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A Road Map for Campus Sustainability

by Amit Mrig

In this report: A Sustainable Approach to Sustainability Coordinating Sustainability Efforts Across Campus Integrating Sustainability into Curricular and Co-curricular Programs Efficiency and Cost Control Leveraging Early Successes to Increase Funding and Involvement A Letter From Amit Mrig, President, Academic Impressions July 2011. Whether your institution is driven by social values, economic reality, or political and market demand, the trend to become more sustainable is undeniable. Yet, with all of the momentum throughout the industry and society writ large, including more than 650 campus presidents pledging carbon neutrality, most sustainability efforts have a difficult time achieving meaningful gains. Such efforts are often driven more by the individual will of a student, faculty member, or campus president than through smart planning, implementation, and resourcing. This reality was the impetus for the Academic Impressions Sustainability Road Map – a methodology that advocates for an integrated, scalable approach to campus sustainability, and one that can help generate broad-based support and buy-in. We’ve gathered experts from the leading green institutions to share their insights on how to maximize the economic, social, and environmental returns on these investments. We hope their advice will be useful. Read the paper.   See Upcoming Events for Academic Administrators

Leveraging Early Successes to Increase Funding and Involvement

Telling the story of your institution’s sustainability efforts to key stakeholders is a critical step both for building momentum and support for an initiative, and for leveraging your successes to solicit both engagement and funding from your constituents. When Academic Impressions surveyed a number of the nation’s leaders in campus sustainability, we found that one of the often unrealized benefits of a comprehensive sustainability initiative is its impact on stakeholder relations. Many donors, particularly young alumni, are attracted to projects related to sustainability, and institutions such as the University of California at Berkeley, the University of Notre Dame, Oregon State University, and Boston University have already launched efforts to engage alumni in campus sustainability or fund sustainability efforts through private gifts. Leveraging your early successes effectively to gather support for further efforts requires being deliberate in your outreach. Some key steps include: Develop a story about how your various efforts are integrated Brand your initiative — this can help you communicate the campus-wide nature of the effort and aid you in building credibility and constituency (for an example, see the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s “We Conserve” initiative) Discuss your efforts with your institution’s development office, ask about your institution’s top fundraising priorities, and work together to identify […]

Improving the Accessibility of Online Course Materials

July 7, 2011. In a climate of increased demand for online courses and increased federal scrutiny of regulatory compliance, it is increasingly critical that colleges and universities ensure the accessibility of their online course materials for students with disabilities — and not only for online courses, but also for classes held in the physical classroom that direct students to pursue research online or access supplemental materials via a course management system. Fortunately, significant gains in accessibility can be made with relative ease — the key is to be proactive and plan for them early rather than after an issue is noticed. To learn more about the “low-hanging fruit” for accessibility of course materials, we interviewed two leading experts on the issue from Drexel University — Dan Allen, content management specialist with Drexel’s Office of Information Resources and Technology, and Jenny Dugger, director of Drexel’s Office of Disability Services. Allen and Dugger offer the following tips for: Vetting potential vendors for accessibility Coaching your faculty in making course materials more accessible Vet Potential Vendors, Thoroughly “Where institutions often get into trouble is when they don’t vet their vendors for accessibility; by the time they realize there are issues, they have already made a long-term […]

Five Tips for Making Your Website Mobile-Friendly

June 23, 2011. Last June, Ball State University released a study showing that of college students owning phones, 49 percent owned smartphones; the number had doubled since 2009. In the year since, many colleges and universities have launched mobile marketing initiatives or mobile apps for students and alumni. Among those efforts that have seen early gains: Piloting targeted mobile apps (during the weekend of its launch, the University of Virginia’s application saw downloads from several thousand users). Inviting prospective students to opt in to text messaging or “mobile updates.” Look to St. Mary’s University for a leading-edge example; while St. Mary’s has seen few students opt in, the university has seen a high yield rate among those who do. However, very few institutions have taken smartphones into account in their Web design, which presents a significant risk as a growing number of prospective students access college websites from mobile devices. In an interview with Academic Impressions this week, Bob Johnson, president of Bob Johnson Consulting LLC, advised that the most immediate and pressing mobile marketing investment to make is to create a mobile-friendly version or section of your website. He offers the following tips. The Mobile-Friendly Website According to a 2010 survey of 1,000 college-bound high […]

Social Media: Targeting Your Content

June 16, 2011. In a recent interview with Academic Impressions, Brad Ward, CEO of BlueFuego Inc., cited his organization’s research into the impact of university Facebook pages. After a 25-month study of nearly 400,000 Facebook updates across more than 1,200 university Facebook pages, Ward concluded that most institutions offer too much content via social media channels, leading to declines in engagement as their audiences begin to “tune them out.” Ward warns that quality is far more important than quantity, because institutions compete with family and friends for time and social media “space” — in short, for the attention of students and alumni on channels that are already overcrowded with content. It’s critical that marketing and communications and alumni relations offices invest more in listening to their audience’s social media preferences and preferred content. Effective listening can empower your office to offer highly targeted content — whether on your website, on your Facebook page, or via a mobile app. To learn more, we turned to Linda Thomas Brooks, president of Ingenuity Media, The Martin Group and past member of the board of directors for the Ohio State University Alumni Association. With considerable expertise in setting up effective social media listening posts, Brooks offers the […]

Five Things Department Chairs Need to Know About Fundraising

According to a January 2010 Academic Impressions survey of department chairs, 64 percent of department chairs felt that they were not adequately prepared to assume the role when they first began chairing their department. And of the various duties and responsibilities of the academic chair, 43 percent felt least prepared to address advancement and fundraising initiatives. Yet by virtue of the chair’s position, not only are there many times when a department leader will need to be involved in the conversation between a potential donor and the institution, there are also many times when the chair may need to be the only official involved in the conversation. This is because the donor may want to hear from the academic leader in his or her field of interest, rather than from a professional fundraiser. And as more institutions, both private and public, look to ramp up fundraising efforts, the role of academic leaders will become increasingly vital. We turned to Jason McNeal, Ph.D., consultant with Gonser Gerber Tinker Stuhr LLP, for his advice on what those new to the department chair position most need to know in order to take an active and effective role in fundraising. He offers these five […]

Make Your Alumni Board Effective

June 9, 2011. During a series of interviews with leaders in alumni relations earlier this year, Academic Impressions found that many alumni relations offices are struggling with their alumni boards or alumni association boards. While a working board can offer institutional leaders partners to aid in achieving institutional goals for engagement and giving, most boards are not filling this role. Among the common problems: Many boards remain too focused on specific tactics — such as reunion and homecoming Other boards have grown too large and unwieldy, preventing them from “getting down to business” Boards struggle to ensure that 100 percent of their members give to the institution and that their members model supportive relationships with administration To learn more about the characteristics of an effective “working board,” we turned to Gary Olsen, associate vice president of alumni relations and executive director of the alumni association at Villanova University, and Christine Tempesta, director of strategic initiatives with the MIT Alumni Association. Olsen and Tempesta shared their advice on the qualities to look for in board members and managing the board’s scope of responsibilities. Who’s on the Working Board? Olsen and Tempesta suggest these criteria for selecting board members who will be well-positioned to […]

Four Tips for Managing the Brand Launch

June 9, 2011. Competition for visibility continues to pressure institutions of higher education to differentiate themselves in the marketplace. In order to stay competitive, maintain enrollment levels, and meet advancement goals, your institution needs a unique brand strategy that carefully defines who you are in the minds of stakeholders. Often, though, marketing professionals and institutional leaders have questions concerning how to effectively roll out or communicate a change to the brand. Past examples of branding efforts gone wrong have taught us that a brand campaign carries considerable public relations risk. This week, we asked Bill Faust, senior partner and chief strategy officer for Ologie, for his advice; Faust offers these four tips for success in managing your brand launch. Decide Whether You Need a Hard or Soft Launch Faust suggests that a hard launch or “roll-out party” isn’t always necessary: “some launches are very soft and are rolled out over time, applied to specific areas of the institution at a time.” If your institution has been through a tumultuous time or needs to change its public image dramatically (the public thinks of you as X, but you need them to think of you as Y), then a hard launch may be […]

Deepening Your Talent Bench: Horizontal Career Ladders

Historically, the pathway to the presidency in higher education has been through traditional academic ranks — tenured faculty or department chairs becoming a dean, and then later a provost. But as Academic Impressions president Amit Mrig notes, “the competencies required to ascend the academic hierarchy don’t necessarily match those required to lead increasingly complex organizations in an increasingly competitive marketplace.” Rather than increase reliance on the private sector as a source for future leaders, institutions may do well to take a cue from the private sector’s approach to leadership development. To prepare for a globalized economy where talent, ideas, customers, suppliers, and financing will come from different markets around the world, the best-managed corporations like General Electric, IBM, and PepsiCo are intentionally requiring emerging leaders to manage major projects or even run entire divisions in different parts of the organization — units that may be far outside their discipline or home town. This strategy of building horizontal career ladders not only builds cross-boundary collaborations and global connections, but gives these future leaders a systemic view of the organization. Horizontal Career Moves Versatile leaders develop transferable problem-solving and diagnostic skills that allow them to assess the strategic — not just the technical — […]

Report: Developing Leaders in Higher Education

by Amit Mrig

June 2011. Nearly one-half of higher-ed administrators gave their institution a C, D, or F letter grade when assessing their campus’s commitment to their development as a leader. Higher ed institutions are facing impending waves of retirement at all levels of the institution and across all sectors of our industry. In an increasingly competitive marketplace, how institutions capture and transfer knowledge and identify and develop the next generation of leaders will be key determinants of their futures. Recent research by Academic Impressions suggests that institutions have yet to meaningfully address this problem. In a survey conducted of a broad range of administrators, 40 percent of respondents indicated that their institution was not actively preparing for the upcoming retirements. Many industries with aging workforces face similar challenges. Fortunately for higher education, the private sector is much further along in tackling the problem and has many lessons to offer. That’s why we’ve asked experts from both higher education and the corporate sector to share their insights and expertise on these critical issues. We hope their advice will be useful to you. In This Issue Read this full report (PDF). See Upcoming Leadership Workshops

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