As the school year begins, teachers are excited, students are giddy, and everyone is looking to the year ahead. But what about the marketing department? The enrollment team? Based on our research, we have learned that this time of year is perfect to start recruiting students for the next school year.
The school year that is 12 months away? Yes.
Today we are sharing our top 3 tips for implementing a year-round enrollment strategy.
1. Engage Parents
Our experience has shown that the most influential tool in student recruitment is parent engagement. Using our grassroots approach to student recruitment, parents are engaged through door knocking, working events, and more. Utilizing motivated and knowledgeable parents is an imperative key to success. Typically, when we run a campaign, we begin training parents for recruitment in September and October to put everything into action starting in November. Then the recruitment campaign will run from November all of the way until the start of the next school year. We know that may seem like a long time, but your competition is recruiting year-round so we want you to compete back.
2. Keep It Simple
We have a rule here at Caissa: remove barriers to enrollment. We have seen parents decide to attend a school district but give-up during the registration process because it requires answering 7,589 questions on the enrollment form or the hours the school is open for enrollment are only during the workday.
We suggest that the district evaluates its enrollment process to remove as many barriers as possible. The more convenient it is for parents to enroll, the better. Make the entire process as easy as possible from beginning-to-end. The more you can do and the less you require parents to do, the better.
If you are interested in an enrollment evaluation for your district, please email us here.
3. Utilize Continuous Enrollment
The massive amount of school choice is hurting school districts across the country. Continuous enrollment is a system wherein your current students are automatically re-enrolled for the upcoming school year.By automatically re-enrolling students, you make the choice easier for parents and increase your student retention rates.
Continuous Enrollment simplifies enrollment for returning students, reduces the workload of school administrators, and allows for better use of the school’s time, resources, and marketing budget.
Now is the time to start establishing your plan to recruit students for next year.
If you want to learn more about our student recruitment services, click the button below.