TBR Strategic Enrollment Management

What is Strategic Enrollment Management?

Strategic Enrollment Management (SEM) is the concept and process that enables the fulfillment of institutional mission and students' education goals. SEM represents a system-wide effort, guided by the colleges' mission, vision and strategic priorities to achieve instituiton specific goals for enrollment, persistence, retention and graduation. Our Strategic Enrollment Management (SEM) goal is to create a strong and growing pipeline of students enrolling in the institution that are served seamlessly en route to achieving their education and career goals. To achieve our goal, we TBR partners with Achieving the Dream (ATD) to identify emerging needs and ways to improve practices across the full spectrum of capacities required for whole-college reform.

TBR expectations for the SEM planning process include:

• institutions identify external competition and labor market demands to identify marketing, recruitment, and retention strategies;
• institutions share clear communication plans for the recruitment and onboarding processes which can then be shared with third parties working in the state to ensure seamlessness in messaging to students
• institutions identify recruitment goals that can be used for benchmarking and accountability
• institutions identify recruitment goals to address equity issues
• institutions identify goals, strategies, and tactics in recruitment and retention practices (which may use your existing ATD goals or include a revisioning of next steps where there are gaps)
• institutions identify where System level support for recruitment and retention is still needed

Community College SEM Planning & Implementation Timeline

Each of the 13 community colleges had SEM/ATD planning teams worked with a consultant during the 2019-2020 academic year to create a joint SEM/ATD plan. The SEM Framework is intended to engage the campus at large. The following campus committees are used in the framework:  SEM Steering Committee, Recruitment Council, Retention Council, and Data Team

During the fall 2020 semester, community college began implementation of their SEM plans. Ongoing check-ins by the staff in the Office of Student Success are conducted with each institutional SEM point-of-contact to monitor progress on the implemenation of the SEM plans.

TCAT SEM Planning & Implementation Timeline

Each of the 27 technical colleges had SEM/ATD planning teams that worked with a consultant during the 2020-2021 academic year to create a joint SEM/ATD plan. The SEM Framework is intended to engage the campus at large. A campus representative for recruitment and retention, along with the institutional president, were invited to participate in a series of trainings and engagement opportunities to help lead the work at the campus level. SEM planning began in August 2020 with a kick-off webinar in September 2020. SEM enrollment goal creation with system-level councils took place in October 2020.

On November 9, 2020 Town Hall #1 with all TCAT Presidents and Institutional Points of Contact for Recruitment and Retention met to review SEM Council draft goals and provide feedback. A Town Hall #2 with all TCAT Presidents and Institutional Points of Contact for Recruitment and Retention met in January 2021 to review SEM Council draft strategies and provide feedback. Final SEM plans were due April 1, 2021 and final ATD were due June 30, 2021. TCATs began implementation of their SEM plans in fall 2021. Ongoing check-ins by the staff in the Office of Student Success are conducted with each institutional SEM representatives to monitor progress on the implemenation of the SEM plans. 

TCAT SEM Council Representatives

Recruitment Council

Retention Council

Data Council (for System & TCAT Councils)

In addition to the System-level councils, each TCAT has appointed a Recruitment and Retention point-of-contact that will lead the work at the institutional level.

Consultant

Through support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Frontier Set, the Office of Student Success contracted with the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers (AACRAO) to serve as consultants on the community college and TCAT strategic enrollment management work.