Jim Brigadier:

Education data initiative. And inside Higher ed recently published some stats, which have shown that 35% of students do not feel a sense of belonging at the institution that they attend. And it’s important to create opportunities for the community building so that students can feel at home and at ease at their institution, whether they’re taking classes online, whether they’re taking classes at on campus. And that can occur by connecting them to student organizations, student governments, other areas of campus, or simply making it easier for students to chat with one another or even to see where students are in the, in their class, where they can move to like formal study groups and work together in teams. We also often hear from the universities we speak with, that the students aren’t aware of all the student support services that are offered. Recently Tightened Partners, for example, had done some research on, on this and driving toward a degree study, which shows that over about 35% of student survey respondents were unaware of really critical support services that were offered on campus and promoted.

Jim Brigadier:

It’s almost like you have to communicate it over and over again. And in fact, Titan Partner’s newest report addresses the opportunities that institutions and their faculty can actually bolster belonging among learners to increase persistence, retention, which overall, as we all know, contributes toward the success of the student. For administrators that we work with, we’re focused on making it easy for them to share relevant content with students. ’cause Students aren’t reading many of their emails recently. We’ve heard as low as 35, and as high as 55% of emails go on red. And all of these, if you do it properly, are ways to build community and increase student sense of belonging, meaning ’em at their level and at their persona. And the more students can feel supported, cared about, nurtured, the more likely they’re gonna continue their studies. It’s real simple, right? It’s a basic formula.

Joe Gottlieb:

That’s Jim Brigadier, early beneficiary of remote education programs that preceeded online learning, decorated major in the U.S. Marine Corps, 24-year veteran in ed tech. And since last year, the CEO of Ready Education, a leading student engagement platform that is transforming the way institutions are engaging their students’, academic and community life. We talked about the importance of keeping students engaged during their education journeys, the ways that current solutions are supporting this challenge, and some of the important results that Jim and team have been seeing. I hope you enjoy our conversation.

Joe Gottlieb:

Welcome to TRANSFORMED, a Higher Digital podcast focused on the new why’s, the new what’s and the new how’s in higher ed. In each episode, you’ll experience hosts and guests pulling for the resurgence of higher ed, while identifying and discussing the best practices needed to accomplish that resurgence. Culture, strategy and tactics, planning and execution, people, process and technology. It’s all on the menu because that’s what’s required to truly transform.

Joe Gottlieb:

Hello, welcome and thanks for joining us for another episode of TRANSFORMED. My name is Joe Gottlieb, president and CTO of Higher Digital. And today I am joined by Jim Brigadier, Chief Executive Officer of Ready Education, a leading student engagement platform that is transforming the way institutions are engaging their students’, academic and community life. And Ready Education is also Higher Digital’s newest partner. Jim, welcome to TRANSFORMED.

Jim Brigadier:

Thanks so much, Joe. Happy to be here. And it’s been an exciting year for us at Ready Education. I’m coming up on my one year mark just in a couple of weeks, so I don’t feel so new anymore. So it’s, it’s been a wonderful ride so far. We continue to grow. In fact, just this week on an all hands call in the organization, we welcome five new employees. We’ve had a hundred new institutions join us globally over the past year, which is very exciting for us. But really for all of us at Ready Education, it’s all about being focused on student engagement and the success of the students. For me and the team that I’m privileged to lead, it’s about making it easier for the institutions that we serve to connect to those students. We continue to roll out amazing new innovative enhancements.

Jim Brigadier:

We have a tremendous Chief Product Officer, Gene Teon, and a tremendous Chief Technology Officer in Steve Polish. And we’ve been incredibly innovative over the past year. And also even last month, you may have heard we did Student Success Week, which really, we call it Student Success Week, but it went on for two weeks. And we had a series of webinars hosted a number of clients around the globe. We had over 400 attendees in those two weeks, which was marvelous. And in fact, frankly, that led us to just make an announcement yesterday internally that we’ll be hosting our first annual users conference next year in late June. So we’re growing, we’re excited. It’s been a great ride so far, and it’s all about student success and that’s what matters in education technology. So, but enough of that update. I want to hear more about what do you want to talk about, Joe?

Joe Gottlieb:

Well, I’m glad you asked Jim. I want to talk about your perspective on this really important topic. So important right now, how engagement and especially mobile engagement is transforming student success. So we’re gonna go deep on that today, super excited about that. But before we do, tell me a bit about your personal journey and how it has shaped the work that you’re doing in higher ed.

Jim Brigadier:

It’s a great question. And my journey throughout my life has been a series of conversation with a lot of people. And it really comes back to serving, serving not just institutions for me, but serving in general. My my parents, both of them were first generation college students. My mother lost her dad in World War II, which enabled her to go to school at no cost. Otherwise she wouldn’t have had that opportunity. And my father’s father also served in World War II, and he would have what we would call today as PTSD. And so he struggled, but that actually enabled my, my father financially to even attempt college, and that’s where they met. And then my mother was a career teacher, and my father was a career fighter pilot in the Marine Corps, and they believed in serving. And in fact, the four kids that they had, me being the oldest all of us serve.

Jim Brigadier:

I’ve been in education and served in the Marine Corps. My brother is also serving in education. My other brother is in the Marine Corps. And my, my sister’s a career nurse, so we all believe in serving. And, and the four of us combined have nine degrees. So when you go back to their parents were exceedingly poor, they gave their, their children through sacrifice and opportunity to be first generation students. And you can see where education is the big equalizer. And you know, of course, my, my brothers and my sister and I have moved up to upper middle class. And so you can see that trend, which is really exciting. I went in the Marine Corps outta the University of South Carolina and served for eight years myself before coming into Ed Tech 24 years ago. And actually while I was in the Marine Corps, I also got my MBA through what was then called the Graduate Outreach Program at Auburn University, which is kind of the precursor to online learning.

Jim Brigadier:

And the reason why that was so important for me, and it was a, it was a great experience, was I was a traditional undergrad four years in on ROTC scholarship commissioned. But when I was getting my MBA, it was while I was abroad, I was in Okinawa, Japan, I was on a ship, I was in the desert all while I had to learn through the old if you remember recording the class in a VHS tape, sending it to the student in this, in this case me. And over 16 quarters, four years, I earned my MBA through all these locations working 80 hours a week and being really middle class, obviously in the Marine Corps and while having two kids. And so I say that because I can see right now where that single mother serving, you know, three children or somebody who’s really sacrificing or doing something that’s, you know in a remote way, it is hard, it’s a lot easier to do four years at an institution than it is to do things remotely.

Jim Brigadier:

So that really shaped a lot of my thinking. By the time I left the Marine Corps, I served at Ellucian for 12 years, started off in sales and before coming to Ready Education, it culminated with I was the president Global Markets at Anthology, which I know most of your audiences heard of anthology, but what you might not know is when I joined that company as campus management, between that time and me leaving eight years later, we had grown tremendously from 600 employees to 4,000, serving about 4 million users to 155 million users, and growing from around 60 million in revenue to about 700 million in revenue. So it was a really cool ride. While acquiring three companies, while merging with three companies, I’m sure most people have heard of Blackboard, that was the big merger near the end. But a lot of those experiences around the globe and working with those 4,500 institutions continued to shape my thinking all geared around student success and some of the tremendous experiences that I had being out there and having that privilege to lead that 400 person team for a couple of years.

Joe Gottlieb:

Well, thanks for sharing that background, Jim. You know, each of these stories is a bit different and I think it sets a nice personal context for these conversations, so I’m glad you shared that. And, you know, thinking about your experience, you’ve got a ton of it, a lot of senior experience with some of the biggest brands in EdTech. You joined Ready Education as CEO almost a year ago. Now, I’d like to ask you, what made you decide to join Ready Education in the first place? What was, what really got you excited?

Jim Brigadier:

Yeah, there were a couple things, but the main driver, Joe, was, as we touched on previously, I’ve been focused on identifying ways to continue to help students be successful. And to your point, I’ve done that with both large scale organizations and small, so I’ve seen it from all sides. Ready Education is a small company. We’re about 150 employees, and so very different from anthology or from Ellucian or even academic partnerships where I was also serving for a couple of years. But when I looked at the possibility of joining Ready, I, I did my own research, did extensive research actually, and Ready offered an impressive solution that I could see would benefit any digital ecosystem that’s out there because we serve community colleges, privates, publics, large, small, R1s, all types, and we’re in 28 countries. So there’s really no institution that doesn’t, you know, gear up toward needing to drive towards student success and better outcomes.

Jim Brigadier:

The, the company has made tremendous gains in the last couple of years in relation to student engagement and, and, and success. And on top of that, our clients have been with us for a long time. That was another driver for me wanting to come on. We call it a gross retention rate, but essentially we don’t have a lot of institutions leaving us. Once they come in and join the family, they tend to stay. You know, another reason for my excitement to join Ready too is, and there’s an outstanding opportunity today with the enrollment cliff coming and with the challenges that are looming here in the upcoming horizon, that we have an opportunity to really impact students and their lives, and that transforms nations at the end of the day. And it, it’s exciting to be in a, in a very undulating position right now when you look at how institutions look at student success and really try to figure out ways how to unlock that.

Jim Brigadier:

I would also say that I’m very fortunate that I belong to a good board. Level Equity is the majority owner of Ready Education. And the good news about that is that team and the board have been very supportive about make, not just making sure culturally we’re adaptive to where we need to go, but also the fact that we can be innovative and we can drive toward the success, and they let us be creative with that innovation. And if you don’t have an owner that allows that, it makes it very difficult. So we’ve been very blessed by that. Not to mention we have some really amazing employees at Ready Education.

Joe Gottlieb:

Well, it’s important because when an institution is selecting a really important solution vendor that, and they want to become a partner with that vendor, your ability to have a very solid team ownership structure, mission and vision, things like that, right? So that’s a good thing for people to keep in mind when they make these choices. But I wanna shift this conversation over to really the challenges to student success. To me, they represent major headwinds that today’s higher education leaders must manage through to avoid a crisis. You mentioned the looming demographic cliff, but which will immediately translates to, we gotta make sure we retain the students we have mm-hmm, <affirmative> since there’s gonna be fewer coming in the front door based upon the demographics. So, but what are some of the headwinds that you see out there in terms of student success as we set up this problem and this conversation?

Jim Brigadier:

There’s, we certainly have our challenges in front of us, Joe, no doubt. I would say, I mean, first and foremost, student recruitment and retention are always gonna be the top challenges for student success. But there are some topics that pose more of a threat now, I would say more than ever. For example, for example, or for instance, the higher education sector has been facing that financial and demographic challenge for really about a decade now. It’s not really new, but we’re talking about it more. Peak enrollment really was projected to probably hit by about 2025, and we’re coming up on that. The past year’s developments will compound the challenges leaders face in creating a sustainable path forward. And institutions will need to be creative and adapt to that and invest more and more in student engagement. So like, look, for example, let’s talk about the perceived value of education globally.

Jim Brigadier:

We’re seeing increasingly commentary and, and thought leadership from the media questioning the value of higher education given the cost. And I wanna be specific about perceived costs. As we know that the sticker price is paid by very few people at a hundred percent, right? You’ve got the, the discount rates, but that is impacting the perception of value. So in the past decade, the share of Americans expressing high confidence in the value of education fell precipitously. I think the latest number I saw was, I think from 57, if I’m not mistaken, down to about 37%. The student experience needs to be considered by these institutions and offered personal experiences that students are expecting and quite frankly, demanding as are their parents. And when they’re shopping for institutions. And that experience will very much impact the success of not only the institution, but the students themselves. And I would say experience is a top consideration of students before enrolling.

Jim Brigadier:

But I have to go back to the point regarding the demographic cliff that you mentioned, or we talked about with the fewer college age students, especially in the Northeast. A recent legislative report indicated that overall college enrollment nationwide has dropped, I think about 5% or just under 5% over the past five years. In community college, that enrollment has dropped by about triple that. I think it’s a little over 14%. Of course, there are other factors that impact directly college attendance beyond demographics. First, there’s a shift toward online learning. In 20 22, 23 academic year, 53% of US students were taking at least a class online. That’s becoming more pervasive according to the National Center of Education Statistics. And overall, that means institutions have to try new creative approaches for the students to engage and connect, or it’s gonna continue downward sloping. Engagement leads me to student retention.

Jim Brigadier:

As with enrollment, a number of factors impacting retention include, but are not limited to focusing on a few things. Financial pressures. This is a significant concern as you know, Joe, for many college students seven out of 10 in a recent survey of students in higher education, U.S. institutions feel stressed about their personal finance or finances. If students don’t have a community around them, they don’t feel supported and they don’t feel connected, they’re less likely to be retained and succeed. So I think the sense of belonging impacts the student’s mental health. And around two thirds of college students in the U.S. quit their studies and stop out or drop out. It’s usually because of some kind of mental disorder. And that’s been, again, increasingly in the spotlight of of late. And also I would say lastly, students today have higher standards than they ever have before.

Jim Brigadier:

And they want familiar technology. They want technology that’s easy, they know it and it knows them. And education institutions often deal with the topography of so many solutions and having to deal with that. I was recently listening to one of your podcasts by Dr. Tamara Brown from the University of Texas at Arlington. And she talks about that complexity that exists out there in the topography that you know, administrators have to wrestle with, contend with students have busy lives, but at the same time, they’re not just taking classes, right? They are full-time workers, they’re part-time workers, they’re caring for children. A lot of students are non-traditional. And then you have, again, continuous costs that are rising. Many students are, as they say, one flat tire away from dropping out or stopping out because they have to go out and work to essentially take care of the essentials in life, like food and shelter.

Jim Brigadier:

So I would kind of summarize it like this, Joe. Going to college used to be akin to investing in a bond premium, meaning you can really only gain today, I would say it’s almost increasingly trending toward thinking around colleges as it’s like going to a casino at times, at least how parents would describe it that way. You may win, you may lose, in other words, with a college degree, will it pay off? Or will you spend four years kind of languish, maybe drop out, come back, and it really doesn’t pay out the economics that it was supposed to. And I would say there’s a cultural and political divide over the worth of college degrees today. And that’s been really alarming. That’s, that has probably started trending, what about a decade ago, I guess. So when you look at all that combined, there’s definitely some concerns.

Jim Brigadier:

I recently read an article that a very well known economist predicted that will be eight and a half million baccalaureate degrees short by the year 2030. And that’s huge. That’s short in order to maintain, maintain economic viability within the United States job market. So there’s always gonna be jobs that require skills and, and, and trades, but there won’t be enough for them in the future. Opportunities will be really severely limited for non-college grads. So it’s essential that those baccalaureate degrees are fulfilled so our economy can continue to thrive, communities can thrive, and students can actually go through life on their terms and what they intended to initially set out to obtain.

Joe Gottlieb:

Well, you covered a lot there. There’s a lot of great data points. And I would just summarize some of that as, as being about, it’s not only an individual challenge for each student going through this journey. Like you said, it might feel a little bit more like entering a casino than than picking up a bond. But it’s also a regional concern. So, you know, being able to serve regions and deliver the, the, the graduates that are necessary for the labor pool for that, you know, that region to be successful as well as nations as you point out. And so institutions are sitting there with this, this set of sort of really levers and dials increasingly to figure out how do we do a better job? How do we step up to deal with the looming demographic cliff? How do we address the fact that student mental health is a trickier prospect? At least we know more about it, and therefore more easy it’s easy for us to spot it as a, a driver for some of these challenges. How can we step up and, and make this a better place with, with more, with more outcomes? So let’s talk about that, the relationship between engagement and success. This seems that there’s new evidence every week about how student engagement is, is critical to student success. I’ve read various reports, but I’m wondering if you can share any of the science that you’ve seen that explains this relationship.

Jim Brigadier:

Sure. I mean, online learning within the higher education sector has grown in the number of online courses that students continue to take is again, increasing. If you remember Clayton, Chris Christensen who passed away several years ago, he said back to institutions in general about 15, 20 years ago, that it’s a death sentence if you don’t go and go online fast. ’cause That’s where the world was going. According to a study by Sage Journals, one of the critical components actually of quality of online education is to ensure learner engagement. I mean, in short, the need to effectively measure learner ex engagement is imperative to determining the performances and the success of the achievements of learners, which is very important to note. It was also found there are positive correlation between the engagement of students and the online modules and the performance and the final learning activity.

Jim Brigadier:

So when you look at things like in general, the average engagement level of students was significantly higher for good performers as compared to low performers. So I would say the mean performance of highly engaged students with significantly better than those with low engagement levels. Basically in, in some, Joe you could say that we can testify of this when we speak to clients as, as a company, institutions use the data we provide for early proactive outreach. And that engagement data also serves as an early alert indicator. And this, in this intervention positively would impact critical student success factors that we’re seeing out there that institutions really have to be keen on in order to continue driving forward and focusing on that student journey.

Joe Gottlieb:

And let’s be clear, this is not limited to online. You, you make the point from Clayton Christian about the importance of online, but this is also about making sure that students that are, that are on campus are engaged because we can’t take them for granted just because they’re on campus, right?

Jim Brigadier:

Right.

Joe Gottlieb:

So, so now I wanna shift gears a little and talk about, about community and the importance of community in this whole context. You know, a sense of belonging truly impacts a student’s mental health. But can you tell me more about this general importance of community in the, in the ways that you’re helping institutions to crack this problem?

Jim Brigadier:

Well, it’s clear, Joe, that students are continuing to face multiple challenges throughout their education journey. I mean, we know this at Ready Education because we strive to not only be a technology partner, but also a thought partner in the industry, truly building those relationships with our clients and with our partners from the ground up education data initiative. And inside Higher Ed recently published some stats which have shown that 35% of students do not feel a sense of belonging at the institution that they attend. And it’s important to create opportunities for the community building so that students can feel at home and at ease at their institution, whether they’re taking classes online, whether they’re taking classes at on campus. And that can occur by connecting them to student organizations, student governments, other areas of campus, or simply making it easier for students to chat with one another or even to see where students are in the, in their class where they can move to like formal study groups and work together in teams.

Jim Brigadier:

We also often hear from the universities we speak with that the students aren’t aware of all the students’ support services that are offered. Recently, Titan Partners, for example, had done some research on, on this and driving toward a degree study, which shows that over about 35% of student survey respondents were unaware of really critical support services that were offered on campus and promoted. It’s almost like you have to communicate it over and over again. And in fact, Titan Partner’s newest report addresses the opportunities that institutions and their faculty can actually bolster belonging among learners to increase persistence, retention, which overall, as we all know, contributes toward the success of the student. For administrators that we work with, we’re focused on making it easy for them to share relevant content with students. ’cause Students aren’t reading many of their emails recently. We’ve heard as low as 35 and as high as 55 percent of emails go unread.

Jim Brigadier:

And all of these, if you do it properly, are ways to build community and increase student sense of belonging, meeting on, at their level and at their persona. And the more students can feel supported, cared about, nurtured, the more likely they’re gonna continue their studies. It’s real simple, right? It’s a basic formula, but administrators are often kind of there, there’s too much work and too much effort on their plates for the number of students that they serve. They’ve gotta get smarter in the technologies that they use. And then also, you mentioned a sense of belonging. That’s important as well as it incorporates really the feeling of being valued included as an individual on the campus or at the institution. And research would further suggest that those students have a greater sense of belonging, are highly motivated, more likely to continue their academic confidence finished through the matriculation process, graduate and achieve great things.

Jim Brigadier:

So really in a nutshell, it’s kind of like building that community on a more personal level at a mobile level as well. ’cause That’s what students are using is really where meet leaders probably have not focused on enough and need to put more thought toward that. And, and frankly, more investment toward that. And institutions are also struggling operationally with their budgets as budgets have been cut in many cases. And so it’s kind of that that dogma and that dilemma that puts folks into the cross hairs of this is gonna be tough going forward. But I think the technology there is, is there Joe to, to advance and we certainly feel like our technology is, is right there, innovative, it can really help as well.

Joe Gottlieb:

Well, I’m glad you brought up mobile because we know that students do so much more on their mobile phones than prior generations. It really is a mega trend. And and to the extent that software has not kept pace, this is pretty classic, right? Like, so if you think about the solutions that are in place at most institutions, most of them are not serving up an amazing mobile experience. And there are exceptions and there are ways to fill those gaps. But at the end of the day, you want to make it really easy for a student to have a mobile experience that accomplishes all the things we’re talking about, a sense of belonging, this connection to community the right level of engagement, opportunities to throw signals that might allow the institution to step in and and supply services that are filling a, a perhaps a gap that the, the student is experiencing.

Joe Gottlieb:

So super, super important. And we do a lot of work in, in student experience journey mapping, and we find that consolidating the mobile experience for the student to simplify it, to let them go to one place is so, so critical to success. So I’d like to, I’d like to talk about mobile engagement and I’d like to distinguish three different use cases. So let’s break it down this way. Administrative conveniences for the student, real-time social collaboration and notification, which really blends into the, their communications infrastructure that they use generally all day, every day. And then primary learning tools. So can we, can you elaborate on those three different use cases and how you’re helping institutions to span the scope of this mobile engagement problem?

Jim Brigadier:

Yeah, sure. Absolutely. Joe, you’re getting very academic on me, so <laugh>. Perfect. So let me start with social collaboration and notification. So we all know students live on their phones. In fact, adults do too. Adult students and other professional adults. That’s our primary tool. It’s the students’ primary source of information that needs to be accessible and available on the mobile. That’s how they connect and stay engaged with each other. And that’s where I mentioned previously we’re 54, maybe even down to in some studies high 30, 39 percent of emails go unread by the students. They’re on their phone, they’re constantly on their phone. They want something very quick in real time. As far as administrative conveniences, students and staff members at institutions want to be as efficient as possible. And for students, they want to be able to do things like register for events, check course grades, and more on their mobile device.

Jim Brigadier:

How do we make it easier for them to get that information they need? Well, in an ideal world, they would primarily use one platform for all of their academic and co-curricular needs. And that’s exactly what we provide in our mobile. And they don’t have to check in four different places and they, they want the convenience. And then for administrators, there are also some similar expectations. And while they are on their computer more often than the students by probably a long shot, they also wanna be able to take care of key priorities on that mobile device. So you look at the, the groups that we work with and the professionals that we work with at the institution, student affair, profess student affairs and student success professionals are always, always on the go. They’re always on the run. They wear multiple hats. So being able to make quick adjustments on a mobile to events and other campus activities is very paramount to them.

Jim Brigadier:

And then lastly, I think you mentioned the primary learning tool. This one is probably a little bit more tricky. There are students who use their mobile device to complete all of their work, but I don’t think that’s the ideal experience. It is however, a reality for some, and I would say in ed tech, we have to make it easier for these students to be just, it’s gotta be simplified. It really comes down to that it’s an ongoing challenge that the sector faces. Some of this can occur through conversations with institutions about options around, you know, class assignments, exams, et cetera, and how we can fix that. While that falls outside of the direct scope, there are also important conversations to have. And for students, really it comes down to the reality of mobile device. They can’t do everything, can’t write a 10 page paper.

Jim Brigadier:

That would be kind of challenging. At Ready Education, for example, we’re focused on making sure students are connected to what’s happening at the institution in real time. Whether it’s clubs activities, reminding them about their academic deadlines, getting updates to faculty members, being able to measure it with, with data. So an institution or administrators can look at a student’s full 360 degree view and see where they may, may be falling short. All of this can be done on the mobile device and that’s really where it’s always gonna be. Or at least for the foreseeable future. We just need to make sure it’s convenient, accessible, strong user interface that attracts the students and the administrators toward that. And when all that happens, it kind of falls in place. And we’ve seen statistics time and time again. In fact, Oral Roberts, for example, put out a really good case study about their experience with Ready and the way mobile has quite frankly transformed that institution over the past decade. I’m sure you’re familiar with Mike Matthews, the CIO there, he’s been very instrumental there. So all the statistics would point due North when it comes to getting students more engaged, making it simplified, and putting all of that convenience to the fingertips and letting them do the rest.

Joe Gottlieb:

I appreciate that and I’m glad you, you mentioned the limits of what’s going on in the primary learning tools. ’cause It allows me to just make a general point, which is higher education institutions have typically pretty large and complex portfolios of solutions, and they often have even more than one LMS in their, in their environments that are active and things that are happening outside the LMS. So I think one of the not to mention s SISs, you know, so student information systems and, and HR and finance systems and things like that. So one of the things that I’ve observed about what you guys are able to do for institutions is to really unify the student experience, not by replacing the user experience of these critical solutions, but by helping the student keep track of what’s going on with notifications of actions pending, for example.

Joe Gottlieb:

Yes, you go deeper on stuff like calendaring and events and give the, the institution solution to be able to cover those bases. But the, but the net effect is the student is getting a really unified personal experience that helps them stay engaged with all the different things that they should be keeping, keeping up with. So really, really important. So with that context set, let’s jump into some successes. So what are some of the key successes where mobile friendly engagement has helped students develop this sense of belonging and achieve better outcomes in their studies and, and job placement for that matter? Tell us a few of the, the victory laps you have to share.

Jim Brigadier:

Sure. Joe, I, I could go really on and on on this topic ’cause we hear so many great stories from our students, from our administrators that we serve. I’ll, I’ll try to keep it short. We get, we get so many actual quotes that come in because we do those surveys. And I, I will tell you, you will get emotional, I do when you read some of these quotes because we, we know that we’re kind of the behind the scenes company that’s helping to transform and change lives. And we know that, and it sometimes can sound almost like a cliche, but it’s so very true. And when you read the student comments, it will literally bring tears to your eyes. I’m telling you like, like several students will say like, they thought they had no opportunity or they dropped out and they came back to a different institution that served them in a specific way with a mobile device that really helped them become engaged and really felt inclusive on campus.

Jim Brigadier:

But I, I’d have to read those quotes to you. We have ’em. It just, it’s, it’s again, it’s, it is just very emotional to see the, the transformation that we can enact behind the scenes. There was a recent client survey also done by one of our campus groups clients for all the students on campus asking really around, do you wanna keep this platform and is it be benefiting you? And 96% of the students said, absolutely this is critical to the success that I as a person or as a student have had on the campus. That was in one particular case, but overall would see those stats in the nineties. It’s almost an imperative. This really, you know, what’s interesting Joe, is people talk about we need an LMS, we need a learning management system, we need a, a constituent relationship management solution or a CRM or a student information system.

Jim Brigadier:

Nobody’s really talking about a student engagement system. Those other solutions are critical by the way. But a student engagement system, it’s really where it’s at, it’s measurable, it’s supportive to the institution and the clients. It’s data-driven and that’s really where we’re, we’re gonna see the future go when it comes to the investment dollars as well as the focus of institutions. But really through all these surveys and feedbacks that we see and we provide, we can get on a regular basis a a really good strong sense of how we’re, how we’re helping the student. And really also the student is, is really the best source of taking a look at what we deliver and saying, here’s how you can improve it. In fact, even I’ll I’ll say this fall, which is exciting. We’ve not announced this, you know, publicly, publicly yet, but we’re actually we have, well we have executive advisory councils and we have 10 CIOs that represent a cross smattering of the institutions that we serve.

Jim Brigadier:

And we have an executive advisory council that also has made up of VPs of student success. So we kinda have the technical and the functional two executive advisory councils. And this fall we’re gonna create our first student advisory council. So we’ll be using students from campuses to be like on our board, so to speak, help us to drive innovation. And really, I’ll tell you like the secret sauce here. And what we’re gonna be doing with that is we also have an opportunity to use those students for not only internships but hopefully full-time employment when they graduate. It’s kind of our way of also giving back and getting back the top talent out there that’s choosing our solution. So we’re excited about kind of how that works. You know, both directions I should say bidirectionally. So we’re really thrilled about that. But those surveys really tell us kind of our, our true North star and I would say that continues to help us drive that innovation toward helping those institutions achieve the success.

Joe Gottlieb:

Well I’m, I’m glad you had a chance to share those, those nuggets because they’re, they really do illustrate the importance of this category and the work and the work that we do. Helping institutions really drive strategically aligned portfolios of change, whether it be technology related or beyond the importance of rallying around student success as a priority, as an imperative, as a, as a strategic objective is, is really, really upon us. And you mentioned the other systems that are better known. Well that’s true because they’ve been known for quite some time. They’ve represented the nuts and bolts, whether it be a teaching and learning in the case of the LMS or the administrative support services. Typically in the case of the SIS but this student engagement system is, you know, we would agree, while we don’t tend to push technology, we, we really try to help people focus on solving the, the challenges of operating an institution. There comes, there come times when a new category is really necessary to bring together some of the existing tech. And I think this one is is important for that reason. So with that, I’d love to bring this podcast to a close. In summary, Jim, what are three takeaways we could offer our listeners on how student engagement is transforming student success?

Jim Brigadier:

Yeah, great way to close it out. Joe. If I had to really think through three core points in summary. ’cause There’s a lot out there as you know, to unpack. I would say it’s, it boils down to something as simple as this. Number one, meet students where they are, that is critical. Meet ’em where they are on their personal, on a personal level. Number two, I would say engagement has to be seamlessly simple and students need constant reminders and encouragement to engage. It’s that communicate, keep communicating over communicating or over communicate. And then lastly, I think the last point I would make is this, all is only possible with data. Data is the key and the source to the truth. And at the end of the day, the data allows you to measure consistently improve for the student. So meet students where they are, that’s critical. Engagement has to seamlessly be simple and, and students need to be reminded of that encouraged. And again, data will always be the key. You hear that a lot, but it’s so true. I would say those are the three big things. Joe, in summary,

Joe Gottlieb:

Great summary. Jim, thanks so much for joining me today.

Jim Brigadier:

Thanks for having me, Joe. Appreciate it. My pleasure.

Joe Gottlieb:

Thanks to our guest for joining us as well. I hope you have a great day. I look forward to hosting you again on the next episode of TRANSFORMED.

Joe Gottlieb:

Yo, stop the music. Hey, listeners have transformed. I hope you enjoyed that episode and whether you did or not, I hope that it made you stop and think about the role that you are playing in your organization’s ability to change in the digital era. And if it made you stop and think, perhaps you would be willing to share your thoughts, suggestions, alternative perspectives, or even criticisms related to this or any other episode, I would love to hear from you. So send me an email at info@Higher.Digital or Joe@Higher.Digital. And if you have friends or colleagues that you think might enjoy it, please share our podcast with them as you and they can easily find TRANSFORMED is available wherever you get your podcasts.