This week I headed from Columbus, Ohio to Buffalo and then Rochester, New York.  The focus of my week was college fairs (I had four of them), but I did have some high school visits as well.  Here are my notes from this week: On my way up from Columbus I stopped for lunch at a Chick-fil-a.  I was totally and pleasantly surprised by the conservative values of this place.  It isn’t open on Sundays, they had Christian music on the in-house radio, and the last one is the kicker: in front of each cash register there are placards that read, “God’s commandment is to not steal.” ...

The high school visit is alive and well.  This past week’s seven visits reaffirmed our assumption that providing an opportunity for personal contact at the students’ high school is really important.  I visited high schools all within about an hour’s driving distance of Hope.  Snapshots from the week: For the second year in a row I came across wild turkeys on my first day.  Reminded me of the rural community I grew up in! I don’t know about my other “road warrior” peers in admissions office across the country, but McDonald’s is my lifeline on the road. ...

My job in recruiting students for higher ed embodies one particular challenge: the cohort I am trying to recruit will always stay the same age, and I am only going to get older!  In order to connect with these students and remain relevent, I feel like I have to know what’s going on in pop culture.  Having only graduated from college just three years ago, this isn’t currently that big of a challenge.  I imagine it will only become more difficult as the years go on. With that I would like to introduce my Pop Culture Picks.  From time to time I’d like to share music, TV, and movies...

When it comes to our office’s email campaigns, I’ve taken on the role of designer.  Unfortunately we don’t have a dedicated designer or webmaster on staff.  Thankfully design is something that I really enjoy!  I do not claim to have any legitimate educational background in design, however. As you can tell, we are using a basic 2-column format with a ton of opportunities for prospective students to click through to items we believe are important.  The main body area on the right includes information specific to the particular email we are sending. So I’m putting it out there...