North Carolina Central University (NCCU) faculty and staff recently took the stage at a statewide conference, sharing innovative ideas and strategies to transform graduate education.
The 2024 NC Council of Graduate Schools (NCCGS) Conference gathered graduate school professionals from 26 institutions under the theme "Navigating The High Cs: Communication, Collaboration, Community, And Change" to exchange ideas and advance education initiatives.
Nicole Hodges, public communications specialist for NCCU’s School of Graduate Studies, spoke to attendees about “The Art of Engagement: Creative Social Media Strategies for Graduate Schools.” She highlighted innovative approaches to engaging current and prospective graduate students, sharing expertise on marketing trends, audience insights and dynamic content creation.
“You must look at current trends," Hodges said. “Are your current strategies effectively serving your university’s needs? You have to know how and when to pivot, if necessary, when engaging current and prospective students.”
Jim Harper, Ph.D., associate dean of the university’s School of Graduate Studies, also contributed to the conference, leading the session “Are You Student Ready? Strategies & Data Usage to Support Student Success.” Harper explored actionable methods for leveraging data to improve student outcomes and foster success across graduate programs.
“We use tools like retention dashboards to track student progress program by program, identifying how many students graduate each academic year,” Harper said. “We also rely on enrollment reports to monitor if students encounter any challenges during the semester, allowing us to address issues proactively.”
The conference underscored the importance of communication and collaboration, inspiring ongoing partnerships among institutions. Participants left with actionable strategies and renewed enthusiasm for enhancing graduate education in North Carolina.
“The annual NCCGS conference is a valuable opportunity to connect with, and learn from, other graduate school staff across the state. Because we share the common goal of providing quality graduate-level education opportunities for North Carolinians, there is a unique spirit of collaboration at the conference even though, technically, we are direct competitors. I had the pleasure of attending Nicole’s session on creative social media engagement, and appreciated her dynamic delivery and useful takeaways that could inform practice within my own role, said Holly Vaughan, director of graduate recruiting and communications at Western Carolina University.