Webcast

Campus Landscaping: Impact on Recruitment and Retention

62%* of high school seniors made their choice of institution on the basis of the appearance of the campus buildings and grounds. Most of them made that decision within the first 15 minutes of arriving on your campus. The landscape is continually sending messages to students, faculty, and staff; is yours saying what you want it to?

The built environments of our colleges and universities – both the architecture and the landscape – have affective powers that come to bear in the recruitment and retention of students, faculty, and staff. The campus environment is continually sending symbolic as well as functional messages but we often don't realize that the message received is not the intended one. In looking specifically at the role campus environments play in student recruitment and retention, this intriguing webcast pulls together current research on social forces and cultural trends in arenas as diverse as retail anthropology, crime prevention theory, marketing and packaging, trading up and "masstige", experiential economics, demographics, and the "aesthetic imperative." Participants will come away with fresh eyes to see not only their own campus, but also the role those environments play in student recruitment and retention.

"The 62% figure is from Ernest Boyer's book "College: The Undergraduate Experience In America". Harper & Row, 1987. Boyer goes on to say that the most important person in recruiting new students may not be the VP for admissions, but the grounds superintendent. Some might argue that it is out–dated data, but similar findings were established in another survey, and in my own surveys last spring of high school students, which indicated that appearance influenced over 80% of potential students." Phil Waite

Discussion Points:

• Learn the distinction between symbolic and functional messages encoded in the landscape of your campus.
• Learn how retailers shape their environments for the "recruitment and retention" of shoppers and how that applies to higher education environments.
• Understand how shoppers perceive products through packaging, and what implications this has for the "products" of higher education.
• Learn the vital importance aesthetics play in today's culture, and why campuses tend to be behind the curve in this regard.
• Understand the role that "experience of place" plays in today's culture.

Who Should Attend?

This webcast is aimed at: college and university administrators, admissions officers, managers in student recruitment and retention, campus planners, university architects and landscape architects, facilities management personnel, university marketers, and anyone who cares about the appearance of campus.

Non-Architect's Guide to Major Capital Projects

 

 

Author, Phillp Waite, provides non-architects with a broad framework of understanding in the steps, phases, and sequence of planning, designing, and delivering a capital project.

Buy

Presenter:

Phillip Waite is an associate professor in landscape architecture at Washington State University (WSU). Prior to joining the faculty ranks at WSU in 2000, he served for 14 years as the assistant director of capital planning and capital budgets, campus planner, and campus landscape architect at the University of Idaho.

While at Idaho, he created a formalized process for project planning and architectural programming to ensure coordination between program needs, institutional strategic plan, academic plan, capital budgets & strategy, and the Long Range Campus Development Plan. This planning process resulted in documents called Project Planning Guides ("PPGs") for all major capital projects on campus. He was responsible to lead the planning process and prepare Project Planning Guides for nearly $100 million in major capital projects over a six–year period. Two of those facilities, the Idaho Commons—a new student center/classroom facility in the core of campus—and the UI Student Recreation Center, have won architectural awards.

As a faculty member, he teaches courses in landscape architectural design, construction, and graphic communication. He frequently mentors graduate students in landscape architecture, horticulture, and architecture. His current research is directed at the affective power of place and how the landscape of campus affects student recruitment, retention, and learning performance.

An active member of the Society for College and University Planning (SCUP), he has published numerous articles, book chapters, and a book on subjects related to campus planning. His book, "The Non-Architect's Guide to Major Capital Projects" was published by SCUP in 2005. As a gifted communicator, he is a frequent speaker at seminars and workshops for SCUP, APPA, Academic Impressions, ACE, and the Noel Levitz Recruitment and Retention conference. He has degrees in both landscape architecture and architecture, and is a licensed landscape architect.

Moderator:

Debra Mitchell is a senior vice president of the multi-disciplinary landscape architecture, planning, civil engineering and environmental science firm of JJR. With over 30 years experience in the planning and design of vital cities and communities, she understands urban complexities and public process. Based in Chicago, Mitchell has been responsible for the award-winning planning for Chicago's Near North Redevelopment for the Office of the Mayor, the Jackson and Washington Park Framework Plans for the Chicago Park District, the design of the Sears Merchandise Group Headquarters, and San Antonio's Alamo Plaza Streetscape. A former president of the American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA), Mitchell worked to articulate ASLA's vision to the membership, other professions, and the general public. She also served as president of the Landscape Architecture Foundation. Mitchell received her B.S. from the University of Kansas, and an M.L.A. from the University of Illinois.

Archived Program CD: $195 US
Order Now!

The archived CD contains all the visuals synced with the audio
presentation and the question and answer period. Please note that if
your site ordered the live program, the individual who registered at
your site can order the archived CD at half price directly from KRM.
To do this, please call: 800.775.7654 or 715.833.5426.

Questions? Please contact Kathleen Benton, or call 734.998.6966.