Dive Brief:
- Rick Bischoff, vice president of enrollment management at Case Western Reserve University, says that a two-person review team for applications sounded like a silly idea initially, but grew to be a vital part of the school's approach to efficient strategy building in student intake.
- In an interview with the Chronicle of Higher Education, he points out that multi-person review teams allow for faster and more thorough reading, an added level of accountability for employee evaluation, and saved time and money in processing forms.
- Bischoff also points out new processes can require new training methods and relationship cultivation to convince team members to buy into new processes which may change work schedules and environments.
Dive Insight:
Schools which may consider following Case Western's model of application review might also consider the ramifications it can have on costs like staff salaries and benefits, additional technology for processing and training to adjust staff to new time requirements for process completion.
It may also require more focus on areas like eliminating application bias among readers, and developing new standards of consideration to ensure that teams are on the same page, instead of individual reviewers.