The Dashboard is the Last Place Your Enrollment Problem Shows Up
About this episode
Mallory discusses enrollment challenges with Megan Cabrera, focusing on the concept of 'residual momentum' in enrollment management.
Mallory is joined by Megan Cabrera, Director of Strategic Enrollment Management at Okanagan College, about an enrollment trap she calls “residual momentum,” where funnels look stable after marketing spend is cut, then collapse years later. Megan recounts pulling investment from a long-time feeder market during a budget crunch; applications initially held steady, but after partner institutions became degree-granting competitors, yield dropped from 25–50 students to 3–5. They discuss why dashboards lag reality and what earlier signals to watch, including engagement velocity, market penetration, conversion quality, competitor visibility, and relationship health with high schools. Megan argues for integrated, cross-department KPIs to fix handoffs, shares a digital check-in system built with IT to improve service and capture friction-point data, and cautions that AI and CRMs worsen problems without connected systems, data governance, shared definitions, and clear ownership.
People in this episode
Host: Mallory Willsea
Guest: Megan Cabrera
Topics covered
- enrollment management
- marketing
- data governance
- higher education
- AI in education
Keywords
- enrollment
- dashboards
- marketing spend
- applications
- KPI
- AI
- CRM
- high schools
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: Okanagan College
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