Strategic Enrollment Plan Year One FAQ

What is the Strategic Enrollment Plan? 

The Strategic Enrollment Plan (SEP) is a university-wide effort to improve how students discover, choose, enroll at, and succeed at UCCS. The plan aligns people, processes, technology, and resources to support student success from initial interest through graduation.  

Why did UCCS create a Strategic Enrollment Plan? 

The Strategic Enrollment Plan was developed to remove barriers, improve the student experience, strengthen enrollment outcomes, and create a more coordinated approach to student success. The plan brings together faculty, staff, and leaders from across the university to address challenges and identify opportunities for improvement.  

How does the Strategic Enrollment Plan support students? 

The Strategic Enrollment Plan focuses on making UCCS easier to navigate, easier to choose, and better equipped to help students succeed. Initiatives include improving advising, strengthening transfer pathways, simplifying tuition processes, modernizing technology, improving scheduling practices, and enhancing communication throughout the student journey.  

How can faculty and staff support the Strategic Enrollment Plan? 

Student success is a shared responsibility. Faculty and staff support the Strategic Enrollment Plan by identifying barriers, improving processes, using data-informed decision-making, collaborating across departments, and helping create positive experiences for students.  

Why did UCCS create multiple task forces instead of addressing these issues separately? 

Many student challenges cross departmental boundaries. Students do not experience UCCS one office at a time. They experience one university. The Strategic Enrollment Plan brought together faculty, staff, and subject matter experts from across campus to solve problems collaboratively and develop solutions that improve the entire student journey. 

How is UCCS using student feedback to inform decisions? 

Student feedback is a critical part of the Strategic Enrollment Plan. Through surveys, focus groups, advising conversations, orientation feedback, retention data, and student success metrics, task forces are using student perspectives to identify barriers, evaluate services, and guide continuous improvement efforts. 

What does "shared responsibility for student success" mean? 

Shared responsibility means that enrollment and student success are not the responsibility of a single office. Faculty, advisors, student affairs professionals, academic departments, enrollment services, communications teams, technology teams, and campus leadership all contribute to how students experience UCCS. The Strategic Enrollment Plan aims to strengthen collaboration across these areas. 

How has collaboration improved because of the Strategic Enrollment Plan? 

One of the most significant outcomes of the Strategic Enrollment Plan has been increased collaboration across campus. Many task forces brought together groups that do not traditionally work closely together, creating opportunities to solve challenges more quickly, improve communication, share data, and coordinate services in support of students. 

What were the Strategic Enrollment Plan's major accomplishments during Year One? 

Why is improving the transfer student experience a priority? 

Transfer students represent one of UCCS's greatest opportunities to expand access and support student success. Year Two efforts focus on creating clearer pathways, improving credit evaluation processes, simplifying transfer requirements, and helping students understand how prior coursework applies toward their degrees.  

How will transfer students benefit from this work? 

Students will experience more streamlined processes, clearer degree pathways, improved communication, and faster evaluations of transfer credit. The goal is to reduce barriers and make it easier for students to move efficiently toward graduation.  

Why is transfer student success receiving so much attention in Year Two? 

Transfer students make up an important and growing student population, including students coming from community colleges, concurrent enrollment programs, military pathways, and other universities. Year Two efforts focus on simplifying transfer processes, improving credit evaluation, reducing barriers, and helping transfer students quickly understand how their previous coursework applies toward a UCCS degree. 

What improvements can transfer students expect in the future? 

Transfer students can expect efforts focused on faster credit evaluations, clearer degree pathways, improved transfer communications, more transparent transfer guides, and greater coordination between UCCS, community colleges, and academic departments. 

How is UCCS improving advising? 

The Advising Task Force expanded advising capacity, launched a new Enrollment Center, implemented a student exit survey, enhanced proactive outreach efforts, and continued development of early alert systems to help students receive support before challenges become barriers.  

What is the Enrollment Center? 

The Enrollment Center serves as a one-stop location where students can receive assistance with orientation, registration, advising questions, enrollment holds, student portal navigation, and other enrollment-related services.  

What are early alerts? 

Early alerts help faculty, advisors, and support staff identify students who may need academic assistance. These alerts allow the university to connect students with tutoring, advising, coaching, and other resources before academic difficulties become more significant.  

What does affordability mean beyond tuition and financial aid? 

Affordability includes the total student experience. It involves helping students graduate on time, reducing barriers to enrollment, supporting transfer credits, providing flexible scheduling options, improving access to advising and support services, and helping students make informed financial decisions throughout their educational journey. 

How does UCCS help students maximize the value of their degree? 

UCCS focuses on helping students access high-quality academic programs, personalized support services, experiential learning opportunities, career preparation, and pathways that help them complete degrees efficiently and successfully. The Strategic Enrollment Plan seeks to strengthen these experiences while making them more accessible. 

What changes were made to tuition? 

UCCS simplified its tuition structure to reduce complexity and make educational costs easier for students and families to understand. The new model provides greater predictability and transparency throughout a student's academic journey.  

How does the Strategic Enrollment Plan support affordability? 

Affordability extends beyond tuition and financial aid. The Strategic Enrollment Plan focuses on creating clear pathways to graduation, supporting transfer and concurrent enrollment opportunities, expanding scholarship opportunities, and helping students make informed financial decisions. 

What is Think 30? 

Think 30 encourages students to complete 30 credit hours each academic year to help them stay on track for graduation. The initiative can reduce overall educational costs by helping students complete their degrees more efficiently.  

What is Slate? 

Slate is UCCS's student relationship management platform that supports recruitment, admissions, communication, orientation, advising, and student success efforts. It helps create a more seamless and connected experience for students.  

How has technology improved the student experience? 

Technology improvements have enhanced communication, streamlined processes, improved access to information, strengthened data-informed decision-making, expanded mobile app functionality, and reduced administrative barriers for students.  

What technology initiatives are underway? 

Current efforts include expanding Slate capabilities, implementing Ad Astra scheduling tools, improving transfer credit processing, enhancing analytics and reporting, strengthening communications platforms, and exploring AI-enabled solutions that improve efficiency and service delivery.  

How is technology helping improve the student experience? 

Technology initiatives are helping students experience a more seamless university experience. Improvements include integrated communication tools, streamlined admissions and orientation processes, mobile app enhancements, better access to information, improved scheduling technology, and more effective student success tools and analytics. 

How is UCCS using data differently because of the Strategic Enrollment Plan? 

Task forces increasingly use data to identify challenges, measure progress, evaluate initiatives, and inform decision-making. This includes enrollment trends, website analytics, transfer outcomes, scheduling data, advising data, student feedback, and student success metrics. Using data helps UCCS move beyond assumptions and focus resources where they can have the greatest impact. 

Why is course scheduling important? 

Course scheduling directly affects students' ability to access required classes and stay on track for graduation. UCCS is using enrollment data, student feedback, and scheduling analytics to improve course availability, timing, and flexibility.  

What changes might students see in future schedules? 

Students may see more flexible scheduling options, improved course availability, more predictable scheduling patterns, and course offerings that better align with student demand and academic pathways.  

Why is marketing part of the Strategic Enrollment Plan? 

Students begin forming impressions of UCCS long before they apply. Marketing, branding, communications, and digital experiences help prospective students understand who UCCS is, what it offers, and why it may be a good fit for their educational goals.  

What is meant by improving the "digital front door"? 

The digital front door refers to the online experiences that shape a student's first impression of UCCS, including websites, digital advertising, search results, social media, and online content. UCCS is working to make these experiences easier to find, understand, and navigate.