Keeping it short and sweet (like me)

I would have liked to have started my blog with a big mention of our recent award wins, but Sarah beat me to it! However, I couldn’t write a whole blog without a little nudge to our recent successes- well done team! And I was able to attend my first award ceremony, which was fun, of course!

Well there is lot’s going on at the moment, but I won’t touch on the smaller stuff, perhaps just a little mention on a small task…THE UNDERGRADUATE 2016 PROSPECTUS!

Since my last post we've started work on the prospectus designs, working with a new design agency, and we've been pulling together the content (old and new) and updating our messages to reflect our verbal branding messages. So far it’s coming along well; the designs are starting to come together and the content is too!

My other biggies are working on newsletters for our 2015 applicants, finishing our January start student guide, working on PG virtual event plans and writing reports and evaluations for our recent Open Days.

Recently, we've also been sourcing our student bloggers for 2014-15. Over the next 2-3 weeks, we will have one student per course area blogging on a weekly basis about their experience of the University and what they've been up to each week. It’s a great experience for the bloggers and it also provides great insight into student life for students interested in studying here; straight from the horse’s mouth!

My desk is starting to gather dust…

I’ve feel I’ve been gallivanting around the country a lot lately, on training, of course. I attended a CRM meeting in Liverpool, to look at the developments within the programme that we use. This was a really good meeting, I met some of the team from Azorus (the company that provide our CRM system) and they presented some of the work they are developing at the moment. We also had discussions within the group around what else we would like the system to do, so we can further develop it around our needs.

I also attended a PG forum in Manchester, which looked at PG marketing and how to increase conversion. This was a great meeting and provided a good networking opportunity for me, and I was able to speak to other universities and institutes that were experiencing similar things to us. There was also some case study presentations from other unis and a student panel, which were really informative. I left feeling inspired.

And, on top of the above travelling, I’m back up to Manchesteragain tonight for a friend’s wedding!

Speak soon,

K

Postgraduate Forum: June

Postgraduate Taught Courses in a falling market

Yesterday I was in London for the latest PG Forum, 'UK PGT in a falling market - how to reverse the trend'. The event saw delegates from over 25 universities across the country gather to discuss the downward trend in PGT applications and the ways in which we, as marketers and recruiters, might be able to change things.

It was a very interesting day of discussion, and the willingness of delegates to share experiences and ideas was really heartening. Though I'm not sure we got anywhere near figuring out how to reverse the downward trend in PGT applications, some really great ideas were discussed.

Useful considerations to come from the day:
1. Widening Participation
This was a big topic of conversation throughout the day; lots of Universities, like us, seemed to be doing fairly well at converting their undergraduates into postgraduates but the general consensus was that this won't be enough in the future. There was lots of discussions about the accessibility of PG and how we can encourage applications from students based on experience rather than a UG qualification, in order to attract those who might not consider themselves capable of PG study.
2. 'The Postgraduate cliff '
This phrase rather ominously came up on multiple occasions throughout the day. Almost everyone in attendance is worried about what happens when the first £9,000 fees UG cohort reaches their final year; how will they react to PG, and will their already substantial debt put them off? If it does, how do we react?
3. University Systems vs. The Student Experience
During a fascinating student panel, we heard that one current PG student dismissed lots of possible universities based on not being able to pay fees in installments and also the request for her UG transcript before she had received it from her current university. Although it was widely accepted that university processes are in place for good reason, it was interesting that students are dismissing universities because their processes make it too difficult to apply.
   
Other updates

• While we're nearing the print phase of the UCMK 2015 prospectus, the proofing of the PG 2015 is still in full swing. Everything seems to be on track and we're seeing lots of progress being made with each set of proofs that comes in. 
• We're working hard on promoting the upcoming June undergraduate open days, and numbers are growing steadily. 
• You might have noticed the new, large Postgraduate Information Point stand that is now in Park
  Square campus. We hope you'll agree it's looking really good, and we'll be making sure the screen is live and the stand fully stocked by the time our undergraduates are back on campus after summer. 
• I've been spending lots of time filming staff and students, creating content in the form of one minute long mini-lectures ('PGTips'), continuing to film Q&A interviews, and videoing our very own Recruitment Team for the newly launched CRM system, Belong at Beds. 

As ever there's loads of smaller jobs going on alongside those big ones so we're all being kept on our toes.

I'm sure we'll catch up soon!

Clare

Thought provoking forums

As promised in my last blog post, I have an update on my first PG forum- An Introduction to Postgraduate. This was an all-day session, attended by people from numerous universities, who are all new to the world of postgraduate. We covered a lot of topics throughout the day, from the landscape of postgraduate recruitment, challenges within the postgraduate market and quick wins in terms of growing our postgraduate offering and how we market this to potential students. We were given presentations, had discussions within the room, and carried out group activities and fed back to the room on our thoughts and ideas. There was a lot of information provided, and some thought provoking questions that came from this- I certainly felt I came away with things to think about. We even had a student panel come in and talk to us about their experiences of studying at PG level, from how they researched courses to important factors in making a decision on institutions. The student panel was a really valuable part of the day for everyone; after all, they are the people we want to appeal to and impress.

UCMK prospectus

After some late night proofreading, we are ready to make the final few amends to the 2015 UCMK prospectus and it’s looking really good! The team will be briefing the design agency later today, and once the final tweaks are sent back to us early next week, we will be sending the final version to print ready for the UCAS event at our Bedford campus on 23 and 24 June. I’m feeling a mixture of emotions- relief that we are almost finished (and on schedule), nervous as it is an important publication and I want it to be perfect for print, and excitement as it is my first publication for the University and I love seeing the final hard copy of something that has taken up so much of my time over the past few months- I’ve really enjoyed working it.

What else is happening…

The work on our PG prospectus in still on-going, we’ve had the second version back from the agency this week, it’s starting to come together. We have two undergraduate open days approaching on 7 June (Luton campus) and 14 June (Bedford campus) so I have devised a plan for these events and have been implementing these over the last two weeks. As mentioned earlier, we are hosting the Bedfordshire, Northamptonshire and Milton Keynes UCAS Convention at our Bedford campus in June, so I have been producing some course specific items for our stands, which will be going to print next week. And finally, I have been working on the next edition of our monthly e-zine, B4Beds, which will be going out today. As part of this, I have been out videoing people from various departments, and compiling interesting content for our loyal subscribers.

Holiday

Lastly, I couldn’t end my blog without bragging that I am going on holiday on 3 June, a week in Egypt! I’ve not been abroad for 7 years, so I deserve it, right?

Look forward to updating you all soon.

K

It’s all go, go, go!

Happy belated Easter wishes to everyone. After a relaxing six day break, we’re back into the swing of things in the MARC department.

I’ve been here eight weeks now, and it’s really flown over! So, what’s going on…what’s keeping me busy…

Prospectuses are coming

We’re now in the middle of not one, but two prospectuses- UCMK and PG. So lots of proofreading, liaising with departments, coordinating content and updating information. We’re expecting the first proof of the UCMK prospectus from the design agency on Monday 28 April, which will be very exciting- I love seeing a piece of work come together!

Open day

Our Bedford Campus

We’re hosting our next PG open day on 22 May at Luton and Bedford. As conversion is really important to us, I put a six week plan together for the event and I’ve been pushing those plans through with the help of my colleague, Clare. From setting up Google ads with the Digital Team and pushing messages on social media, to placing ads in external newsletters and around our campuses. We’ve had a lot of people sign up so far, which is great news with almost four weeks left to go before the event.

In between my larger projects I have been working on our next edition of B4 Beds- our undergraduate e-zine, briefing course specific leaflets for our UCAS event on 23 June at UoB, filming graduations, and attempting to edit videos (I’m still getting to grips with the software).

My development

I’m really excited that I have been signed up to attend our next PG forum in London at the beginning of May- an introduction to PG. This is an opportunity for people from different universities to get together and discuss their thoughts on postgraduate study and share ideas and best practice for increasing student numbers. I’m looking forward to attending and I’ll have an update on this in my next blog. I am also going to be attending a print workshop later in the year and spending some time shadowing the Digital Team. I’ve learned a lot already in my eight weeks and I'm looking forward to that continuing.

So, as expected, lot’s going on and I’m loving it!