After doubling its list of partner schools undergoing a rapid expansion to meet the digital needs of universities during COVID-19, Cleveland software company Wisr is now working to help them reduce summer melt—the drop-off between incoming students who declare their intention to attend a University but never arrive on campus.
Enrollment numbers for fall and summer are the pressing issue facing University presidents right now, according to a recent survey from the American Council on Education. As these institutions continue to navigate the lingering effects of COVID-19, managing summer melt has never been more critical.
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“Decision day wasn’t the finish line this year, it’s only one piece of the puzzle,” said Wisr CEO Kate Volzer. “Students need to feel like they are a part of the campus community long before classes begin in the fall and schools need to be communicating the value of this educational investment.”
Wisr’s summer melt solutions help universities:
- Retain new students through personal connections with their peers, faculty and staff
- Build excitement by exposing students to academic and student life
- Provide on-going engagement opportunities via chat modules, discussion boards, webinars, and creative summer programming
- Monitor digital engagement metrics and take actionable data to keep students engaged
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These solutions are proven to significantly reduce summer melt. A recent case study tracked a 29 percent reduction at the University of Chicago between 2018 and 2019, where one staff person was able to manage more than 1,200 first-year students and 60 peer advisors using Wisr’s platform.
“Before COVID-19 we were working with schools like UChicago to pivot their in-person programming to a more dynamic digital campus experience. Now, these digital tools are more important than ever as most schools are forced to redefine their entire engagement strategy for prospective, accepted, and incoming students,” Volzer added. “This summer melt teams and orientation teams are coming together on campuses to build community and confidence for the student body and are taking this time to reinvent dated orientation programs.”
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