Porter & Chester Institute and YTI Career Institute Transform Enrollment Process with Custom Automations
“Porter & Chester Institute and YTI Career Institute strive to be the leader in career education in the regions we serve and provide the best possible service to prospects and students. LeadSquared makes that easier by helping us engage with more students. The platform streamlines multiple stages of the admission process and contains everything within a single system, and it is robust enough to handle multiple integrations. We’re able to automate our marketing and communications tasks as we nurture leads toward enrollment.”
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About Porter & Chester Institute
Porter and Chester Institute is a private sector, post-secondary technical institution with eight campuses throughout Connecticut and Massachusetts. The school’s career training programs in the automotive, computers, trades, and healthcare fields support students in achieving the technical and professional skills essential for their chosen career. Programs are offered in a hybrid format, on campus, or online.
PCI’s wholly owned affiliate institution, YTI Career Institute, offers career training in the computer, culinary arts, healthcare, and trades fields via online, on-campus, and hybrid learning models. YTI has three Pennsylvania campuses.
Challenges
Like many career colleges, Porter & Chester Institute (PCI) and its sister school, YTI Career Institute, had to adapt during the pandemic. Since their founding—as the Porter School of Engineering Design in 1946 and York Technical Institute in 1967—PCI and YTI had offered its training programs fully in person on campus. As the schools pivoted to hybrid models for most of their programs, they decided to overhaul their admissions and enrollment processes as well. Their combined CRM system for lead management was separate from the student information system (SIS) and internal system for applicant documentation. PCI/YTI needed a single admissions platform for both institutes that integrated with its existing systems.
Solutions
After vetting several CRM platforms, PCI/YTI selected LeadSquared, which allowed PCI/YTI to:
1. Create pre-application automations to provide students with timely information and alerts to move them to the next stage of their journey.
2. Introduce a self-serve application portal during a time of 100% online learning, so that students could navigate the admissions process on their own—with minimal help from an advisor.
3. Customize an admissions and enrollment platform that integrates seamlessly with the institutes’ SIS and other applications and systems, including a digital cognitive assessment test, background check platform, and e-signature management platform.
4. Automate documentation collection so that PCI/YTI applicants could sign and complete required documents electronically and the admissions team could track applicants’ progress.
Results
The pandemic pushed PCI/YTI to offer more of their education programs in both 100% online and hybrid modalities for the first time. As restrictions eased, the institutions seized the opportunity to reimagine program delivery to optimize learning and accommodate students’ busy lives. Today, PCI and YTI offer online, on-campus, and hybrid programs.
PCI/YTI leaders also realized that the admissions team plays a vital role in the pre-enrollment process, helping prospective students understand program requirements before getting started. PCI/YTI returned to their student-centered, consultative admissions approach. The versatility of LeadSquared made it easy for PCI/YTI to adjust their workflow automations as needed.
