Strategic Enrollment Management Planning

What is strategic enrollment management planning?

Strategic enrollment management planning is an institution’s efforts to identify, recruit, enroll, retain, and graduate a student body in accordance with an institution’s mission and goals while also maintaining fiscal sustainability.

Although it is often thought of as undergraduate-focused, graduate strategic enrollment management planning has recently grown in prominence.

Why do strategic enrollment management planning?

As US higher education has had to rely more on tuition for revenue, enrollment management practices have become more critical to institutional sustainability. Strategic enrollment management planning grounds enrollment management in a college’s or university’s mission and strategic plan, along with trends in the broader environment.

Why is integrated planning important for strategic enrollment management planning?

Since it focuses on the student experience from recruitment through graduation, the strategic enrollment management plan needs to be informed by multiple plans (strategic plan, academic plan, diversity and inclusion plan, etc.) on campus while also informing others (budget, campus plans, student affairs). Integrated planning connects strategic enrollment management planning to these efforts.

Who does strategic enrollment management planning?

Strategic enrollment management planning is often conducted by an office of enrollment management or an office of admissions. Many institutions contract with consultants to provide expertise in this process.

Departments which may contribute data or expertise to the planning process include:

• Admissions
• Financial aid
• Marketing
• Finance
• Institutional research
• Academic advising
• Career counseling

When is strategic enrollment management planning done?

Strategic enrollment management planning is an ongoing activity, though it is cyclical. Depending on the institution, the timing of strategic enrollment management is related to:

• Institutional admissions deadlines
• Financial aid deadlines
• Institutional financial planning milestones
• State higher education appropriations

How is strategic enrollment management planning done?

Strategic enrollment management planning examines broad environmental trends and analyzes how these trends affect the larger pool of students capable of applying to a college or university. It then determines goals for the student body, and collaborates on campus-wide efforts to ensure these goals align with efforts in marketing, recruitment, admission, tuition setting, financial aid, academics, and student success programming.

During strategic enrollment management planning, the planning team will gather data from stakeholder departments and review strategic needs. Then models are created that show the different possible scenarios towards which an institution’s admissions and financial aid departments could strive and how student success programs will need to align with the hopeful new student base.

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