The demographic cliff is here. Traditional recruitment strategies, the ones admissions offices have relied on for decades, are no longer enough to yield the class. Institutions that don’t adapt will continue to lose ground in their regions, markets, and, eventually, everywhere.
Our Admissions GPS service offers a comprehensive and transformative approach to higher education admissions, tailored to address the shifting demographics and increasing competition in higher education.
This comprehensive system restructures admissions offices and processes, optimizing lead generation, communications, and staff management. With advanced data analytics, new markets, and more personalized recruitment, Admissions GPS helps colleges grow their applicant pools while maintaining quality and net revenue. Our expert team provides on-the-ground support to streamline operations, train staff, and ensure long-term success with customizable modules that meet the specific needs of each institution.
Admissions GPS, Stevens Strategy’s enrollment management system, addresses three common admissions challenges: attracting enough qualified prospects, converting applicants through smarter communication, and organizing the office for maximum efficiency. It can be implemented fully or in focused modules.
We help institutions move beyond traditional search to expand and diversify their applicant pools. This includes data analytics to identify viable secondary and tertiary markets, automated admissions tools to handle higher volumes, rapid financial aid processing, and algorithms for qualifying prospects early. The goal is to significantly grow the pool — in some cases doubling or tripling application volume — while ensuring those applications are genuinely qualified throughout the process.
Most admissions offices communicate improvisationally, without a coherent strategy for moving prospects through the funnel. We build a 12-month communications system — emails, texts, calls — and implement a prioritization framework so counselors focus their energy on the right applicants at the right time. We also develop forecasting tools so leadership has an accurate, real-time picture of where the class stands.
This is the most intensive module, involving on-the-ground support to restructure the admissions office’s operations. We help institutions set individual counselor goals, evaluate performance, revise office hours and on-campus programming, cross-train staff on financial aid, and build a culture that is customer-focused and results-oriented.
Most engagements begin with an admissions audit: a structured evaluation of all three areas that produces a clear score and identifies where the institution is most exposed. From there, institutions can choose to address one, two, or all three modules. The full package produces the most durable results, but the modular structure allows institutions to start where the need is greatest.
Enrollment is the financial engine of most institutions. When the admissions operation underperforms — whether due to a thin prospect pool, low yield, or an office that isn’t structured to close — the consequences ripple across the entire institution. Admissions GPS gives leadership a proven, end-to-end system to get enrollment back on track.
