ASU Dekalb Tops in Student Recruitment
The Dekalb Alumni Chapter of Albany State University was well represented during Saturday's Student Recruitment Training Session held on the ASU campus. The Dekalb Chapter was also represented remotely via ASU's live Web meeting room. ASU President Dr. Everette Freeman told those gathered, "This is unprecedented. I don't know of any other HBCU that is partnering with its alumni (to recruit students)." Freeman also said, "Data suggests if (we're) able to quickly capture students from (alumni) chapters, they will ignore offers from other schools. The earlier we can get potential students interested and excited, the earlier we can send the acceptance letters."
Event organizer, ASU Vice President of Information and Instructional Technology, Virginia Stewart told the alumni, "You are setting the bar." She introduced ASU's new Director of Enrollment Services, James Burrell, who challenged alumni to recruit 1/4 of new students. He said, "One of the most important activities in which you (alumni) will be involved as an Alumni Recruitment Team Member is establishing personal contact with students." Burrell added that alumni are significant because, "You can add your personal experiences and knowledge." Burrell went on to say, "It will involve about two hours a month of your time."
Burrell says that he is also available for training sessions with individual alumni chapters. He and Stewart solicited ideas from alumni as to what their needs are when it comes to properly recruiting students.
Dekalb Chapter's Scholarship and Recruitment Chair Tamara Nelson says, "They are going to most definitely use the alumni more. I see that, he (Burrell) is going to be calling on alumni more and we need to be prepared, ready and committed. They are committed to getting the tools that we need." The Dekalb Chapter has consistently assisted ASU with its satellite efforts, participating in approximately 20 college fairs during the 2010-2011 recruitment season.
Prior to presenting statistics on current recruitment efforts, Burrell said, "You will see that some of you are doing well, and some of you are not doing so well." Tops among the number of potential student applicants submitted for Fall 2011, Dekalb also had more than 100 students already accepted to ASU. That bested any other chapter.
Following the training session, Stewart said, "It was a good workshop. I look forward to doing another one." She also thanked the Dekalb Chapter for giving her "some good ideas that were needed."
From this reporter's point of view, logging on to the Web meeting room was very easy and the system was self-explanatory. I was able to text my questions directly to the session. If you preferred to use a microphone, you could verbalize your questions and comments directly to the room.