[Alumni-chat] Selling Anitoch! (Long Tail)

[Brian Aker]

Hi!

When I recently attended an Alumni Meeting here in Seattle I was left  
with a very different impression on how well Antioch is Selling itself.

The meeting was one telling about Antioch's history... a good story,  
but not really the rebellious story which was Antioch. It left out  
all of the history that had passion to it. When I look at the  
material that the college produces I see this lack of attention to  
its strengths left out.

The other piece I picked up? My partner, who was not an Antioch  
Student, listened to a story about a librarian peeking into the  
computers and checking up on what students were reading. She was  
amazed at how there was no uproar in the room over this. She works at  
the University of Washington and has a staff of both employees and  
students, and couldn't imagine invading student's privacy in this  
manner.

On reflection I had let the privacy point filter in and out of my  
head, and just thought "typical Antioch".  On later reflection I  
thought a bit more about Antioch's paternalistic nature when I was a  
student and how much irritated me then. From listening to this talk,  
all I could see was an environment that has just increased its nature  
toward "the college knows best".

Yuck!

When I was a student, many of those surrounding me were transfer  
students (among the BS majors it was well over half for 1994). It  
would be interesting to know how this mix has changed over the years.  
Transfer students would be more sensitive to paternalistic behavior  
then entering students (though I can see them growing to hate it).

Even if the message being presented about the school is wrong, I am  
wondering whether its a time to update the behavior of the school to  
the nature of the institution. Antioch is very much Long Tail, it  
would be nice to see it recognize this and play to its strengths.

Cheers,
	-Brian



On Mar 26, 2007, at 7:21 AM, Seth Gordon wrote:

> I submit to you and to everyone else:
>
> 1. If you equate total enrollment woes with just the admissions  
> office you
> are missing the complete story (this is true at any college or  
> university)
>
> 2. It takes resources to tell a story.
>
> 3. One of the crucial elements of marketing is "keeping promises."  
> If the
> story told does not meet up with the expectations of the  
> individuals who
> hope to experience that story than you will have a problem.
>
> Having worked in the admissions office at the college some time ago
> (2001-2003) and knowing several of the staff presently I can tell  
> you that
> admissions does a very good job of telling the story they can tell,  
> with
> the resources they do have.
>
> Also, the comparison resources of the other colleges mentioned is  
> not the
> same. While Antioch may have been held up with the Unviersity of  
> Chicago,
> Reed, Oberlin and Swarthmore some time ago, it is simply not in that
> league anymore --for better or worse, it is an unfair comparison to  
> make.
>
> Antioch has some challenges ahead to be sure. I recommend asking more
> complete questions than taking the easy way out by casting blame at  
> any
> one part of the organization.
>
> Seth Gordon '01
>
>
>
> Alumni Chat List <alumni-chat at w3.antioch.edu> writes:
>> Antioch has been "left behind" for one simple reason:  its story  
>> is not
>> told or sold adequately by the Antioch admissions office.    
>> Antioch does
>> indeed have an attractive story which should be told, but that  
>> story is
>> NOT told adequately or attractively.
>
>
> Seth E. Gordon, M.A.
> Associate Director of Enrollment Services
> Antioch University McGregor
> 800 Livermore St.
> Yellow Springs, OH  45387
> 937-769-1825
> www.mcgregor.edu
>
> _______________________________________________
> Alumni-chat mailing list
> Alumni-chat at w3.antioch.edu
> http://w3.antioch.edu/mailman/listinfo/alumni-chat

--
_______________________________________________________
Brian "Krow" Aker, brian at tangent.org
Seattle, Washington
http://krow.net/
http://tangent.org/
_______________________________________________________
You can't grep a dead tree.