GPD News + Info » Recruitment

Recruitment

Recruitment Events: Upcoming venues for programs to attend recruitment fairs.

There are many resources at your disposal to assist with graduate recruitment. Please review the information below and feel free to contact one of the following individuals to discuss your needs in more detail:

Recruitment Opportunities and Strategies

Maintain an Up-to-Date Website

Ensure the program website is up-to-date and tailored to prospective students. Address the questions most people want to know, like:

    1. What are the career outcomes of graduates with this degree/certificate?
    2. How is the program delivered? (online, on-campus, hybrid, off-campus)
    3. Can a student enroll part-time or full-time, and how long will the program take based on part-time or full-time enrollment?
    4. How much does the program cost?
    5. Is funding available in the form of graduate assistantships and/or tuition support?
    6. What are the faculty’s areas of expertise? (research, teaching, service)

Engage the Program Faculty to Help

Collaborate with the graduate faculty to create organizational strategies to help recruit prospective applicants! Some programs on campus have a committee that is tasked with recruiting prospective applicants and managing the admissions processes. A shared ownership model is a terrific and efficient way to support enrollment.

Communicate Regularly

Connect with prospective students and applicants in Slate; contact Ellie Ivey if you need additional guidance. Engage your faculty and students to help connect prospective and admitted students. Personalizing recruitment is vital to help prospective students choose UNC Charlotte for their graduate education.

Host an Information Session

Hosting an Information Session or Open House for prospective and/or admitted students provides them an opportunity to meet with faculty, staff, current students, and alumni; if the program is on campus, it can also provide an opportunity to showcase a program’s facilities. Graduate Admissions utilizes Slate’s Event Management System to manage events, including RSVP’s for registration and event communications. Contact Ellie Ivey to schedule an Information Session.

The National Name Exchange: Recruit Prospective Students from Historically Underrepresented Groups

Founded in 1976, the National Name Exchange began as a consortium of fifty-five nationally-known universities which annually collected and exchanged the names of their underrepresented students who were in their sophomore, junior or senior year of their undergraduate education. The purpose of the Exchange is to ensure that participating universities continue to identify a pool of students who could be recruited to the graduate programs at these institutions. NNE-participating institutions conduct activities consistent with the national efforts to increase the enrollment of traditionally underrepresented peoples in graduate education. In 2022, the National Name Exchange became part of the Council of Graduate Schools and is now managed by the Council of Graduate Schools.

The annual enrollment period for students is underway and will run until July 15. Institutions that enroll students in the NNE are able to recruit from the pool of all students enrolled for a calendar year. Ellie Ivey in the Graduate School is Charlotte’s designated NNE Coordinator and annually communicates with eligible UNC Charlotte students to participate in the program. Ellie can also support your efforts to recruit these exemplary students to your graduate programs.

For 2023, the NNE database currently has just over 3,500 new enrollees from 61 institutions. A list of institutions with new enrollees is below. To utilize the Exchange, please email Ellie to coordinate a time to identify your search parameters (detailed below) and pull your lists of prospective applicants from Slate.

Attend a Graduate Recruitment Fair

Representatives from Graduate Admissions participate in select recruitment fairs each year. The Admissions team keeps a Recruitment Event list of programs you can attend to recruit prospective students. Information on international student recruitment opportunities is also available from NAFSA:  Association of International Educators and EducationUSA.

Host a Telethon

Support your faculty and/or currently enrolled graduate students to call prospective applicants. Personal outreach is a tremendous way to connect with individuals.

Promote your Programs via Social Media

Email Ellie Ivey, efeely@uncc.edu, any social media-ready artwork/content and she will propagate the Graduate Admissions Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn accounts.

Purchase Graduate Records Examination (GRE) Search Information

Purchase names and contact information of prospective students using the GRE Search. To access the GRE Search site, contact Ellie Ivey.

Offer an Early Entry Program

Encourage UNC Charlotte juniors with a strong GPA to apply to the Early Entry program (if your program has one).  Visit undergraduate courses to share information about early entry opportunities and engage exemplary students early.

Offer an Accelerated Master’s Program

Academically talented high school seniors and undergraduate UNC Charlotte freshmen are encouraged to apply for admission to an Accelerated Master’s Program and begin work toward a graduate degree before completion of the baccalaureate degree.

Connect with Foreign Institutions

Establish “pipelines’ with colleagues at other universities (both domestic and international) to recruit top students; offer to visit the institution to recruit students. Capitalize on the University’s existing links with institutions around the globe to build collaborative partnerships. EducationUSA offers a plethora of resources to help.   

Retain Currently Enrolled Students

Support and encourage continuing students to register for classes; retaining the current class is as important as enrolling the new class of students.

Leverage Academic Opportunities and Professional Development Events

Initiate summer research programs to bring exemplary students to campus and then use the opportunity to recruit them to your graduate program.

Advertise in Professional Conferences

Take advantage of conferences in your discipline or in interdisciplinary programs focused on diversity, such as the Society for the Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science and Engineering (SACNAS), the Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students (ABRCMS), the Society of Women Engineers, and Op-Ed (N.C. Alliance to Create Opportunity Through Education).

Prepare Promotional Information

Develop a PowerPoint/Google Slides, Flash, or other multi-media presentation to show at conferences and when visiting other universities that will provide prospective students with a visual representation of your program, facilities, and people. Short videos are also excellent to include on a program’s website.

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Graduate Student Recruitment Materials Available

Graduate Admissions offers GPDs an updated suite of collateral materials for use in their recruitment plans. Contact Ellie Ivey to coordinate delivery or printing options.

Check out our Communications Toolkit!

 

Effectively Recruit McNair Scholars

The Ronald E. McNair Postbaccalaureate Achievement Program helps prepare eligible participants for doctoral studies through involvement in research and scholarly projects. Participants are typically from disadvantaged backgrounds, generally from underrepresented segments of society, and have strong academic potential.

Staff in the Office of Graduate Admissions actively recruits McNair Scholars at the McNair regional conference each summer and routinely waives their application fees. Note that the fee waiver must be requested by the applicant prior to submitting the application for admission. Applicants should contact Ellie Ivey to request the fee waiver; they must also email her a letter of participation as a McNair Scholar. Ivey also has access to the McNair Scholars database of participants.

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Consider Full-File Review, aka Holistic Admissions

Ensure access to post-baccalaureate education by understanding, promoting, and adopting full-file review (holistic admissions). Identify applicant qualities that contribute to success in the graduate program by ensuring that no single factor leads to inclusion or exclusion from admissions consideration. Doing so may increase program diversity and student success. The 2016 Council of Graduate Schools report on holistic admissions states, “Diversity is essential to the overall success of graduate programs. All students in a program, regardless of background, benefit from taking part in a learning environment that reflects various kinds of diversity.” Additional resources include: