6.24.2008

CareerTech Champions Feed


Each year, thousands of Oklahomans reap the benefits provided by the Oklahoma CareerTech System. Read highlights about individuals who applied what they learned and became successful employees, entrepreneurs and leaders in business organizations.

Issue 5

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Google Maps

You probably already know that you can go to Google Maps to find out where you need to go. Did you know that you could build custom maps that can tell a story?

The LA Times has used Google Maps to build a representation of the California wildfires. Where there is a fire, they have placed a small icon and shared some information about containment and acreage burned,

As you develop your technology center website and consider user tools and add-ons, you might think about including a map of your district. Showing the schools that you serve could help people understand the scope of your technology center district and could help students visualize the proximity of their community and the campus they will be attending.

Here is the LA Times fire map…..




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Congratulations HOSA Students


Just wanted to pass along the accomplishments of the Oklahoma HOSA delegation from their National Leadership Conference.

Oklahoma sent 240 students, adviosrs and families to Dallas, TX for this year's conference.

There were 46 states in all at the conference.
—-Oklahoma was awarded the "Most Professional" state at the conference!!---

There are 46 competitive events. The Oklahoma event winner count includes:
Top 10----22
3rd Place---9
2nd Place---6
1st Place---15
Mastery Level-Kaiser Permanente Health Care Issues Exam----5

Congratulations Guys!!

6.19.2008

Cub Scouts and Retention



Cub Scouts across America are working to earn the National Summertime Pack Award. It is given to those Units that hold three activities – one each one in June, July and August. The award is meant to encourage a year round program.

Why? Studies show that Units who have a year round program, engage their members and have fun are larger and more successful than those who don’t. Translation, they retain their members!

Earlier we posted some thoughts on summer activities for recruitment in technology centers. Pizza party in June, movie night on the campus in July and a Welcome Back to School BBQ in August – now your summer is planned.

If you aren’t doing anything with your recruits this summer, start planning now. It will help the transition from sophomore student to technology center student and might even let them know you care about them. It’s not to late.

6.12.2008

iSpring

Need to convert your Power Point presentation to flash so that you can share it on the web? With iSpring you can upload your Power Point presentation to an account and have it converted to Flash. From their you can embedd your presentation in a blog, on a website, link it to del.icio.us or some other nest things.

Check out some of the presenattion on iSpring

Here is an older presentation converted to flash on iSpring

6.06.2008

Hello, how are you?

An instructor walks down the hall headed to the classroom. A student is heading in the opposite direction to lunch. As they pass each other they both look down and mutter “Hi.”

How many times does this scene play out on your campus? We have all been guilty at one point about it. We are too busy to stop for a second, we’ve had a rough day or we simply do not want to be around people.

The way you interact with students says a lot about your campus. Image the impression that you will leave on a prospective student when the recruitment staff is telling them how friendly your campus is, and as they walk around on tour all they see are instructors and staff who don’t even flash a smile or simply wave.

Now, imagine the impression that you will leave on a prospective student when that same instructor or staff person walks to the student, smiles, ask them how their visit is going and then listens to the answer. Talk about delivering on expectations!!

Do you work on the campus where everyone genuinely takes an interest in how others are doing? Do people say hi and smile at each other? Maybe you ask how their parents or their kids are doing. Whatever the opportunity, by taking a genuine interest in each other, and in our students, we will deliver the friendly and family like atmosphere that the Oklahoma CareerTech System is known for.

Go say hi to someone. Who knows, you may be the highlight of their day and the head start they need on the way to a great weekend!!

6.04.2008

Dog Days of Summer?

The dog days of summer are not quite here yet and that means that there is still time to recruit and engage your prospective students as they are deciding to show up for the first day of class.

In the enrollment funnel process, your prospective student should be right down in the neck, almost ready to be counted as an actual student. Still, there is work to be completed to help ensure that these prospective students arrive on the first day of class and can truly be counted as your students.

I have had conversations with people and we discussed that their classes were full in May, but when August arrived these prospective students did not show. This could be for a lot of reasons. Maybe their girlfriend or boyfriend decided that they were not going to go to the tech center, they decided that football was much more important, they were told that they can not go to a technology center and go to college or maybe they became apprehensive and a feeling of discomfort about starting a new school without their old friends set in. Whatever the reason, and they are all valid, the prospective student decided not to show up.

How do we as a system fix this problem? Engaging the student through the last part of the enrollment process is the answer. Universities and colleges spend big money on one and two day student orientation programs and enrollment days, Oklahoma State University has Alpha Week, Texas A&M has Fish Camp, and many more events happen throughout the country with the same objective, to give a student a sense of place and belonging.

How can this apply to the Oklahoma CareerTech System? Ideally each technology center would develop two to three events or ideas to keep your new students engaged. If you weren’t doing anything, implementing one idea would be a great place to start!

Some simple summer recruitment ideas:

New Student Pizza Party
Invite all incoming junior students to a pizza party located at your technology center. Invite all staff and encourage them to interact with the new students. This can help jump-start relationship building and lead to increased retention over the summer.

Movie Night
Rent out a local theater and invite your prospective students and parents. Let them watch the latest flick and incorporate recruitment opportunities in the process. Maybe before the movie they are allowed to watch the latest Alliance video, maybe with their ticket they are given a bookmark with a school calendar. The ideas are as limited as your imagination.

Orientation Day
Hold a special Orientation Day that will allow new students the opportunity to meet other new students, allow them to spend some time in their classroom with their instructor and learn where the preparatory services are located throughout the campus.

Summer Newsletter
What better way to let the parents know what is going on than by sending each new student parents a packet of new student information or newsletters? Reminding the parents about starting dates, driving rules, or student organization is a great way to get parents interested in what is happening at your technology center.

Parent Letter
Why not send a letter to the parents of new students directly from the students new instructor. Allow the parent the opportunity to interact with the instructor via phone, email or face to face and you have created an avenue to communicate down the road.

These are just a few quick brainstorming ideas. If you have more, please share them as we would like to hear about them.

6.02.2008

Simplicity and Consistency


What can we learn about marketing from The Wiggles?

Never heard of The Wiggles, then first, background on the musical children’s group with ten multi-platinum records who have sold 17 million DVDs and four million CD’s.

According to Wikipedia, the Wiggles are a children's musical group formed in Sydney, Australia in 1991. The Wiggles are children's entertainers that have rewritten the book about how children can be entertained with song and dance, and my kids and their friends loved them!

On to my point.

This morning my daughter woke up bright and early and the only thing on was The Wiggles. They were being shown at one of the space centers and were all wearing a space suit, custom designed in their signature colors; Greg in yellow, Murray in red, Jeff in purple, and Anthony in blue.

Simple and consistent colors that they wear in most every episode regardless of costume.

How does this relate?

What got me to start thinking about how The Wiggles apply to marketing is that they are consistent and simple in their message. There is no confusion amongst their fans about who is who. Even during flashback scenes to their childhood, they are still in their signature colors.

Is your marketing message simple? What good is developing a marketing campaign if no one can remember it? Look at examples in the corporate world like Nike with their swoosh, Oakley and their “O” and McDonalds with the golden arches. If it isn’t simple, maybe it is time to rethink your message.

Is your marketing message consistent? Does your photography reflect your message? Is your website designed to have the same look and feel as your brochure and your Power Point presentations? If people get lost shifting through your different marketing pieces maybe it is time to align your message so that it is consistent through all your publications.

Some early Monday morning thoughts I thought I would share.

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