Customer service in higher education is still new and few are certain how to do it well. Here’s what our panel of experts have to say. Providing good customer service to students has become an expectation in today’s higher education environment, yet customer service in higher education is still new and few are certain how to do it well, or what the term means when placed in the context of students, faculty, and staff. To learn more about how colleges and universities are adapting the concept of service competencies to this sector, and to gather practical advice for how units and departments can navigate this shift in mindset, we turned to three acknowledged experts on customer service in higher education: These three are also the authors of the popular book Elevating Customer Service in Higher Education: A Practical Guide. Sarah Seigle. Hi Heath, Emily, Eileen. Thank you for joining us for this conversation! The first question we want to ask is: How has the way higher ed looks at customer service changed over the past 5 years? Emily Richardson. The expectation of immediate responsiveness was not around 5 years ago, and in the digital age, we now expect a response to a […]
By Emma White JD, MAAssistant Professor and Department Chair, English, University of Hawai`i, Maui College Navigation and cartography may be overused clichés, but they helped me through tenure’s stormy seas. And the process of obtaining tenure is an especially stormy sea for women in particular. Data from the American Association of University Women shows that only 27% of tenured faculty among four-year institutions are women. Women faculty—especially women faculty of color—also face additional barriers in the form of systemic sexism, racism, and isolation based on the marginalized identities they hold. I cannot solve most of the challenges women face around promotion & tenure in one article, but I can share some of my own experiences in hopes of helping other women faculty along in the process. I applied for and was awarded tenure while pregnant with my first child. Over the five-year process to gain tenure, I followed a highly effective strategy that helped me improve my teaching, align with my goals, and manage my stress. I’ve since had the honor of mentoring other women through the tenure process, and as I look back on how I navigated my own, several guideposts emerge. Accept that you need a map and […]
Photo by the University of Alberta. The Student Connect centre. The Challenge Run-around, duplication of services, confusion for students, inconsistency of service delivery–these are just some of the challenges that come about as a result of the complex bureaucracies in higher education. As student services professionals, we all do our best to support our students, but there comes a time when a fundamental change, and a reimagining of how we do things, is required to address these issues. Like many large institutions, at the University of Alberta we operate in a decentralized environment. We support approximately 40,000 students across three main campuses in our province; we have 180 staff and 80 student volunteers in the Office of the Registrar (RO); and in the 2015/2016 academic year, we had a total of 104,252 interactions across all three channels (phone, email, and in-person). This volume has presented us with a challenge; our old, decentralized model was not enough to ensure we could help students access key services easily. In 2010, the RO at the University of Alberta began a journey to redesign what front line student service would look like. At the time the RO supported seven service points for students. Something […]
By Kathy Edersheim President, Impactrics Social distancing and isolation brought on by the pandemic have proven the importance of community and connection, the very priorities for alumni relations. As the vaccine rolls-out and we look forward to a new normal, it is the perfect moment for alumni associations to assess the challenges and, yes, opportunities that have emerged from an almost entirely virtual system and consider what that means for the future. Observing and working with over 25 institutions during the past year has provided perspective on the potential for new directions and greater success. During the outset of the pandemic Since March, alumni relations pivoted to the virtual world like everything else. The first challenge was how to get alumni to support students facing an abbreviated semester and, often, financial challenges. It was a major communication effort to keep alumni informed about cancelled events (including refunds for tickets), campus news, and to solicit donations for student emergency funds while working remotely. At some institutions, the alumni-student support network for career guidance was mobilized to assist graduating students. Overall, the remote management of this process was surprisingly well-accepted and effective in maintaining and building connections. For many institutions, the most […]
Derek Jones joined the Center for Innovation and Change as Faculty Director in June 2021. He is Associate Professor of Cognitive Science and has directed the Cognitive Science program at UE since 2013. Dr. Jones has held many faculty leadership positions during his time at UE, including Director of the First Year Seminar, Vice Chair of the Faculty Senate and Co-Chair of the UE Mission and Core Values Workgroup. He received the College of Arts and Sciences Dean’s Teaching Award in 2019. In June of 2023, Dr. Jones will begin his role as Director of Field Innovation, where in addition to overseeing UE’s “ChangeLab” experiential education programming, he will develop social innovation programs for rural high schools in southeastern Indiana and Kentucky. Dr. Jones graduated from the University of Evansville with a BA and a BFA in 2003. He served as an officer in the Army after graduating, and then went on to earn an MA from the University of Houston in 2007 and a PhD in Philosophy from Indiana University in 2013. His current research interests include the psychology of creativity, expertise, technology, and embodied cognition, and he has published a book and several articles on related topics. A […]
Meet the first ever Metaversity Director, Dr. Muhsinah Lateefah Morris. A BS chemistry graduate of the HBCU Clark Atlanta University. She obtained an MS & PhD from the Harvard of the South, Emory University in Biomolecular Chemistry. Dr. Morris has been part of and leading Morehouse’s Metaversity project since the Spring of 2021. She’s won awards for Teaching Excellence at Morehouse College, Best Emerging Technology and Innovation from CBRE, First Place Unconventional Innovation in Industry by T-Mobile, and Educator of the Year for 2022 by STEM Women Atlanta. She resides in McDonough GA with her husband and five sons. One of her sons has autism and she advocates for the entire autism community as a member of the Community Advisory Council and advocacy Ambassadors for Autism Speaks. She’s a VR pioneer in education and is transforming learning globally. She is affectionately known as Dr. M.O.M. (Molder of Minds) by all her students. She continues to mold the minds of educators and students globally in the Metaverse. She is a member of the XR Advisory Council for the XR Association and Futurist Council for Jobs for the Future (JFF). Her goal is to authentically transform the educational system for our future […]
Though institutions of higher education are increasingly looking for technological solutions to strategic challenges, downgrades in the rank of the chief information officer at institutions such as MIT and the University of Chicago raise questions about the CIO’s role in university leadership. While there isn’t any conclusive data to suggest that the CIO role is shrinking, concerns voiced over that possibility do serve to direct increased attention to one of IT’s pressing challenges: that is, how to position the CIO, and the broader IT organization, as a strategic partner within the institution. We turned to Gene Spencer, principal of Gene Spencer Consulting and a lead thinker on IT management, for practical advice on how chief information officers can grow, rather than shrink, their role. Missed Opportunities “Running an IT organization is about relationships first, then technology.”Gene Spencer, Gene Spencer Consulting Spencer suggests that CIOs who see their role shrinking may need to first look at their own approach to key interactions with partners across the institution. Common mistakes that a CIO can make which actually reduce his or her ability to engage with key decision-makers (and be seen as a strategic partner) include: The most critical thing is to shift your focus […]
Eric Silva MSE Assistant Director TRIO Student Support Services at Metropolitan State University of Denver Ally Garcia EdD Assistant Dean for the Center of Equity and Student Achievement and the Director of TRIO Student Support Services at Metropolitan State University of Denver Higher education, since its inception, has been exclusive in who can pursue higher levels of learning and engagement. This oppressive truth not only has subjected students to pain and trauma, but also the faculty and staff who work within those ivory towers. In order to interrupt, and hopefully change these marginalizing spaces, it is paramount that institutions of higher learning acknowledge, assess, and devote resources and time to deconstructing practices, policies, and procedures which have been normed on the exclusionary nature of higher education. This position often toys with the theoretical question of the overall mission of higher education and its connection to serving the public good. The following work was our form of resistance to normative hiring structures within Student Affairs. Although not exhaustive, the work below may help guide you and your institution on its own journey of assessing and changing current hiring and promotion structures to truly serve the public good. The process In the […]
Student financial literacy remains top of mind at many institutions, and for good reason. With student default rates on the rise and retention a greater challenge than it’s ever been, colleges and universities throughout the sector are looking for ways to make financial literacy education available for their student population. The University of North Texas, behind the work of Paul Goebel—Senior Director of their Student Money Management Center—is entering its tenth year in providing students a comprehensive financial literacy program, and here he offers tips and suggestions for those looking to start similar programming on campus. To build a successful financial literacy program on your campus, Paul recommends the following: Paul Goebel explains these in greater depth in this podcast: Join us Online to Learn More Join us for a recorded online training that will help increase student participation in your financial literacy programs by showing you how to: Watch the Digital Recording
By Dr. Leslie Madsen, Teresa Focarile, Dr. Tasha Souza, Dr. Lisa Berry After the COVID-19 pandemic profoundly disrupted the spring 2020 semester, Boise State University faculty looked toward an uncertain fall with some trepidation. Because students might have to quarantine for weeks or miss several classes due to illness, instructors realized they would not only need to be ready to shift modalities as they had during spring semester, but potentially teach in multiple modalities simultaneously. To help faculty plan their fall classes, the campus units responsible for supporting instructors’ course design, the Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) and eCampus Center (eC2), worked together to create a three-week Flexible Teaching for Student Success Institute (FTSS). While the collaboration between the two units led to several locally novel developments in the design and delivery of the summer Institute, a simple document template at the heart of the effort proved to be its most significant—and useful—innovation. Drawing on the tenets of Universal Design for Learning (UDL), the Flexible Learning and Instruction Plan, or FLIP, expands on the traditional course-design table by: asking instructors to build in adjustability and to provide students with multiple ways to access course content; allow for students to […]
