Two higher education institutions do not typically collaborate to help build and market one school’s online programs. And they certainly don’t then jointly contract with an outside consulting firm for additional marketing and recruiting help. But that’s what the University of New Haven (UNH), Educators Serving Educators (ESE), a unit of Excelsior College, and JMH Consulting are doing to generate leads and new enrollments for some of UNH’s online degree programs.
As colleges and universities are finding it increasingly necessary to develop new revenue streams, shared expertise and engaging other institutions as potential partners, not just competitors, will benefit not only the partners but will result in better programs and services for students. Through this session, participants will learn how to:
• Structure a partnership that capitalizes on your strengths and compensates for weaknesses
• Create a structure so there is a clear understanding of responsibilities
• Set measurable deliverables so everyone is held accountable
• Understand what a good partnership should include from a financial perspective
By turning conventional wisdom on its head and sharing institutional resources and expertise, this arrangement can be a future model for innovative thinking on how to generate revenue through different partnership agreements.
1. The Leaders in Professional, Continuing, and Online Education 1www.upcea.edu
What’s In It for Us?
How Two Institutions and a Consulting Firm Teamed Up
for Mutual Success
MARSHA HAM, UNIVERSITY OF NEW HAVEN
SUSAN KRYCZKA, EXCELSIOR COLLEGE
NICOLE FOERSCHLER HORN, JMH CONSULTING
2. The Leaders in Professional, Continuing, and Online Education 2www.upcea.edu
71% of college/universities offer online courses
6.7 million students took courses in 2011
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Are you ready?
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Partnership vs. Alone
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Partnership Benefits
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Partnership Risks
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Making Cents of Your Options
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Choosing Your Partner
Finding the “right fit”
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Smart Partnerships
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Structuring the Agreement
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Exit Strategy
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At the Starting Line
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Reality Sets In
Making it happen
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Whew! Now what?
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Making it Work
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Questions???
Notas do Editor
Introducing ourselves and talking about our goals
We’re going to talk about what we learned and give some best practices that you can apply
We want to share what our experiences have been so we can provide insights that might be helpful to you.
SUSAN’s Slide
The number of students taking at least one online course in the United States continues to increase with 6.7 million taking courses in 2011 or 32%.
Seventy-one percent of colleges and universities have some form of online learning. Lots of schools who aren’t in it want to be, those who are want to expand their market share. That’s a lot of competition.
How to get the resources to start or expand?
MARSHA’S SLIDE
What UNH considered on the frontend of deciding whether to partner. . .
Was there support from the top down?
Who needed to be involved in the planning conversation?
Who would take the lead?
What is in it for each of the vested groups?
Where would there be push back, if any?
Was there potential for revenue sharing back to the colleges & departments?
Was there potential for additional support for internal departments?
MARSHA’S SLIDE- REVIEW THE CHOICE WE FACE WHEN GOING ONLINE
Go it alone by investing entirely in the staff, faculty, infrastructure, marketing, etc.)
Get a partner to handle one part, some or all of the pieces.
Assess the reality of going it along, especially when it comes to marketing and enrollment management.
Decide internally what you can do short term and long term, the in vestment required, and what vendors can provide the rest.
MARSHA’S SLIDE - PARTNERS ARE NOT SUPERHEROES, BUT THEY CAN HELP
Faster time to launch
Less time investment
Mitigated risk
Increased staff and capability
Potential to learn from partner
SUSAN’S SLIDE
Less money if successful
Less control throughout the partnership
Maintaining the university brand and experience
MARSHA WITH SUSAN’S INPUT
Discuss the business plan requirements
Have you researched the program/s for market viability for scalable growth?
Understanding of how curriculum must meet needs of industry
Who will conduct the research?
Within the institution or by the partner?
MARSHA – WITH NICOLE AND SUSAN CHIMING IN
Determine the cultural fit
“Black box” model
Partnership model
How involved do you want your partner to be
MARSHA – WITH NICOLE AND SUSAN CHIMING IN
Interview your partners - Is it the “right sized” fit? Are you too big or too small to receive the appropriate amount of attention from your partner?
Mission/Goal Alignment
What are your top 3 goals?
Does this align with your partner’s goals?
What are your strengths and weaknesses; where do you need a partner and where do you have internal resources
NICOLE SLIDE – MARSHA AND SUSAN CHIME IN
Clarify responsibilities to compensate for weaknesses and build on strengths
Examine the risks and benefits of a revenue share vs. flat fee
Compensation based on control
Build in accountability
MARSHA AND SUSAN
What’s the exit strategy? – Set the exit strategy when things are going well
What happens to your students?
Who owns the processes?
Who owns the marketing?
What happens if things go south?
MARSHA’S SLIDE – Nicole chimes in
Making sure you have the informational flow set up
Measuring the activities – managing the data (set up data tracking early)
Set expectations and goals from the beginning
Make sure everyone is on the same page
The process of reaching the goal should be transparent
That’s why measuring is important
MARSHA –
Meeting, meetings and more meetings
Operational and logistical planning
Who takes the lead internally at the logistical level?
Curriculum/Calendar planning
Instructional design
Starts per year
Marketing planning
Recruitment to matriculation
Retention activities
What worked well with the launch?
What needs tweaking?
How can we maximize what was learned for the next launch?
How are the internal service departments handling the flow of new students
What additional adjustments need to be made to provide high level of student/customer services in a rapid turnaround?
What each partner brought to the relationship
Excelsior College/ESE-expertise online, instructional designers, vendor management
UNH-academic programs
JMH-enrollment management and marketing