Welcome to the Admission Office, Dear Reader! Whether you’re new to the office in general or simply new to the school, we’re sure you have some first-month jitters to work out. WIth that in mind, we have a few words of wisdom to share from our Consultants and your fellow Admission Officers.
- Get to know your community! You’ll be working a lot with your school’s families (your “school ambassadors”) and others in the broader neighborhood. Turn that faceless crowd into familiar faces by attending as many school events as possible in your first year. Even if it’s not an event coordinated by the Admission Office, experiencing your school’s culture through student concerts or sporting events will enable you to become more familiar with your school—and thus better able to describe it to future parents—and let the school become more familiar with you.
- Buy some work clothes in your school’s colors. It doesn’t have to be adorned with your school’s mascot or seal, but having work-appropriate attire in the school colors can boost your sense of belonging to your new school family and look sharp when offering tours to prospective students.
- Meet everyone involved in the admission process. This includes those on the admission selection committee and teachers who do the student interviews. Offer to treat them to lunch one day and pick their brains about previous admission seasons. That way, when spring crunch time comes, you know how they operate and can integrate into the process in a seamless, painless transition.
- Bookmark innovative new ideas and processes (but proceed with caution). One of the quickest ways to alienate any office is to completely revamp established systems without trying out the current methods first. (Those current methods might even work better than your potential suggestions.) Unless otherwise encouraged by your School Head, it’s probably best to take mental notes of hangups in the process and possible solutions to implement in the next year—or if asked directly for suggestions!
- Keep a stash of caffeine and headache medication on hand at all times. Burning the midnight oil for weekend events or late application reading is not unheard of, and coffee or tea are your best friends.
- Plan your professional development now. It seems odd to be thinking about classes or coursework when you’ve barely arrived in the office, but there are so many odds and ends that only fellow Admission Officers can relate to—and reading tips off the Internet can only get you so far (no matter how excellent ours are!). By broaching the topic of PD during budget discussions, you show that you’re dedicated to learning how to do the best job that you can, and you have a better chance of funds being set aside for continuing education now than scrambling at the end of the school year for the “unused” money buckets.
Additional ISM resources:
ISM Monthly Update for Admission Officers Vol. 13 No. 5 Top Ten Admission Articles of 2014
ISM Monthly Update for Admission Officers Vol. 12 No. 6 Admission and Development Go Hand in Hand
Additional ISM resources for Gold Consortium members:
I&P Vol. 30 No. 13 The Comprehensive Admission Model
