When the national averages for freshman retention rates at public schools sits around 64 percent and private schools hover around 70 percent, there's clearly room for improvement in ensuring students return to campus the following fall. Of course, students and parents seem especially clued in to retention rates, as no one wants to get settled […]
Free community college spreads: New York introduced its Excelsior scholarship for students from families with income less than $100,000. The challenges of free tuition also became apparent, as Oregon and other states grappled with fewer budget dollars than needed to accept every applicant. Greek life endangered?: The true worth of fraternities and sororities was scrutinized […]
Admissions, enrollment, marketing, retention and financial aid administrators surveyed generally have a sunny outlook about the student population in 2018—with 62 percent anticipating an enrollment increase. International student enrollment is in a less positive place, however, with only about one-quarter of the 92 respondents expecting an increase this year. Regarding the online student population, 47 […]
A new 656-bed, five-story building offering Wi-Fi access and HD cable now stands near the center of Boise State's campus in Idaho. The 236,000-square-foot facility serves as a residence hall for first-year students and as a space for honor students—with classrooms, study lounges, honors department offices and dining facilities. CHALLENGE: The university needed additional housing […]
Higher ed leaders love an opportunity to tout the beauty of their campuses, and continuous construction gives them a lot to talk about. One-third of the 72 presidents, chancellors and provosts surveyed by UB named capital projects as one of their institution's biggest priorities for 2018. At nearly half of their campuses, ground will break […]
What deep currents will shape this new year for higher ed digital marketers and communicators? I've tried to answer this question every January for the past few years, and it doesn't get easier. Change is the only constant. While we can't see the future, we can keep an eye on digital marketing trends to help […]
Samuel Merritt University in Oakland, California, needs more space. Students learn in makeshift classrooms at a local medical center and lack a campus to call their own. Instead of building one, officials came up with a new solution to meet the institution's needs: Share a campus with another college in Oakland. This fall, Samuel Merritt […]
Clouds that emerged throughout 2017 are hanging over the heads of campus administrators, posing potentially huge impacts to higher ed as a whole. Just a few of the significant national developments include: the proposed $9 billion in cuts to the U.S. Department of Education for fiscal year 2018—which if implemented will affect Stafford Loan financing, […]
In the fall of 2015, Muhlenberg College President John Williams asked if I would teach a copyright law course to interested undergraduate students. While at Harvard Law School, he and his wife Diane had taken an online course titled CopyrightX, the brainchild of Harvard professor Terry Fisher. President Williams was very excited about the course, […]
There's no question that recent graduates are leaving college with more student loan debt. More students are taking out loans and they're borrowing larger amounts. But apocryphal stories about students owing $100,000 or more coming out of college don't represent the reality for most borrowers. In 2015, roughly two-thirds of student loan balances were $25,000 […]
