Enrollment Optimization

There are many consulting firms that will address individual aspects of admissions and financial aid for you. They might recommend discounting to bring in a bigger class, or design and field a survey, or produce a beautiful set of admissions publications.

Hardwick-Day helps colleges envision the whole game, the entire board, before making separate moves. Tactics must support a comprehensive, competitive brand strategy, and work within the practical constraints of day-to-day enrollment management operations.

Hardwick-Day has worked with some of the most selective colleges in the country, and helped others raise their academic profile to the next tier—which gives the firm an arsenal of recruitment and technological techniques to help clients succeed, whatever their institutional goals.

Contact Jim Day or Nathan Mueller.

Environmental Scan and Strategic Review

Hardwick-Day believes in context. In detail. And in everything in between. The firm sets every Financial Aid Optimization in context with its Landscape Analysis, which is available as a standalone product as well. The firm's principals help colleges identify strategic challenges and opportunities with a view toward strengthening market position by increasing consideration and willingness to pay on the part of families, and optimizing resources across the institution. More...

Prospect & Conversion Analysis

Colleges must pinpoint human and budgetary resources on recruiting the types of inquiries who are most likely to enroll. This seems obvious, but it's often missing in practice. Fast App has many colleges treading water, victims of their own recruitment success. Inquiry scoring could is a lifeline from Hardwick-Day, guiding universities in real time to build relationships with particular students who are really interested in the institution. More...

Annual Tactical Review

It’s like Enrollment CSI, except that client operations emerge from this “post-mortem exam” alive and well, and more crisply focused than ever. More...

Aid-Related Retention Analysis

High retention and graduation rates should be the gold stars earned for masterly recruitment. They also make great recruitment pitches (especially for parents). Many schools know their IPEDS numbers, but beyond these lies the realm in which an institution builds a data warehouse to examine retention events in fine detail by majors, GPAs, aid packages, and dozens of other factors. More...

Comprehensive Enrollment Optimization

Sometimes incremental improvements simply aren’t enough. Leadership transition, staff turnover, competitive vulnerability, sudden opportunities, and other factors can engender the need for quick repositioning, dramatic overhaul, or even a complete turnaround in admissions operations. More...