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View From The Edge
magazine.
Today, many colleges and universities are under tremendous financial stress, especially as the fallout from the pandemic continues. While growing revenue is critical to long-term prosperity, several institutions have been forced to cut expenses, lay off staff, and eliminate programs. This may help free up budget dollars temporarily, but this solution is not the pathway to prosperity. Competitive institutions of the future will continuously invest in technology, program development, faculty enrichment, and student success and retention.
In partnership with Edge, the Core Education Foundation aims to provide institutions with access to a deeper pool of resources to grow their revenue, while being able to better achieve their mission and serve their students and staff. As a non-profit education organization, Core aligns its resources to support the goals of each organization, with all revenue flowing directly to the institution. Supporting services include marketing, admissions, student services, financial aid, global resources, academic services, finance, information technology, legal, and human resources. The Core team provides expertise in each of these areas and through these services can help balance all functional areas within an organization, creating the momentum that is needed to accelerate major initiatives. While new areas of program development may be suggested, all faculty and academic decisions will continue to be made by the institution.
Positioning for Success
As Core’s Implementation Partner, Edge will be lending its extensive expertise in strategic IT leadership, business systems modernization projects, and streamlining the adoption of transformative educational technologies. As a collaborative team, the best-fit technologies that support the institution’s long-term strategic goals will be identified and implemented. Through a 90-day feasibility study, an organization can work with Core to determine if support services would be useful in effectively achieving their goals. Throughout this timeframe, Core and Edge will gain a better understanding of institutional growth goals, technology needs, marketing efforts, student admissions, academic programs, and overall operations.
Once an institution becomes affiliated with Core, there will be a three-month “on-boarding” process that is designed to build working relationships and detail how Core will support the organization’s specific needs. During this on-boarding process, there will be a high priority on identifying the ways an institution can further grow their revenue. With resources that focus on first-time freshmen, transfer students, graduate students, and professional programs, Core’s marketing and admissions support teams partner with an institution’s current staff to explore creative ways to attract and retain more students and deliver a superior college experience.
Personalized Technology Roadmap
During the first year of affiliation, a technology roadmap is created to outline the most appropriate software solutions that will help position an institution for success. Core affiliated institutions will have access to best-in-class, cloud hosted enterprise software and tools that can often be too costly or complex, especially for smaller institutions. Available as modules, these systems can be configured to match the institution’s business needs, and since they are cloud-hosted, can help minimize capital expenditures and quickly scale as those needs change. The platforms used by Core are standardized versions of the solutions used at major, innovative institutions.
Over time, the team will work together to standardize on a cloud based configurable platform that will help upgrade legacy technology and aligns best with an institution’s long-term goals. However, institutions may choose not to transition to Core platforms, but can adopt one or more cloud based software modules that better fits their plans for growth.
Even before COVID impacted nearly every facet of higher education, many colleges and universities were grappling with rising costs and strained budgets. The challenge many institutions now face is not only remaining resilient during these unexpected times, but determining how to effectively mature and expand organizational capabilities and capacity. Core hopes to help organizations navigate these questions and develop a long-term plan that allows them to remain competitive, prosperous, and future forward.
