Office Hours With EAB

David Croom from Ascend at the Aspen Institute joins EAB’s Meacie Fairfax to dispel myths around today’s student-parents who comprise more than 20% of total undergraduate enrollment. Student-parents tend to have higher GPAs than their childless peers despite having 50% less time on average, to devote to their academics. David shares compelling success stories and recommendations on creative ways f...

Inside Higher Ed Editor Scott Jaschik highlights the news stories he believes will have an outsized impact on higher education in the months and years to come. Jaschik is joined on the podcast by Carla Hickman, whose take on these issues is informed by her role as head of EAB’s Research division. The two explore issues ranging from the massive challenges facing community colleges to the game-chang...

EAB’s Sally Amoruso hosts a conversation with outgoing UMBC President Freeman Hrabowski that traces his beginnings as an academic prodigy and participant in the 1963 “Children’s March” organized by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., to his transformational leadership at UMBC. The two discuss UMBC’s well-earned reputation for producing more African-American undergraduates who go on to earn PhDs in scienc...

EAB’s Madeleine Rhyneer and the University of Rochester's Dr. Robert Alexander explore the challenges of managing a successful team and department during a tight labor market. The two discuss the importance of building trust and promoting effective collaboration. Robert and Madeleine also reveal strategies for assessing your team’s inclination (or resistance) to adapting and embracing change to ov...

EAB’s David Bevevino and Ed Venit share results of a new poll that shows surging interest among student success leaders in applying analytics to boost retention and graduation rates. David and Ed suggest that institutions may finally be moving out of pandemic crisis mode and turning their attention to improving how they identify and communicate with students who appear to be falling off track. The...

Seramount President Subha Berry hosts a discussion on DEI and the evolving role of the Chief Diversity Officer. Subha’s guest on the program, Microsoft Chief Diversity Officer Lindsay-Rae McIntyre, shares her perspective on the renewed urgency on DEI efforts in the wake of George Floyd’s murder and the ensuing racial justice protests. Both Subha and Lindsay-Rae also offer advice to DEI leaders at...

EAB’s Brooke Thayer and Michael Fischer examine best practices emerging from the pandemic in terms of space utilization and integration of technologies that give students and campus employees the flexibility they want. Brook and Michael touch on innovations in classroom design, clever integration of new wellness spaces on campus, and the cultural change that has to happen to make campus office spa...

EAB’s Sally Amoruso is joined by Lisa Gevelber who leads Grow with Google, a $1-billion enterprise that has helped more than 70,000 students strengthen their earning potential by completing Google Career Certificates. Lisa was a featured speaker at EAB’s recent Presidential Experience Lab, an event that attracted more than 100 college and university presidents who gathered to discuss the rise of a...

EAB’s Madeleine Rhyneer and Dr. Angel Pérez, CEO of the National Association for College Admission Counseling, discuss recommended changes to admissions policies designed to improve college access. Dr. Pérez talks about his own educational journey that began in Puerto Rico and continued in one of the roughest neighborhoods in the South Bronx before a chance encounter with a high school guidance co...

EAB experts Alexa Silverman and Meacie Fairfax examine why traditional student-advising approaches and early alert systems may be perceived negatively by students of color. Meacie and Alexa offer suggestions on ways to build trust and engagement with these students early on, so they are more receptive to offers of support. The two also discuss the importance of enlisting multicultural student grou...

EAB experts Meredith McNeill and Ben Court examine recent data on K-12 learning disruptions and their impact on college readiness. The two share tips on how to prepare to serve students who may present a broader range of needs and abilities than those from years past. Meredith and Ben also discuss the data on adolescent mental health and the kinds of support today’s students will need when they ar...

EAB experts Kate Cudé and Dr. Jenna Dell discuss the recent rise and long history of student activism. They explore the power of social media to amplify student demands and offer reasons why this technology presents both challenges and opportunities for university leaders. Kate and Jenna also share strategies for advancement teams on how to approach difficult conversations with major donors when t...

EAB Experts Brett Schraeder and Sarah Le Duc provide insight into how financial aid optimization (FAO) works and how universities leverage FAO strategy to balance institutional goals. The two separate fact from fiction and explain how schools use FAO to optimize revenue from wealthier families so they can afford to be more generous in awarding financial aid to students from historically underserve...

EAB’s Madeleine Rhyneer and Lex Ruby-Howe share strategies to help admissions teams boost yield by identifying students within their admit pool who are highly likely or highly unlikely to enroll, versus those who are genuinely undecided. By leveraging simple surveys and more advanced analytics, schools can focus their resources and tailor their outreach efforts to greater effect. Madeleine and Lex...

EAB’s Meacie Fairfax and Ed Venit explore pandemic ripple effects that will continue to impact student persistence at colleges and universities for the foreseeable future. They cite studies showing that student feelings of isolation, disengagement, depression, and other mental health challenges—a growing concern for years—have all worsened during the pandemic. They also point to learning challenge...

IUPUI Chief Enrollment Officer Dr. Boyd Bradshaw joins EAB’s Owen Crean to talk about the importance of strategic enrollment management and the challenges of getting everyone on the same page within a distributed leadership structure. Dr. Bradshaw outlines the structure of a modern enrollment management program and talks about how to break down silos that can hamper recruiting efforts. Finally, he...

Rowan University has emerged as one of the fastest-growing research universities in the country with two medical schools and nearly double the total enrollment they had in 2012 when Dr. Ali Houshmand became its president. Dr. Houshmand talks with EAB’s Hersh Steinberg about the power of partnering with businesses and other institutions in ways that keep them invested in the success of your school....

EAB’s Brittany Motley and Meacie Fairfax share what they’ve learned from working with the ten schools (so far) that have signed on to EAB's Moon Shot for Equity and dedicated themselves to eliminating equity gaps by the end of this decade. We also hear from front-line staff at those institutions about how they’re integrating Moon Shot initiatives into their workflow, about challenges and unexpecte...

President Dr. Benoit-Antoine Bacon of Carleton University and Vice Provost for Diversity and Inclusion Dr. Carol Henderson of Emory University discuss how universities across Canada and the United States are reckoning with their historical ties to slavery, indigenous dispossession, and racial oppression. This discussion was excerpted from a November 2021 EAB webinar moderated by EAB’s Kurubel Bela...

Dr. Roderick Heath explains how his own experience and his study of noncognitive behaviors inform his work as Director of the African American Male Initiative at North Carolina Central University. In a conversation with EAB’s Michael Schwengel, Dr. Heath discusses how he combines data, technology, and a range of motivational tactics to engage these students and foster a sense of belonging he says...

EAB’s Sally Amoruso talks with Colorado State University President Joyce McConnell about ways to drive greater diversity in higher education leadership. McConnell traces her own journey to becoming the first woman President at CSU and shares her thoughts on effective ways of recruiting and cultivating diverse talent. Amoruso and McConnell also touch on the importance of building a culture of trust...

The typical university campus has tens or even hundreds of thousands of square feet of office space begging for a makeover. With so many campus employees working remotely, schools have a golden opportunity to transform that space with less disruption. EAB’s Elizabeth Denny and Michael Fischer offer advice to help university leaders think through their options whether they’re looking to pilot a few...

Tom Sugar is joined by University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Chancellor Mark Mone, for a look back on lessons learned during year one of EAB’s “Moon Shot for Equity.” Tom and Dr. Mone discuss the importance of going beyond articulation agreements to make it easier for students—and the credits they have earned—to transfer between schools. They also point to two important reasons so many colleges fail t...

2021 saw an infusion of much-needed federal stimulus dollars as well as record-setting endowment growth. Unfortunately, a fall enrollment dip and other cost pressures have kept most university leaders scrambling to achieve financial sustainability. EAB’s Jeff Martin and Scott Winslow review fall 2021 enrollment figures, possible opportunities for cost-cutting, as well as potential sources of reven...

Many institutions adopted test-optional admissions policies out of necessity in the early days of the pandemic. EAB’s Madeleine Rhyneer, an expert with more than 25 years of experience leading university admissions teams, says those hastily constructed policies are well-intentioned, but many are poorly defined. She and fellow EAB enrollment guru Michael Koppenheffer discuss different sides of the...