Digitalizing Student Admission: Paperless recruitment process

How can we change the time-consuming admission process into a more efficient one? How can we prepare the university for the peak time when many people apply? How to reduce the paperwork to benefit digital operations?

This article will help you answer these questions.

The key elements of seamless digitized admissions

Going digital in higher education means saying goodbye to all that paperwork in the admission process. And it’s not just the admission office that’s affected; it’s also the enrollment, registrar, financial aid, and accounting departments that get a digital makeover. 

Can these departments be made more effective in this digital age? Here are some key features that will help them work smoothly:

Electronic signatures

Applicants sign documents electronically, eliminating the need for physical paperwork. This accelerates the admission process and enhances security and compliance by ensuring the authenticity of signatures. 

Document uploads

Applications, letters of recommendation, essays, and other documents can be securely and conveniently submitted online. This simplifies the application process and reduces the risk of documents being lost or misplaced. 

Online payments

Payment integration enables applicants to pay application fees and tuition electronically. This not only makes the financial aspect of admissions more convenient for students but also streamlines payment processing for the university, reducing administrative work. 

Enrollment workflows

Enrollment workflows, integrated into Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems, help institutions manage applicant data efficiently. These systems automate communication, track applicant progress, and facilitate personalized interactions, ultimately optimizing the admissions journey.

Automated communication

Paperless admissions utilize automation for communication throughout the process. Applicants receive short messages with confirmation of document receipt, information about deadlines, and invitations to schedule interviews or submit surveys. This keeps applicants informed and engaged and reduces manual communication overhead. 

By incorporating these elements, higher education institutions create a seamless, efficient, and secure paperless admission process. This improves the applicant experience and allows admissions staff to focus on more strategic aspects of their roles, ultimately contributing to higher levels of satisfaction and the overall success of the institution.

However, digitalizing the application process presents some challenges, including:

• time and effort needed to train the staff and implement the technological solutions
• risk of data security concerning sensitive student information
• possible barriers for applicants who have limited digital access

Planning and resources can help you overcome these obstacles. It’s worth the effort because the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. Taking the possible risks into account makes the paperless admission process possible.

Streamlined, sustainable, successful: The benefits of transitioning to a paperless admission

Students, faculty, and staff will benefit from going digital in more ways than one. Here are three main reasons why universities should go paperless:

A better student experience

• A paperless admission process makes it accessible from anywhere, eliminating the inconvenience of traveling for applications. 
• Students get shorter processing times and shorter waiting times, which leads to a better service quality overall. This student-centric approach makes admission more efficient, convenient, and eco-conscious.
• It helps meet environmental sustainability goals by reducing paper consumption and cutting transportation and waste management costs.

Now students have a place to go to see these opportunities and submit applications to participate. We saw a pretty sharp increase in engagement once we started focusing on experience – CMO, public research university.

Source: Forrester Report: The Total Economic Impact Of Salesforce Education Cloud, October 2020

Improved document storage and security

• Digital applications are submitted, reviewed, and stored electronically, ensuring rapid access to data. This accelerates the application review process and allows for efficient data analysis.
• Electronic document storage and retrieval greatly enhance data analysis capabilities. With information readily available at your fingertips, it’s easier to make data-driven decisions and identify trends.
• The risk of lost or misplaced documents is virtually eliminated, contributing to increased accuracy in the admission process.

In Salesforce, the enrollment team can prepare a lot of work in advance, like set up templates, so that they’re ready to go when needed. It gives the team the ability to execute with consistency and excellence, and it’s pretty easy for them to use. Now somebody can be on vacation and somebody else can step in and take for them and there is not a loss of business continuity – CMO, public research university.

Source: Forrester Report: The Total Economic Impact Of Salesforce Education Cloud, October 2020

Streamlined operations and increased efficiency

• It helps smaller admissions teams boost their capacity to handle larger application volumes efficiently. Overflowing file folders and manual data entry tasks that consume time can be eliminated, reducing administrative overhead.
• It facilitates assessment of the Return on Investment (ROI) of recruitment efforts. With automatic tracking of application starts and submissions, institutions gain insights into the effectiveness of their outreach strategies, allowing for data-driven adjustments and improved targeting.
• It sets your school apart. Prospective students are attracted to institutions that offer a seamless, tech-savvy experience.
• It yields significant time and cost savings. Reduced paper and printing expenses contribute to a greener environment and deliver substantial financial benefits.

We saw some early successes in admissions and enrollment: We had the largest summer enrollment in the history of the university. We would not have been able to have that level of engagement and promotion of summer programs without Salesforce. I don’t think our peer institutions are saying the same thing. – CIO, public research university.

Source: Forrester Report: The Total Economic Impact Of Salesforce Education Cloud, October 2020

How can the Salesforce solution improve university admission processes?

Fortunately, we are currently in a period where embracing digital technology in higher education is feasible and highly advantageous. Investing in online classes, digital resources, or changing the way you apply for school doesn’t just improve your university’s reputation now but helps your institution in the future. 

It matches the expectations and values of modern higher education perfectly. And Salesforce is the right answer: it helps universities to make a paperless recruitment process.