There\nare many unsung heroes on our Fort Hays State University campus. One group that\nfits this description is our admissions staff. On the surface, their jobs look\nlike a lot of fun \u2013 meeting prospective Tigers and their families, sharing\ntheir love of FHSU, helping them complete all the right paperwork, and then\nwelcoming each student to campus with great joy and enthusiasm. They get to\ndress in Fort Hays State gear EVERY day and connect with so many people in\nmeaningful ways. They inspire and encourage the hearts of many who feel college\nis a big scary step. In a way, they are the big sisters and brothers of every\non-campus student.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What\nwe often fail to think about is exactly how complex, critical, and\ntime-demanding their jobs are. Our staff really need to \u201cbe on\u201d \u2013 and\nauthentically on \u2013 all of the time. The position demands the ability to relate\nto diverse student populations and their family members while exhibiting a high\nlevel of enthusiasm and creativity. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
However,\nthey also need more than finely honed people skills. They manage a lot of\npaperwork and need to understand university policies and processes, not to\nmention how to navigate often overwhelming federal financial aid forms. They\nprioritize complex travel and event schedules, which often require extensive\novernight, evening, and weekend work. After a long day of meeting students and\ntheir families, the administrative work begins. There are records to update,\ntelephone calls to make, social media posts to draft, and relentless follow-up\nas each counselor continues to check-in with every student to ensure questions\nare answered and enthusiasm is built.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Two jobs on a college campus have built-in areas of accountability that are both data-driven and demanding. While it\u2019s not only about the numbers for coaches and admissions staffers, coaches are evaluated on winning and admissions professionals must get students to become Tigers. At the end of the day, I know the desire to win is in the DNA of all of our coaches, and I know how much our admissions team cares about meeting institutional enrollment goals; it is, indeed, a heavy weight to bear for both.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Of\ncourse, student recruitment work requires a lot of support from the faculty who\nwill teach and advise the new students, as well as from professional staff who\nwill process financial aid and housing requests, help our new Tigers get\nacclimated to campus, and fulfill many other support service roles. These\nvillage-like efforts reinforce and supplement the work of the admissions staff.\nOur strong university-wide ethic of care also helps \u2013 a lot. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The pandemic has significantly changed how we interact with one another, and I got to wondering about its impact on the daily routines of our admissions staff. Like many of us, our admissions colleagues took to the Internet to communicate and develop strong personal relationships. Personal Zoom sessions are becoming standard. Our admissions staff also attends virtual college fairs where they deliver short, powerful presentations to hundreds of students across the state simultaneously. To stand out in this media requires a whole different skill set.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Although\nsome recruiters have placed their cars in park, the FHSU Tiger team is still\nmaking high school visits whenever they can. Our admissions staff don masks\nwhen visiting the schools and, not surprisingly, are thoughtful in adhering to\nsocial distancing measures, personal wellness checks, and sometimes temperature\nchecks. In some cases, the in-class meetings have been replaced with socially\ndistanced presentations in the high school gym \u2013 which demands our team to be\neven more creative and personable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
According\nto our admissions team, so far, we are experiencing larger crowds and more\ninterest in FHSU. One creative high school counselor found our visit to be the\nperfect opportunity to gather the entire school, from freshmen to seniors, to\nlisten to our presentation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jon\nArmstrong, director of admissions, shared that we have received great feedback\nfrom high school counselors. They are truly grateful that FHSU is willing to\ntravel to them. It is a great time to demonstrate our resilience by doing\neverything we can to show up \u2013 even when it is difficult.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Another\ngreat example of that \u201ccan-do\u201d attitude is how we have been able to accommodate\nstudents who are not able to visit campus. For example, when one student was\nunable to come to campus, our team created a virtual visit. This particular\nprospective Tiger was so impressed by everything FHSU had to offer that shortly\nafter she participated in the virtual visit, her completed application arrived\nin our registrar\u2019s office. The high school counselor also followed up,\nrequesting an FHSU pennant and swag.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Other\npandemic-related adjustments we\u2019ve made include converting our larger Tiger Day\nand Tiger Mania fall and spring events into Tiger Days \u2013 which feature multiple\ncampus events with a maximum of 45 guests. This will be more work for our\nadmissions staff, but I know the moment one person steps on this campus, the\nstaff will become so energized, and they will feel the extra effort was worth\nit. They are always so genuinely happy when parents and students share how\nthrilled they are to be able to visit the campus. And of course, positive\nenergy feeds positive energy. So, I know the quality, personal attention each\nstudent and family receives will be exemplary. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Fall\n2021 recruitment is even more challenging than fall 2020. I am so grateful for\nour hard-working admissions staff who always go the extra mile to make our\nprospective students and campus visitors always feel welcomed. Thank you,\nunsung heroes, for your positive, restless spirit. I know you love to promote\nthe power of an FHSU education \u2013 no matter what it takes!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tisa Mason is president of Fort Hays State University.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" There are many unsung heroes on our Fort Hays State University campus. One group that fits this description is our admissions staff. On the surface,… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37698,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[12323,55],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-56917","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-campus-life","category-opinion"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/tigermedianet.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Mason-Tisa-040A6662.jpg?fit=750%2C1050&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56917","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=56917"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56917\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":56918,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56917\/revisions\/56918"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/37698"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=56917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=56917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=56917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}