In stark contrast to prevailing trends in higher education, colleges and universities have or are boosting their enrollment, retention, and graduation rates by improving their students’ sense of belonging, student support services, student-faculty relationships, and career readiness programs.

In this podcast, Dr. Drumm McNaughton explores how higher ed leaders can follow these actionable steps with CEO Elliot Felix of Brightspot Strategy, a consultancy focusing on attracting and retaining students. Elliot shares these impressive findings based on his experiences with the 110 schools he’s partnered with over the last 12 years. These experiences and national research studies revealed that students who feel like they belong on campus are about 40% more likely to continue after their freshmen year. Additionally, students who had an encouraging mentor or participated in an internship are twice as likely to find meaningful, engaging work after graduation. They believe that college is worth the cost.

#HigherEdEnrollment #StudentSupport #HigherEdPodcast

Podcast Highlights

• To understand the importance of a student’s sense of belonging, higher ed leaders are encouraged to read Dr. Terrell Strayhorn’s book College Students’ Sense of Belonging. This book posits that if students feel they matter, are cared for, and are a part of something, their experiences will reinforce their experiences positively.
• Higher ed can instill a sense of belonging in students through spaces. Take a multifaceted approach by creating identity and affinity centers for underserved communities such as LGBTQ+, first-gen, student veterans, and parents. Also important are common spaces like student unions, libraries, and their events and programs, like student support organizations, and peer-to-peer relationships and service delivery.
• Colleges and universities already offer student support, but students and parents either aren’t aware of them, aren’t comfortable using them, or these programs are offered at the wrong time. Higher ed institutions need to find ways to integrate this support and make it more visible, accessible, and normalized.
• Connect career readiness opportunities to coursework. Notable examples include Johns Hopkins’ Imagine Center, where career planning, life design, academic planning, and academic advising are all integrated into one place. At CUNY, Guttman Community College’s “Ethnographies of Work” class has students shadow employees. Tulane, Stanford, and ASU also have offerings in life design.
• Provide digital and in-person support in an integrated, coordinated way through one-stop shops, for example. Create spaces that connect separated programs and services.

 

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  Our Podcast Guest: Elliot Felix

Elliot Felix is an author, speaker, teacher, father, and consultant to more than a hundred colleges and universities. He uses his background in design to make college work for all students by improving the spaces they learn and live in, the support services they rely on, and the technology they use.

Over the last 20 years, he has spoken at SxSW Edu, taught courses on innovation, and worked with top universities like Carnegie Mellon, MIT, NYU, NC State, and the University of Virginia. Brightspot Strategy, the education consulting company he founded in 2011, was acquired by Buro Happold in 2020 and has improved the experience of more than 1,000,000 students.

You can find his work in Fast Company, Forbes, and The Chronicle of Higher Education. His book How to Get the Most Out of College was published in January 2022 by Alinea Learning. He lives in Minneapolis with his son Theo, daughter Nora, and wife Liz.

Link to Transcript

About the Host

Dr. Drumm McNaughton, host and consultant to higher ed institutions. To learn more about his services and other thought leadership pieces, visit his firm’s website, https://changinghighered.com/.

The Change Leader’s Social Media Links

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drdrumm/
• Twitter: @thechangeldr
• Email: [email protected]