What comes to mind when you hear the term, “improving the student experience?”
It’s a term that gets brought up almost daily in the world of higher education—and with good reason.
Most of the time, people talk about the student experience in terms of engaging more with students, understanding what drives them, and building a program that fits their needs regarding curriculum, schedule, financial aid, and more.
So, when you hear that term, you might not intuitively think about diving into your software systems and extrapolating data as the route to becoming more student-centric, but Daphne Dor-Ner, Chief Product Officer at Portico, says that you should.
In fact, Daphne argues that technical colleges and career schools should take a more quantitative perspective toward improving their student experience.
We sat down with Daphne, who has spent her whole career helping institutions solve process and technology problems, about how technical colleges should re-think the student lifecycle. Here's what she had to say.
Q: What is the student lifecycle, and when exactly does it start?
DAPHNE:
Great question. To me, the student lifecycle actually starts before a student is thinking about any particular school.
It begins when a potential student has the idea that additional education, learning, or training will benefit their lives and their career. They understand this, and they’re ready to take action.
They’ll start with researching what types of programs are available to them; which schools offer these programs; what will be required of them in terms of time, effort, and cost; and what type of curriculum and modality will best fit their schedule and lifestyle. This is the beginning of the student lifecycle.
The student lifecycle progresses through interactions with one or more schools as they spend time on their websites, tour campuses, speak with admissions staff, and determine which program is right for them. It continues through the enrollment process, attending classes, acquiring skills, passing exams, all the way through to graduation.
In my view, it doesn’t even end there, the student lifecycle extends through job placement, career progress, and continued education.
Q: What are the common challenges you see schools face when it comes to managing the student lifecycle?
DAPHNE
The biggest challenge I see comes from limitations of the data that schools collect about students.
Most schools pride themselves on being student-centric. On the whole, career-focused institutions have made tremendous strides in improving how they track the student lifecycle.
That said, there is still room for improvement. Many of the schools I work with still have gaps in their data. Many schools don’t have the insights they need to help them make data-driven decisions for improving the student experience, increasing retention, and driving profitability. When equipped with this data, they are able to do all of these things and more.
For example, say you discover, by reviewing data, that in a key program, students tend to disengage or fall behind when they hit a particular course. Now you have an opportunity to address a retention issue in a very specific way.
Here’s another example: in reviewing your student demographic data, you may realize that many students in a particular program are parents. They have unique challenges and commitments that others might not, and now that you know, you can take steps to help them manage their schedules, workloads, and other needs.
Another data challenge I see is friction at the major points of transition along the student journey: prospect to applicant, applicant to student, student to graduate, etc.
These transitions often happen at organizational handoff points—from one internal team to another. These teams may be using different systems or software making it harder to capture a holistic view of students in your data.
READ: Why Consolidating Your Tech Stack is Key for Career Education Success
Q: What are the benefits of building a more intentional view of the student lifecycle?
DAPHNE:
Oh, that’s easy! There are so many benefits.
Creating a more personalized experience for students, who feel like you really know, understand, and care about them has all kinds of wonderful side effects for your school.
Higher retention rates. If you’re able to improve the student experience, you increase the likelihood of retaining students all the way through graduation.
Organic referrals. Satisfied students recommend your programs to friends and colleagues.
Engaged and satisfied staff. Your staff spends more time on high-leverage activities that you and they can tell matter, because you’re looking at the data.
Higher ROI and profitability for your school. Not just because of the increased retention rates, but because you’ll have a better understanding of how your school operates, what your students need, and where to invest your time and resources.
Q: Okay, you’ve convinced us. So, where should schools start with improving the student lifecycle?
DAPHNE
Great! The first step is to start collecting the data and turning it into something actionable. Don’t just look at the numbers, but look for the story the numbers are telling.
We already covered a couple of examples in this discussion: retention/drop-off rates for all of your programs and demographics of your students are two great places to start.
Look for patterns. Understand what’s happening at key points along the student journey. Get a clear picture of what kind of interactions, interventions, and supports, drive student behavior in a direction that you know leads to results—because the data tells you so.
Beyond that, look for ways that you can automate lower-leverage tasks and activities (manual data entry, sending reminders one-by-one, etc.) so that your team can focus on being more student-centric. Free up their time from busy work so they can do what they care most about: engaging with the students in a meaningful way.
Q: Where does technology fit in when it comes to managing the student lifecycle?
DAPHNE
Oh, technology is at the heart of it. It’s essential.
Think of it this way: most schools already have some version of these tools in place.
A CRM for student communications
An SIS for tracking academic progress, grades, and accumulation of skills and competencies.
Attendance tracking, whether that’s with attendance tracking software (it should be!) or on paper, student attendance is a great indicator of their level of engagement and commitment to the program.
Financial aid is a key part of the student experience. For many students, it’s how they are affording school.
I would say all of these solutions are essential, but it’s not enough to simply have each of them as a standalone tool. They work best when they are part of a unified, cohesive system that allows you to share data, communicate across platforms, and reduce manual, repetitive work.
READ: SIS Software: Expectation vs. Reality
Q: What software would you recommend for any technical schools looking to create better student experiences?
DAPHNE
I am biased of course but…Portico. There’s nothing on the market like it.
I have spent my entire career in the higher ed industry and there has never been an all-in-one tool like this. We say it all the time—it was designed for higher ed professionals, by higher ed professionals.
Not only that, but it was designed specifically with technical, career, trade, and vocational institutions in mind.
With Portico’s all-in-one solution, you can automate, organize, and streamline your processes so the people on your campus can do what’s most important: focusing on your students.
That means less attrition. Lower staff turnover. Increased collaboration. And what we all care deeply about: better student outcomes.
I recommend anyone who works in career-focused institutions to check out Portico’s suite of tools that’s built for every stage of the student lifecycle and designed to scale with your needs.
Get Started to request a demo or talk to the Portico sales team.