How to Nail Re-enrollment Every Time

So many factors determine the success of your re-enrollment process:

• How do current families feel about their child’s experience?
• Are your teachers and program meeting student and parent expectations?
• What is the forecast for prospective student admission?

Answering questions like these give you a sense of how many seats you have to fill, which families will be signing their re-enrollment contract for next year, and who might be looking elsewhere.

Let’s explore four common reasons private school families decide to look elsewhere.

Reasons that Private School Families Don't Re-enroll

1. It’s the Economy

No matter how well a school is serving its students, it can be hard to outperform a challenging economy. Economic downturns or personal financial challenges can make the cost of private school tuition difficult to manage, leading parents to seek more affordable options.

A study conducted by NAIS indicated that more parents than ever feel “stressed” about paying tuition, while the number of parents who feel “satisfied” has fallen by 10 percent in the last decade. Other emotions commonly expressed by parents include “overwhelmed” and “worried.”

On the bright side, research indicates that when parents are satisfied, they will endeavor to make sacrifices and prioritize private education. The current economic climate doesn’t bode well for private-independent schools. With that said, this finding reinforces the need to understand how families feel about your program.

2. Educational ROI

You’ve promised innovative programs, dedicated faculty, and acceptance into the best-fit colleges or secondary schools. What happens if student outcomes don’t match parent expectations? Whether dissatisfaction is based on perception or reality, the decision to stay or go can hinge on what families see as a return on their significant educational investment.

3. Failure to Thrive 

Parents invest in private schools to provide the very best for their children — academically, socially, and emotionally. Students don’t always find the right-fit experience. They might struggle to make friends or find the academic program doesn’t suit their learning style. Maybe the success a student found in the lower school hasn’t translated to the upper grades. Bottom line: When a child experiences problems, families will look elsewhere for solutions.

4. Service with a Smile

Educators often reject the idea that their school is a business; they don’t want to see enrollment as a transaction, or think of their families as customers. But no matter what name you give it, the “customer service” experience often drives a parent’s perception of their child’s school.

When school officials are hard to reach, tuition payments are a headache to make, or a website yields more questions than answers, parents might seek a school they think will make their lives easier.

How will you know what’s in store when it’s time for parents to sign on for another year?

Don’t Just Guess; KNOW.

A comprehensive enrollment management strategy requires more than anecdotal feedback; you need to arm yourself with as much information as possible. Feedback from teachers, social media buzz, and everyday interactions with students and parents can provide some of this critical data.

However, effective planning requires more than anecdotal evidence. Good leadership demands access to what parents and students are thinking and saying — not just to you, but about you — at drop-off and pick-up, in the bleachers at meets and games, and around their own kitchen tables.

Surveys are a reliable, data-driven way to understand what’s on the minds of those in your community, and it’s worth enlisting a third-party expert to handle this potentially sensitive process.

Are independent surveys worth the investment of time and money they require? Do you need to go outside your own team to gather the information you need? Here’s why our experts say utilizing an established, external team to facilitate the survey process is an investment worth making.

No Names, Please

I have great relationships with the families in my community, you might be saying. If they have concerns, believe me! They’ll say so.

Not always. In visiting and working with schools, we continue to hear stories about surveys gone wrong. Many of these issues stem from designing surveys “in-house.” In-house surveys can be fine for brief, targeted polls about specific initiatives, but surveys aimed at collecting more comprehensive data from entire sectors of the community require greater caution.

Parents may feel that voicing their concerns aloud might jeopardize their child’s position at school or even single out their family as a squeaky wheel that’s not worth the grease. YOU know that your faculty values parent feedback and is committed to treating all students with respect and care. But parents might worry that, at best, their criticism won’t be taken constructively, and at worst, it will be turned against them.

Independent surveys give parents the comfort of anonymity. By separating your faculty and yourself from the process, you demonstrate your openness to feedback, trust in your community, and confidence in the process.

You’re also maintaining the day-to-day, offline communication channels that parents and teachers rely upon. Whatever challenges and solutions teachers are already working on with parents and students won’t be disrupted, while parents will still have the opportunity to offer feedback more formally.

Trust the Experts

Popular tools like Survey Monkey and Google Forms might tempt some to solicit feedback on their own. But there is more to an effective survey than a list of questions and easy-to-use interface.

From ISM’s Ideas & Perspectives: "In visiting and working with schools, we continue to hear stories about surveys gone wrong. … In-house surveys can be fine for brief, targeted polls about specific initiatives, but surveys aimed at collecting more comprehensive data from entire sectors of the community require greater caution."

Working with experts ensures that you’re asking the right questions — in the right way — and receiving feedback that is both helpful and actionable.

Measuring Up

Most surveys, even those you might conduct on your own, will give you information about your own community. When you work with third-party experts like the ISM Surveys team, you’re also learning how your results stack up against other private-independent schools. This allows you to make more strategic decisions and prioritize issues more effectively.

• Benchmarks – see where you stack up.
• Survey results delivered efficiently and with clarity.
• Net Promoter Score question at the end of any survey to understand satisfaction and loyalty.

News You Can Use

Once you’ve asked the questions and gathered the answers, then what? The process of compiling, synthesizing, and evaluating survey results can be time-consuming and complicated. Outsourcing this process gives you access to valuable information faster without sacrificing your team’s time and resources.

With ISM Surveys, you’ll receive comprehensive reports and practical recommendations fast. We utilize the Net Promoter Score question on every survey, which provides a real understanding of your community’s satisfaction with their experience and loyalty to your school.

We Have a Plan for That

For every big decision you need to make as a school leader, ISM Surveys offers a comprehensive survey that can be customized to fit your school’s needs. It all depends on the information you’re looking for.

• Parent and Student Satisfaction surveys identify strengths and areas for improvement in your program
• Faculty-oriented surveys help you understand how teachers and staff feel about their work, how you can enhance the faculty culture, and where you might need to anticipate staff turnover
• Surveying alumni can tell you a lot about how your school prepared graduates for future success (and how likely they might be to give back philanthropically).
• Applicant and Attrition surveys might explain why some families did not choose to enroll, or why they chose to leave
• Board and Executive Leadership surveys delve into a critical aspect of school life that your constituents might be hesitant to share: how you and your fellow leaders are delivering on the promises you’ve made.

The prospect of asking for feedback can be intimidating and — let’s face it — receiving that feedback isn’t always pleasant. But during re-enrollment, and throughout the year, knowing the good and the bad by the numbers allows you to proceed strategically with confidence and data.