https:\/\/staffadvancement.com<\/a>.<\/p>\nFor now, this logo will be explained since it relates to a linear alignment of the elements for SchoolAdvancement’s ARMED Framework, even though it’s really a systemic one.<\/p>\n
The first thing to remember is to start at the bottom and work your way up.\u00a0 When you’re building any type of structure, it’s important to have a strong foundation.\u00a0 It’s not a stretch, then, to realize that the first row at the bottom is Asset Management.<\/p>\n
The line is green – because it’s the bottom line, and the bottom line isn’t about money – it’s how money is managed.\u00a0 In an example from my family, I was asked to do some “forensic accounting” to help “figure out” why they didn’t have enough money to do what they felt they needed to do.\u00a0 After examining bank statements for a year, I said that there was about $6,000 per year that was just going to “cash” since it consisted of about 5 $100 withdrawals from an ATM per month.\u00a0 The response: “No, that’s not possible.\u00a0 Yes we take that amount out, but $6,000 is a lot of money.”<\/p>\n
Frankly, it’s simple math.\u00a0 $500 per month…times 12 months…is…$6,000.\u00a0 \u00a0The lesson?\u00a0 What you don’t track, you lose.\u00a0 It’s important to track tuition, as well as use financial aid funds and scholarships strategically.<\/p>\n
In the business world, FTE stands for Full Time Equivalent, and their utilization is necessary to see how many employees are working full-time and part-time to make for effective budget planning.\u00a0 Similarly, in schools, much discussion has happened over the past 30 years or so about the rising cost of tuition, as well as tuition setting strategies.\u00a0 Cost-based tuition has been inferred to mean that tuition is going to be equivalent to the cost of education, when, in reality, it needs to be MORE than the cost of education.<\/p>\n
In the life of the tuition-charging school, FTE can stand for Full Tuition Equivalents, and RPS can mean Revenue Per Student.<\/p>\n
These are important figures.<\/p>\n
Knowing what they represent can help in the enrollment planning process, and take into consideration what resources need to be utilized in order to enroll students whose parents will be able to meet their payment obligations which are aligned with their current financial need.<\/p>\n
As you can see, there’s a LOT that gets packed into building and managing the financial foundation of the school.\u00a0 To start at some other level is simply a recipe for eventual disaster to strike.<\/p>\n
The next level up is Retention, which is the blue line.\u00a0 This is a reference to ice hockey, where members of one team need to be on one side of it before the offense can move to score a goal.\u00a0 The importance of keeping as many students as you can from year to year is usually considered a given, but in these days of economic uncertainty, it’s more important than ever to have good retention strategies in place.<\/p>\n
The next level is Marketing, indicated by a purple line.\u00a0 This is a nod to Stan Phelps and “Purple Goldfish,” as well as Seth Godin’s “Purple Cow.”\u00a0 Both of these marketing texts stress the importance of being unique, since if a customer cannot differentiate you from your competition, the entity with the lowest price wins.\u00a0 In tuition charging schools, that’s also a recipe for disaster.<\/p>\n
Further, marketing relies on retention, just as it sits on retention in this model, because positive word of mouth marketing from current parents provide the most effective and least expensive marketing strategy a school can have.<\/p>\n
The next level up is Enrollment, since good marketing leads to a significant number of inquiries, and the way those inquiries are managed and shepherded will lead schools to growth in enrollment.\u00a0 In this treatment, enrollment is considered to be applied to students currently “not enrolled” in the school.<\/p>\n
In some school settings, this is termed as “Admissions” while Enrollment refers to both the number of new and returning students.<\/p>\n
It’s for this reason, however, that Enrollment is represented by a red line, since there will come a point where an optimum enrollment is achieved, and a waiting list needs to be started.\u00a0 It’s just like the red line on a car’s tachometer.\u00a0 Rev the engine too high over the red line, and it will eventually burn out.\u00a0 Similarly, if the school exceeds it’s optimum number of students, the quality of education will start to deteriorate.<\/p>\n
The capstone is Development, which is the seeking of outside sources for funds.\u00a0 Many schools begin at this level, primarily because administrators and board members believe it’s all about the money.\u00a0 If it is, however, isn’t it interesting that the money is represented at the bottom line.<\/p>\n
This line isn’t yellow – it’s gold – a combination of yellow and orange, because this is where alumni, businesses, community members and other donors need to be continually engaged to support the school with their time, talent and treasure.\u00a0 A school cannot be supported only on the funds that come from tuition from enrolled families, especially if there is significant financial need in the school.<\/p>\n
Try and do this first, and it’s like building the roof of a house before the walls are up.<\/p>\n
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If you’ve been a follower of SchoolAdvancement, you know that one of its goals is to foster systems thinking as the way to think through problems to solutions.\u00a0 As educators, we’re trained by linear thinking (first\/next) which evolves into process thinking (if\/then).\u00a0 Process thinking is the basis of all research, computer programming, and even Artificial […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3494,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"saved_in_kubio":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[70],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3514","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-staff-system"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/staffadvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3514","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/staffadvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/staffadvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staffadvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staffadvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3514"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/staffadvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3514\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3515,"href":"https:\/\/staffadvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3514\/revisions\/3515"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staffadvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3494"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/staffadvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3514"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staffadvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3514"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staffadvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3514"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}