It was a pleasure to meet Principal Eid and Ms. Willis at the gallery day in Stayer Center. I felt that we had a very genuine discussion about the scenario we face at Clay High, and while I expected there to be a lot of overlap of what they already know and what we found in our research, I was glad to see that we were able to identify new factors and trends that may help us address Clay High’s issues. I felt that the journey map was the most valuable part of our day, explaining and pointing out the shortcomings at each moment of the school decision process.
Here were the main takeaways:
- There is a clear obstacle created by the school district government when it uses marketing and brochures to boost Adams High’s appearance and bring down the other three high schools in the area. The school has a lot going against them, but we do think there are ways to circumvent those efforts and contribute to the word of mouth and relationships that helps Clay High get the enrollment.
- We are dealing with two targets: students and parents. Each have their individual needs and goals, so the solution to increase enrollment at Clay will be a multifaceted one. The immersions and ethnographies certainly helped, but we may want to see a few more subsets of students and parents to really get a good sense of the whole population.
- There are very addressable issues with the school’s image. For Clay High to be an art magnet, it should embrace their students’ art throughout the halls, give it color, and enliven the environment. As seen with the immersion, Clay feels repressive, strict, and uninspiring in certain parts of the campus, especially with its patrol and security protocol. Improving those parts may help it make a more inviting place for prospective students.
- As for gaps, I do think that we haven’t really addressed the socioeconomic element of this issue as much. One thing we found and began to consider through our expert interview was that where people attend high school and why they do are drastically different for people with different financial or racial identities. Lower class families are less likely to look at what we assumed to be the primary source for information and will simply rely on word of mouth or just proximity and safety. So while improving the marketing materials may be important, it may be more worthwhile to design a program that revolves around improving how families of Clay students communicate with prospective families. This leads to another discussion – what type of students are we really looking for? Do we simply want to increase enrollment? Or do we want to target a certain socioeconomic class? I do think that while our interviews have provided us with perspective from the extreme ends of the parents, we should pay more attention to the lower income family and minority families more, since it would be more representative of the surrounding South Bend community.