5 Keys to Multicultural Student Recruitment

They're elements to student recruitment that are universal no matter the institution or level of education being provided. When it comes to Multicultural student recruitment through some of the elements become more nuisance and it's up to admissions departments and recruitment agencies to be in tune with the differences in attracting multicultural Students vs. the General Market student. They're a number of Key elements to multicultural student recruitment.

Here are 5.

1. Be Genuine

Given social history, and the access we all have to information 2017 it is important to be genuine when dealing with the multicultural student prospect. As a group, they're extremely in tuned and sensitive to messaging. Reading the lines in between the lines and around the lines and deconstructing messages to come to their own conclusion. If your message isn't genuine it will not go over well with this audience and could even lead to a backlash.

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2. Highlight Successes

Do you already have a diverse student body and can share success stories on those student's experiences? Great! Push those stories to the forefront in your recruitment of Multicultural students. If you don't have those type of stories yet, find campuses that do and highlight those. You may be thinking why would I promote another institution while trying to recruit for mine? It's not about the institution it's about the prospective student. In highlighting positive experiences whether your own institutions or others you show that you get it or have a solid commitment to working towards an ideal situation for the multicultural student. This sentiment goes a long way as pointed out in the first key being genuine is of the utmost importance and the multicultural audience is pretty loyal and will give you points for trying.

3. If At First You Don't Succeed, Try Again

Diversity initiatives often times follow a pattern. The egregious incident involving minority group takes place, outrage ensues, company or institution promises to do better put diversity initiative in place initiative flounders company or institution abandons until next incident rinse and repeat. The Challenge is if you're starting from a low point where you have little to no multicultural presence at the institution in order to successfully change this you have to have an ironclad commitment to doing so. The dirty little secret is that you'll probably fail miserably on your first try. The analogy is cliche but what would have happened if the first time you rode a bike and fell off you never got back on that bike again? Recruiting Multicultural students is no different keep peddling no matter what.

4. Multicultural Faculty and Staff

You're going to need to be built in advocates for a multicultural recruitment effort. People within the organization that talk the talk and walk the walk. If you have none this is where you're recruitment effort should begin with faculty and staff. Faculty and staff should reflect the student body and vice versa. In addition faculty and staff will have a stake in the success of a recruitment campaign and can be trusted advisers in steps to take and language to use and avoid.

5. Don't Assume

Diversity amongst faculty and staff ties into this next key which doesn't assume. If your targeting a specific demo within the multicultural range stay away from broad strokes and generalizations in your outreach to them, This is a complete turnoff. If you already have faculty and staff that's reflective of the target demo lean on them for advice if you find yourself stuck with messaging or for ideas for outreach. Research, ask questions, conduct focus groups. Whatever you have to do to get the insight you need do it but don't make assumptions.

Read our Ultimate Guide to Student Recruitment

Student recruitment is an ongoing process, but when it comes to multicultural student recruitment that process can look very different from group to group, but if you follow the keys laid out here you have a good foundation on which to start a robust recruitment effort. Do you have any other ideas about Multicultural Student Recruitment take a moment to share with us in the comments section below, we'd love to hear your ideas.