2013 Noel-Levitz research highlights: 7 things we learned this year about college students and higher education enrollment management

Noel-Levitz conducted numerous studies in 2013 to further understand the behaviors and attitudes of prospective and current students in higher education as they relate to student success, student retention, and new student enrollment. We also examined current campus practices for marketing, student recruitment, student retention, and college completion. Here are just a few highlights from all that we learned this year:

1. Most college-bound students are using mobile browsers but many college websites aren’t mobile-ready.

Nearly 70 percent of prospective, college-bound high school students have looked at college websites on mobile devices—even more among students from abroad—but only about half of college sites are mobile-optimized. See our 2013 E-Expectations Report, E-Expectations report on international students, and 2013 Marketing and Student Recruitment Practices Benchmark Report.

2. Only 59 percent of incoming first-year undergraduates report they have a solid system of self-discipline for keeping up with schoolwork, but 59 percent also want help with study skills.

When compared to incoming female students, incoming male students appeared to have less self-discipline and to be less interested in receiving help. See our 2013 National Freshman Attitudes Report and Freshman Attitudes Report for Two-Year Colleges.

3. Online graduate students are among the most satisfied students in higher education.

In this year’s satisfaction reports, we examined the satisfaction of adult learners, traditional-age learners, and graduate and undergraduate online learners, including many differences by topic and institutional type. See our 2013 National Online Learners Report, 2013 Adult Learner Satisfaction-Priorities Report, and 2013 National Student Satisfaction and Priorities Report. Also see the 2013 Report: Online Student Readiness and Satisfaction Within Subpopulations.

4. One of the top undergraduate recruiting practices in 2013 for four-year private and public institutions was using a CRM, but nearly 30 percent weren’t using one.

Interestingly, for four-year private institutions, the practice of using a software application to track and manage student retention—which was also highly rated—was even less popular. See our 2013 Marketing and Recruiting Practices Benchmark Report and 2013 Student Retention and College Completion Practices Report.

5. Approximately one-third of four-year and two-year private and public institutions do not track how many credits their students earn vs. attempt.

This is despite the availability of benchmarks for comparison, e.g., at two-year public institutions, first-year undergraduates complete 77 percent of the credits they attempt in their first term of classes (median rates), vs. 87 percent at the median at four-year public institutions and vs. 93 percent at the median at four-year private institutions. See our 2013 Student Retention and College Completion Practices Report and 2013 Student Retention Indicators Benchmark Report.

6. Four-year private institutions staff their admissions offices at higher levels than do two-year and four-year public institutions, based on the number of enrollees.

For example, at public four-year institutions, the ratio of new-student enrollees to admissions officers is 111:1, but at private institutions, the ratio is 31:1. See our 2013 Report: Cost of Recruiting an Undergraduate Student.

7. Most campuses still fall short when it comes to writing a recruitment plan, a retention plan, and a strategic enrollment plan.

Despite the need for more intentional planning grounded on data, only between 4 and 12 percent of institutions across higher education consider their written strategic enrollment plans and their written retention plans to be of “excellent” quality. See our 2013 Marketing and Recruiting Practices Benchmark Report and 2013 Student Retention and College Completion Practices Report.

You can find more higher education papers and reports on our Web site. Looking ahead to 2014, we anticipate many more studies, including new benchmarks for e-recruiting practices and an update on last year’s new student enrollment and retention outcomes vs. goals.

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Learn more about our National Higher Education Research. To help educators stay on top of the many changes in higher education, Noel-Levitz regularly conducts trend research and shares its findings widely. Learn about four ways we provide information.