From maintaining the necessary grades from their bedroom to lacking face-to-face guidance on the transfer process to facing the prospect of moving during lockdowns — it all culminated in halting students’ transfer ambitions in their tracks.
Fast-forward to the 2023-24 academic year, and colleges are seeing a marked bounceback of transfer student enrollments across the US. According to the National Student Clearinghouse, we’re seeing a healthy 5.3% increase YoY.
This is great news for colleges, but a new kind of challenge for college marketers: transfer students come from institutions of all shapes and sizes, and have decided to change colleges for many different reasons.
The ‘transfer student’ umbrella is broad, so understanding the specific barriers, motivations and attitudes of transferring students is key to building effective marketing and messaging strategies.
Upwards students drove the spike in transfer student enrollment, jumping 7.7% in the last year. Moving from 2-year to 4-year institutions takes a lot of administration for the student, and navigating the complex credit transfer system takes time and a lot of guidance. As community colleges lack the resources for personalized support, this presents a large challenge for students.
Lateral transfer students suffer the same bureaucracy but find it easier to justify the academic integrity of their credentials. Students coming in from other 4-year institutions are more hesitant because of social considerations, largely around leaving their current academic home to find a new network of friends in their new institution. A daunting task indeed.
In either case, making a clear guide on the credentials your university views as acceptable will help guide the student through a sometimes puzzling process. For lateral students, focusing on the social elements of your campus will help ease their concerns about ‘fitting in’.
