Enhance Student Experience Enhance Student Success

Transcription

1 Enhance Student Experience Enhance Student Success

2 The Student Experience What does the average student experience when trying to apply and enroll at your institution? Is the application process student friendly? How quickly are student applications processed? Are students forced to stand in line or wait for long periods of time to meet with counselors/advisors? How quickly are calls answered? How many callers hang up before getting to speak to someone? Does your college track this and report? If a call center is present, can the call center team answer all questions or are calls transferred?

3 Why It Matters? Improving the customer service experience for students can remove unnecessary roadblocks that negatively impact success. Long lines Hold times/busy signals Unnecessarily burdensome processes The process of enrolling in college can be frustrating and intimidating for students especially non-traditional, first generation and under served students.

4 Improving Customer Service Student affairs leaders are increasingly examining the quality of customer service to help improve service to all students but particularly at-risk students. Areas of emphasis include: response times for admission applications and financial aid awards wait times for in person counseling speed and quality of call support services

5 The Multi-Campus Environment Q: How do you effectively monitor, control and improve the student experience at a multi-campus institution or system? A: Create a centralized or shared services environment

6 Benefits Standardization Quality control and compliance Change management Staff alignment Productivity and efficiency

7 Tarrant County College District

8 School Fast Facts 5 campuses + TCC Connect virtual campus 7 transfer degrees; 70 Associate of Applied Science degrees; and nearly 130 certificates of completion Fall 2014 credit students 50,628 Fall 2014 average age 25.7 In FA award year 36,317 enrolled students submitted a Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) 27,249 enrolled students received $118, of financial aid

9 TCC Financial Aid - Before 5-6 financial aid staff at each campus; 12 financial aid staff at district office Verification processing was centralized at district office 17,000 files verified each year Financial aid calls were handled by the campuses 65,000 calls answered each year TCC financial Pell grant student ratio to FA staff was significantly higher than similar community colleges TCC FA was very lean

10 TCC Financial Aid - Before Pros Everything is handled internally, no middle person Good systems and processes that were working well Cons Verification processing volume was difficult to manage during peak times Call volume was also unmanageable during peak times Staff were stretched thin

11 The Process of Change Busy summer/peak processing season, feedback from students and encouragement from chancellor led TCC to consider outsourcing verification and call center Internal committee formed to assess current model and consider alternative processing models TCC was looking for a way to offer more face-to-face, on campus support for students TCC compared current FA processing model to other, similar community colleges

12 The Process of Change Centralization Review Process Focus on financial aid department Assessed current processing model, considered alternatives and conducted a RFP over several month period Internal financial aid staff resources used to complete the review and select the vendor District FA and campus FA operational processes were considered in this process Edfinancial was selected as our 3 rd party partner to answer FA calls and process FA verification Experience, brick & mortar facility, background and price were all important factors Budget constraints and a phased-in implementation plan limited the 3 rd party support to FA calls and FA verification

13 New Service and Support Model Benefits Call volume capacity increased dramatically Call abandon rates reduced dramatically More FA calls are successfully handled FA verification and call center training have been streamlined FA verification processing turnaround time reduced to 1-2 days - which is very popular with students

14 New Service and Support Model Enhancement Student Service Enhancement 5 district FA staff were moved to TCC s 5 campuses to conduct: FA outreach & awareness Host workshops Assist with academic success plans Support FA applicants throughout the FA application process Initial Results Total visits & calls received by TCC financial aid Total phone calls answered by TCC financial aid 1 st two weeks of spring visits/calls Spring 2013 (Before Edfinancial) Spring 2014 (With Edfinancial) 14,673 8,719 4,

15 New Service and Support Model Results More Results Achieved More face to face time with students Better customer service structure Staff has more time to assist students with other FA requests Edfinancial Handled the Following Verification & Call Volume in Two Summers

16 How It Looks Today Staff morale has improved, due to less stressful peak processing seasons Campus staff are able to spend more face to face time with students District staff work closely with Edfinancial Calls are answered in a timely manner and verification processing is completed in a timely manner Students are more satisfied

17 Lessons Learned Continuous cross-training is important Constant communication is important - outsourcing partner is an extension of your team Budgets can become a challenge No phone calls make a huge difference Outsourcing makes it easier to absorb staff turnover with less impact to student

18 Hillsborough Community College

19 About HCC Located in Tampa, Florida President, Dr. Ken Atwater 47,000 students 5 campuses and three centers 7 th largest school in Florida College System $220 million annual budget 2,500 employees $1.1 billion economic impact to Hillsborough County

20 Before Centralization Five campuses = five processing centers for financial aid, admissions, registration, records and veteran affairs Scary at times

21 Before Centralization Benefits Local control by staff on each campus Deficits Lack of college-wide consistency Campus individually created multiple systems Idiosyncratic Processes suffered / customer service suffered Vicious cycle (serving two masters) State and Federal compliance challenges

22 Process of Change Standardization The First Step FA verification FA loan certification Outsourced call center Results Limited improvement Illustrated need for CENTRALIZATION of processes and staff

23 Centralization Process Identified specific college functions to centralize Reviewed and modified staff positions and job descriptions Identified a centralized location for all centralized student services functions Identified technology and equipment needs

24 Centralization Process Created better relationships between enrollment services, financial aid, institutional technology and finance Identified channels of communications Determined staffing patterns needed for centralization and campus functions Identified staff training/development needs Developed a process to reassign staff to the centralized enrollment processing center

25 Blueprint to Improve the Student Experience Conceptual Model College President VP of SSEM Campus President Disabilities Support Services New Student Orientation* Academic Advising* Disabilities Support Services International Education Veteran Student Affairs Judicial Affairs Student Development Counseling* Registrar Enrollment Services Recruitment Career Counseling* Student Activities * Registration TRIO Testing* Athletics* Admissions Financial Aid * Note: Each Student Services Dean assigned an area for college-wide responsibility

26 Phase 1: Financial Aid and Call Center College established a district processing center for student services Financial aid was the guinea pig first to centralize Students Awarded by First Day of Class Data Academic Year (AY) AY AY AY Three Year % increase 9,188 16,555 17,447 47%

27 Phase 1: Financial Aid and Call Center Award Year # Students Awarded Amount Awarded $ On Campus Visits Average Wait Times ,188 60mins , ,091,290 9,926 23mins , ,701,209 8,689 18mins , ,653,642 6,701 25mins , ,425,133 3,273 15mins Numbers of awarded students increased while number of campus visits and average wait times decreased.

28 Call Center Originally, each campus and the district office handled all calls Call center centralized calls for financial aid, admissions, and other student services W/IT and LMS help desk Results: Using external vendor, HCC handled over 220,000 calls in year one

29 Phase 2: Admission, Records & Registrar Centralized admissions processing ARR (Admission, Records and Registration) Results Faster processing of applicants earlier in the peak admission/registration period

30 Phase 2: Admission, Records & Registration Students Admitted by Mid-July 2015 FALL 2014 FALL 2013 FALL 12,246 11,981 12,085 Still a work in progress New process was less than a year old Expectation is 1,000 more applications a year processed by mid-july

31 Phase 2: Veterans Affairs Centralized veteran affairs certification Results Improved certification process with consistency throughout the college campus

32 Overall Benefits Better data generation More consistency throughout the college Increased State and Federal compliance Increased productivity Flexibility of staff resources Enhanced customer services to students

33 Lessons Learned Centralization helps to promote a one college concept for multi-campus colleges Centralizing back office operations improves customer service on the front lines Effective leadership is important Maintaining good internal and external relationships is important for communications

34 Contact Information Dr. Kenneth Ray, Jr. Vice President Student Affairs Hillsborough Community College Phone: David Ximenez Associate Vice Chancellor Tarrant County College District Phone: Judith B. Witherspoon Senior Vice President Edfinancial Services