Discover What’s Next!

Good morning, and welcome to September!

This is the month for Friendship, Sewing, Hunger Action and Happy Cats, for awareness of Sepsis, Childhood Cancer, Chiari, Pulmonary Fibrosis and Ovarian Cancer, to sign up for a Library Card and Read a New Book, to Prevent Suicide, and to enjoy Honey and Sourdough, Chicken and Mushrooms, Shakes and Piano music. (Phew!) 

Today in particular, though, we celebrate Letter Writing, Building Code Staff, Ginger Cats, tofu and cherry popovers – as well as “Chicken Boy” (a 22’ statue in Los Angeles) and Emma M. Nutt (the first female telephone operator, 144 years ago in Sept 1878). 

I’ve been kept pretty busy this week, with an academic retreat at my alma mater (Western U) and the official launch of Eduvation Circles (keep reading). Today, I take possession of my “grandpuppy” Millie, whom I’ll be dogsitting for a few days… so you won't see another Insider newsletter for a little while...

Join Circles!

Hopefully you saw my detailed exposition on Tuesday (“Engaging You All”) describing the next stage in the evolution of this newsletter, an interactive virtual community platform called Eduvation Circles. 

Hundreds of you signed up and started to engage right away – for which my sincere thanks! Some of these brave souls were presidents, VPs, deans, directors, and also service staff, faculty, and grad students. You’ve all kept me really busy for a couple of days, but it’s a really gratifying kind of busy. I’ve had wonderful interactions already with hundreds of members directly, and started learning about their backgrounds and research interests. So far this week, there been 66 posts, 33 comments and 99 RSVPs for upcoming Zoom and livestream events – plus 357 private chat messages between members. I’m delighted to see conversations bubbling up so quickly!

Let me urge you all once again to take this opportunity to join the Reader Circle, or even the Inner Circle, completely free for at least 6 months. Simply visit https://circles.eduvation.ca and set up a profile. (If you log in with LinkedIn, half your profile will even be populated for you automatically.) 

For a quick, 5-minute overview of Eduvation Circles, check out this video.

What You Missed

I’ve promised members of Eduvation Circles that they’ll get exclusive early and complete access to my blogs, curated collections and news items. If you didn’t sign up on Tuesday, here’s what you’ve missed already:

TMU Bold Athletics

I shared 2 launch videos from Toronto Metropolitan U for their new athletics brand, “TMU Bold,” and their new mascot, which completely replaces Eggy the Ram. For my MarCom Circle members, I wrote up a more detailed report based on several sources.  Reader Circle  |  Brand Case Study  |  YouTube

International Sources

I shared a couple of cool “graphs of the day” regarding international student migration. One, from OliverWyman, is animated in the source document (see above). The other, from ICEF, showed just how different Canada’s source countries were in 2020 than Australia, the US or UK. (Hint: we get 2-3x as many students from one country in particular.)  Reader Circle

Ukraine Assistance?

I circulated a reader query about Canadian institutions offering tuition assistance, or even free tuition, to students from Ukraine. I shared one that came to mind, Brandon U. If you know of others, please add a comment here!

Inflationary Woes

Another “graph of the day” came from the Globe & Mail, and showed how inflation has been outpacing wagesin Canada since April. I speculate that it has only magnified the challenges CdnPSE is facing recruiting and retaining talent right now. 

Ask Ken Anything!

I held one of my weekly virtual office hours, “AKA Live,” yesterday afternoon. These live sessions are currently offered only to Insider members (which is free for 6 months, remember). We tackled some interesting marcom questions and enjoyed some small talk – the fewer people who show up, the more personal these discussions turn out to be!

RMIT Campaign

I’ve selected and analyzed a dozen new PSE videos for my #ICYMI collection on Circles, and will be publishing them there over the next 2 weeks. Yesterday it was RMIT’s “Discover What’s Next” campaign (see below). Better yet, join Circles and explore the entire year’s worth!  #ICYMI

What Should I Write Next?

This week I’ve been polling members on Circles about a number of things, but in particular I’ve been seeking their input on what topic I should research next to write about in my blog. So far, with more than 40 votes, it looks like a neck-and-neck tie between “Hiring Challenges” and “Student Preferences for Online/In-Person.” 

If you’ve got an opinion, now’s your chance to weigh in too!

Your Personal Digest

On Eduvation Circles, you’ll be able to “follow” certain topics and join certain groups, thereby customizing the notifications you receive. These can pop up in your browser or mobile app, based on your notification settings, but you can also opt for a daily digest email of anything you missed in those areas of interest.

So, for example, here’s the email digest I received last night, at my “Test Insider” account:

As you can see, my Test account is following me specifically, as well as activity in #ICYMI and the Brand Campaigns collection. These daily digest emails may not be 100% as pretty as this Insider, but it also doesn’t require me to spend hours preparing it manually – and arrives a day or more earlier!

#ICYMI

Australian universities are among the most sophisticated marketers in academia. (Navitas and Study Group have raised the bar there for everyone.) So, I frequently find some inspiring examples of recruitment videos from “down under.”

Discover What’s Next

RMIT University (originally the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology) has released a series of commercials this summer building on the “What’s Next” theme. In the relatively calm :60 spot above, “Discover What’s Next,” music sets a tone of anticipation as the narrator explains “You can feel it. That drive to take what you have and launch it to the next level. To share the energy of people who feel the same way. To wrestle the potential out of the world, harness your creativity, give it form, and set off into an adventure of your own making.” Fast-paced cuts, bright colours, and slick transitions show us students engaged in labs, VR, pick-up basketball, work experiences, conversations on the lawn, and more as they “redefine how the world works.” Ultimately, the spot assures us, “people like you will forge what’s next.” (I also point to their :30 sec spot – see the whole article on Circles.)

As always, thanks for reading… but I’ll thank you even MORE if you do that reading on Eduvation Circles!

I hope your back-to-school preparations are going smoothly. Have a great weekend, and I’ll likely publish this email newsletter again sometime next week. (In the meantime, though, I’ll be posting on Circles throughout the day, every day.)

Stay safe and keep cool!

Ken