring rubric. Results from the inventory were compiled and then scored using a rubric to help narrow down the submissions received. The team looked at factors such as whether or not the initiative was student-centered, if it was innovative, if it could be validated and supported by data, if it was scalable, if it was sustainable, and if it was cross-functional.
Of the more than 80 submissions of initiatives, approximately 20 were selected and organized according to the following themes:
Academic programming and design
Recruitment, marketing, and outreach
Addressing financial need
Academic success, momentum, and goal completion
Student experience and wellbeing
The Role of SEM Core Team and Champions
Schoolcraft narrowed the initiatives down to a finalized set of 14 strategies and tactics once they were organized according to the above themes. The SEM champions served as project managers of the 14 strategies and tactics, responsible for developing an action plan, identifying the timeline, cross-functional team members, resources/costs, estimated enrollment impact, and metrics.
The SEM core team leads supported project leads and team members through the action planning process and beyond. Research team members participated in data workshops to understand data, metrics, and how to access and utilize various databases. Team leads were positioned as such, providing updates and other information to the college community. The community stayed informed and engaged through regular workshops and other events.
The Takeaways
- The framework provided message consistency and assisted in the decision that Schoolcraft should support and fully explore initiatives for at least three years.
- The core team also engaged in discussions and reflection around the idea of project completion. Schoolcraft decided its enrollment management projects would not be complete until:
- the work is institutionalized and part of someone’s job, or
- it’s not working, not showing an impact, with a decision to redirect resources
The presenters noted that this framework is beneficial for getting people involved, aligning the work already happening at the institution, and facilitating program review and accreditation, in addition to increasing collaboration and employee engagement.