‘Denver Bound’ to Attract Non-Resident Students

Barb Edwards talks to faculty and staff about the campaign launched to attract non-resident students to the Downtown Denver Campus.

Office of Marketing Communications

The Downtown Denver Campus of the University of Colorado at Denver and Health Sciences Center is one of the best kept secrets in the country. The campus has it all: a top-notch educational experience, outstanding faculty, a 14-to-1 student-faculty ratio, and access to outdoor activities and all the best venues a large city has to offer. About 60 faculty and staff met in the North Classroom Atrium on Feb. 17 to find out more about spreading the word.

Higher education marketing consulting firm Lipman Hearne researched the strengths and needs of the campus and continues to work with the university to launch "Denver Bound," a full-scale non-resident recruitment effort specifically designed to promote the Downtown Denver Campus to out-of-state students.

"This is the quintessential institution a lot of people are looking for and never find," said Tom Abrahamson, managing director and principal at the Chicago-based firm. The Downtown Denver Campus, he said, has exactly what college students need – they just don't know it yet.

Administration, Admissions and the Office of Marketing Communications have collaborated with Lipman Hearne to get the word out and bolster the institution's non-resident student numbers.

"We've done a lot of research over the past 24 months to begin to understand the Denver campus versus other campuses across the country," explained Mark Heckler, provost. "We wanted to know how it relates to other urban research universities in the United States."

Among the findings was that only one other urban research university – the University of Massachusetts-Boston – did not have residence halls. Soon, U-Mass in Boston will stand alone. In fall 2006, University Village, a residence hall, will open slightly west of the Administration Building. Phase I will have approximately 700 rooms. Phase II, to open the next year, will have an additional 600 rooms. Add those numbers to the Regency Hotel dormitory development and the possibility of an AHEC acquisition and development of the Executive Towers, and within the next few years Downtown Denver Campus students will have access to approximately 2,000 rooms.

The Downtown Denver Campus has a low number of out-of-state students – 213 – plus a large number of part-time students and a disproportionate number of graduate-vs.-undergraduate students. As part of Vision 2010, which has UCDHSC in the top 10 urban campuses in the nation by 2010, Denver Bound is targeting younger, full-time, non-resident students.

Barb Edwards, director of admissions, has spearheaded the efforts on campus and noted that while strides have been made in the past decade to get a younger, more diverse student base, this campaign will enable those numbers to soar. For instance, there were 296 freshmen in fall 1994 compared to 737 in fall 2004. The percentage of undergraduates who were full time in 1994 was 59 percent; in 2004 it was 71 percent. The average age of undergraduates in 1994 was 26.5; that number dropped to 24.3 by 2004.

Cynthia Gayles has joined the Admissions staff, coming from CU-Boulder, to help facilitate the non-resident recruitment efforts. In leaving Boulder, Gayles was able to bring with her a database of 150 high school counselors from all over the country. Within the next week, that database will expand to 300 counselors.

The campaign is kicking off late in the academic game, all involved admit. Most high school seniors have chosen a college by May 1, and Denver Bound has just begun.

"We're really truncating the process," Abrahamson admits. "We're late out of the gate."  Three personalized postcards will be sent out in succession. Each includes a personal web link that directs students to a “micro” website detailing everything the university has to offer.

The centerpiece for this effort is a new scholarship for non-resident students that will be offered to students who are a good fit for the institution. There are many students still undecided, he said, and having a highly rated institution show such individual interest in them might be just the incentive they need.

Edwards noted the goal is to double non-resident numbers each year until 2010 – more than 2,000 new out-of-state students. For fall 2005, with about 40,000 postcards being sent to students in targeted areas, the university hopes for 213 new non-resident recruits. Thus the goal for fall 2006 is 426 new recruits. The campaign, she stressed, isn't a one-time effort; it's an ongoing and progressive program that will change the face of the student body on this campus.

Gayles will be spending much of the next few months spreading the word about at recruitment fairs across the country. She will be talking to high school juniors in preparation for the incoming class of 2006.

A new website dedicated to the “Denver Bound” campaign will be up and running in the near future to detail the campaign and scholarship opportunities at http://abovetheordinary.cudenver.edu/.