Overview

Welcome to the home of the University of Wyoming’s Strategic Enrollment Initiative. Our initial Strategic Enrollment Management (SEM) plan, finalized in January 2017, will guide our efforts to recruit, retain, and graduate undergraduates for the next five years. The key understanding that underlies the plan and its vision, is the recognition that being “student-centered” in the 21st century means that as an institution, we must go beyond the classroom to more actively promote students’ wellness, financial literacy and sense of belonging, in order to assure their overall academic success.

The Strategic Enrollment Management Plan was developed by a task-force of 46 members, including 13 faculty, 17 staff, and 16 administrators, in consultation with Huron Consulting. The plan is based on primary research, undergraduate student enrollment data, 125+ interviews with people across campus and across the state, intensive analysis of all input and data, as well as multiple working meetings between November 2016 and January 2017. As you will see, our process has done much to help understand and identify our place in the market, and ways to improve and invest in recruitment and retention.

Some very simple concepts have emerged from the planning process. First, UW will need to learn how to more effectively support the needs of the students that are currently enrolled. Otherwise, enrollment growth would likely exacerbate current challenges surrounding capacity, and student and faculty retention and morale. In the short term, growth in the student body will come from a focus on improving retention and outcomes for the students we already have and on growing the number of transfer students we enroll. Long term opportunities exist in recruiting more first-time full-time students. All of this will require much more coordination and collaboration across our Office of Admissions, colleges and departments, our marketing and institutional communications group, and our faculty.

Soon, we will be holding a series of town halls around campus to share the report, methods, results, and outcomes of the process, and an initial vision for how we will implement the plan going forward.

Execution of the plan will involve three pieces. The first is the creation of a shared governance committee structure to oversee implementation of the plan. The second is is the transfer of enrollment management functions from the Office of Student Affairs to Academic Affairs. Last, a search will be conducted to hire an associate vice provost for enrollment management who will report to the Provost and have primary responsibility for implementing the plan.