How I was greeted and how long it took to be acknowledged. Were they friendly and helpful. Dressesd professional. Were my requests met.
The strengths in the department that contributes to our students' experience is the detail that I go through with students as the meet with me to complete their financial aid request. Since Federal financial aid policies and procedures may be confusing, especially to first time students, I do explian in detail, how they may or may not qualify for certain aid and the pros and cons of alternative funds that may be available to them.
The challenge may be knowing when to stop giving too much detail & occassionally assuming that a cash paying student may not be interested in other financial aid programs that my be available to them.
Our strengts is the abilty to accurately relay our program and do a great tour an interview of our school. We still need to work on how we treat other departments especially financial aid. I think we need to be cool in the heat of our atsrt cycle and treat each other with respect. Therefore my final report would state that we need improvement in the admissions and FA handoff and vice versa...
Could you provide an example of what you might see at your campus as a mystery shopper?
Being a mystery shopper can be tricky because you need to be knowledgeable about key compliance points while at the same time remain objective. What changes have you made after receiving mystery shop results?
I think it would be fun but hard to be a mystery shopper. If you were shopping your department, you would almost need to play dumb to get the most out of it and to see if the department was explaining things to you the best way possible for you to understand. By knowing your department, it could help you quiz that department to see if they know thier stuff as well. It would definately help the department know what strenghts and weaknesses they have in order to improve.
STRENGTHS CHALLENGES
WE COMMUNICATE CLEARLY, EVENING STUDENTS
RESPECTFULLY W/STUDENTS WOULD LIKE TO SEE
CONCERNING PAYMENT PLANS. MORE OF US!
ALTHOUGH I MAKE A POINT
OF DRESSING PROFESSIONALLY.. MY DESK IS USUALLY
MESSY.
I would access the level of service of each individual representative and work to improve to a level to outstanding service in both departments in every interview.
From your observation I get the sense that you are a very student-focused organization; keep up the great work!
That's very interesting Theresa. It looks like you can celebrate the great program knowledge but have an opportunity to improve the people skills at your institution. How does this information help you in your role?
The strengths would be knowledge about the programs offered from our admissions however the challenges would be their professionalism and the length of time spent during the interview process. One is too short during the interview time and one takes too long. Neither of which appeal to the person sitting in front of them.
I think our strengths are friendly staff, everyone gets warmly greeted and offered water or tea. We ask great questions and get to know the person while giving the tours. Our admissions staff makes it a point to introduce the prospective student to as many of the staff as they can and they explain what that person's role is in the school and how they can help that perspective student succeed if/when they enroll.
I've gotten a lot of comments on how "corporate" our signage looks and a lot of people in this area like a grassroots.
We try to always have a student first attitude, with a smile. As a relatively small school, experiencing growth, our strength has been the personal attention for each student. The challenge is continued personal attention with an ever increasing student popultion.
Great awareness. I'll bet your students appreciate the professional and welcoming environment. What can you do to improve the process of providing detailed information and completing paperwork?
Strengths would include overall customer experience and welcoming environment along with strong professionalism. Challenges include being more detailed with information and thorough with all paperwork being filled out
If only every financial aid administrator felt this way! Taking the time to build rapport with your students and making the effort to create the most comfortable and pleasant experience for them can make a great difference. The FAFSA and the financial aid process can be confusing and even difficult for some students and your approach may help a those students walk away with confidence. Let us know how your new awareness and skills help you.
I'm a financial aid administrator. I think that the admissions process at our school is great and that the financial aid and admissions team work great with each other to ensure that every student/ potential student is well informed with anything that they need to know about our school and how to pay for their education. I'm proud to work with my co workers because I know that we all do our best to make sure that each and every student that walks though our doors feels satisfied when they leave the admissions or financial aid department.
One thing that I think we could work on a little bit more (including myself) would be to add a little more personalization to the whole process. I find my self sometimes acting kind of "robotic" when I am doing financial aid with a student, especially on a busy day when I've already done four FAFSA's.
I think that I'm going to make a point to slow down and try to get to know the student little bit more. Maybe try to add a little more fun to completing a boring FAFSA and estimated award letter. I’m going try to make the student feel like I went above and beyond to make sure that they understand their financial aid and had a good time doing so.
The front desk is such a key component to first impressions at your school and you bring up some great points. How wonderful that your front desk staff recognizes their importance in the process and that they are contributing to a positive impression!
It may sound funny, but if I have to wait, if the front desk staff is able to that they chat with me. At our school the front staff is one of the key components of the school.
Did staff come to me to greet me or was I expected to go to them.
I'm curious, what specifically would the mystery shopper report on the observations you noted if they came by today?
