Increasing timely and optimal course registration
At colleges across the country, many students delay registering for courses until the last minute. This can make it hard for students to get into the courses they need and stay on track to graduate.
ideas42 partnered with John Jay College of Criminal Justice to address this challenge head-on. Together, we redesigned student-facing communications to promote timely course registration and encourage students to register for a full course load of 15 or more credits, which is correlated with on-time graduation and does not cost extra for in-state students.
Our Approach
Leveraging best practices from behavioral science, our redesigned communications campaign had four key parts:
Announcing key dates for course registration to prepare students for upcoming steps.
Sending timely reminders leading up to course registration, including text message reminders 24 hours before and the morning of students’ registration times.
Following up with students who haven’t yet registered and offering resources to assist them.
Encouraging a full course load of 15 credits or more (many students sign up for 12 credits but could add a class for no extra cost, per John Jay’s tuition policy).
The Results
After sending our revised communications campaign, students at John Jay registered for courses earlier. More students registered for courses by the end of the fall term, compared to the previous year.
We weren’t surprised to see that overall registration rates only increased slightly. For a student who isn’t sure about staying enrolled at all, even a really great communications campaign probably isn’t going to change their mind.
We also encouraged students to register for a full course load, and we saw more students sign up for at least 15 credits after receiving our revised communications campaign.
These results demonstrate how small changes to communications can have meaningful impacts on students’ course registration.
Want to try this at your school?
Access communications guidance and templates to help students register for courses on time.
Email us at education@ideas42.org with any questions or to learn more.