Wednesday, October 30, 2013

More Feedback Please

This is a continuation of my previous blog that focused on your experiences with Charter Oak. We received some interesting and useful student feedback about courses, enrollment processes, and lots more. So I am encouraged.

I want to dig into your experience with our Fall 2013 courses. We have noticed that interest in our fifteen week courses is declining while our eight week offerings continue to grow in popularity. As a result, we are developing mostly eight week courses, leaving the longer format for those courses that require a longer learning curve. Please tell us why you are choosing the eight week format. How does this format serve your needs better than longer (or shorter) courses?

Next, we have also noticed that many of you were pre-registered for this semester, but at the deadline, you did not complete your paid registration. We know that adult students do not pay for their courses until the last minute, presumably because family money for your education must wait until the family expenses are covered. So we get that. But for those of you who did not finalize your Fall registrations, even at the very last minute, please let us know why not. What changed? What can we do to help?

And finally, we have been working hard throughout the entire College - Admissions, Advising, Registrar's office, and the Business Office - to better coordinate our outreach to you through the registration process. We have reviewed our outgoing messages, coordinated their content, and tweaked their timing; we have compiled "must call" lists and assigned those calls; and we have tracked the whole process. So now is a good moment to ask how we did with reminding you about registration, prompting you to meet deadlines, and working with you to make sure your course selections met your Plan of Study. Please let me know your thoughts about our process so we can do a better job of meeting your needs.

As always, I love hearing from you, even with criticisms. We are committed to being the best adult serving College out there, and only you can help us become that.