For campuses across the country, the ability to enroll and retain students is critical to the survival of the university. Even though the costs of higher education are putting a heavy financial burden on families of students, there are still high costs related to student recruitment and enrollment.

Fortunately, accurate student contact data can help universities with enrollment and retention of students. Let’s have a look at these processes to understand better how RunnerEDQ’s Clean_Student solution might help.

Student Enrollment

Higher education institutions today need to make investments in a student before they even arrive on campus. According to Ruffalo Noel Levitz 2018 Cost of Recruiting an Undergraduate report; of 126 polled institutions, the median cost for recruiting a single undergraduate was $2,357 for private institutions and $536 for public institutions. It indicates that four-year private institutions spend three times more than four-year public institutions to recruit a single student.

Unfortunately, problems arise when an institution has worked so hard to recruit students who end up dropping out. It happens if a student fails to thrive and engage in all aspects of their studies. It is up to admissions directors to figure out what types of students can succeed at their university of college. It’s also crucial for the universities and colleges to keep the data accurate and updated, as it helps them determine who their students are.

Student Retention

The key to retaining students is the recruitment of students who are a good fit for the institution. Of course, the definition of success varies from student to student and from college to college, but traditionally institutions look at metrics such as graduation rates, retention rates and the like to determine how successful their students are. Part of the problem of retention is that an institution must have an active marketing approach to attract new students, but the shine can wear off once reality strikes.

The key to identifying and attracting the right students for any institution lies in data. Naturally, colleges and universities gather plenty of data on their students. However, to use that data effectively, it has to be of top quality and accuracy. That’s where Runner EDQ software solutions might help.

Benefits of Having the Right Student Data

Our student data management integrations offer universities and colleges a great way to keep track of their prospective students. The quality data provided by Runner EDQ’s Clean_Student for prospects includes ACT, SAT and Third Party List validations, fraud detection with RBDI, as well as other useful features. Those include deduplication of existing lists, demographic data that can help institutions identify which students would be the best fit, social media updates, and Geocode locations. All this data combined can help higher education institutions cut the costs of student recruitment and retention and improve their existing systems.

It’s crucial for universities and colleges to start using student data to meet their enrollment and retention goals. Quality data helps you cut some of the cost of those processes, as well as focus your efforts on areas where they are most needed.