by Mark Sklarow, Executive Director, IECA

Here we are just six days into the New Year, and I’m already focusing on what the consulting field will look like at the mid-point of the new decade. More specifically, I wonder how consultants’ work will be different, what their challenges will be, and what the Independent Educational Consultants Association (IECA) will be doing to ensure consultants’ success.

This wonder is not mere mental exercise. It is essential that IECA always look forward, peer around the bend, examine what’s off in the distance, if we are committed—as we are—to remaining (1) the most recognized and important association in the field of educational advising and (2) an essential part of every great consultant’s arsenal.

The process for planning for 2015 officially kicks off this week in two key ways. Every IECA member received an invitation to take part in a survey coordinated by the Strategic Planning Committee. This survey comes after nine months of work by the committee has been completed, including a review of the successes and failures of recent years and the creation of a report card on the 2005 Strategic Plan. With more than 700 active members, we hope for a major response to the survey. If you are an IECA member, please get started as soon as possible and share your thoughts, opinions, concerns, and more. We have been blessed in the past with survey responses way beyond what other associations report. We hope for another such response now.

This Sunday, Dodge Johnson (PA), president-elect designee, and I will depart for a training symposium designed to prepare for the next several years and strategically beyond. We will be attending a Symposium for Chief Staff Officers and Chief Volunteer Board Officers, sponsored by the American Society of Association Executives. This intense program will give not only time but also professional training to ensure IECA is well positioned to take on new initiatives and tackle whatever comes along in this new decade. Our goal is stronger leadership to further strengthen a great association.

As we begin turning our attention to what IECA is to become, please e-mail, blog, text, and communicate in other ways to share your thoughts. Complete the survey, in the coming days (check your e-mail for the link), and make a pledge to commit yourself to IECA as a volunteer or active participant.

by Mark Sklarow, Executive Director, IECA

Not a single day goes by when I don’t hear from some overseas “agent” offering to ‘represent’ us abroad. On a weekly basis I hear from someone wishing to join the Independent Educational Consultants Association from Asia, Europe or the Middle East who indicate that they are educational consultants but operate “differently.”

That difference makes all the difference.

In almost every case, those claiming to be such atypical consultants are in fact “agents.” They are paid by colleges on a per-head basis for each international student they can feed into the school’s admission funnel. They may tell a parent that they are helping to find a “good match” but in fact that match is limited to the two, three or ten colleges with whom the agent has a contract and they only suggest colleges who pay them a finder’s fee. That is not consulting. Consultants work independently of colleges and make suggestions based solely on the best interest of the student. In fact, accepting a fee from a school, college, camp, or program is grounds for dismissal from IECA. That is how serious a violation of parental trust we consider this.

Frankly, most colleges must agree. I don’t know of any colleges that would pay such a fee for a student referred domestically. Indeed such a scheme would constitute an ethical violation of most any association or organization in the field. Yet many colleges actively engage in this farce across the globe. Many will say they only do so because operating internationally is tougher, that economic realities require such outreach. I remind my colleagues that ethical behavior shines brightest when it is applied to difficult situations, not the easy ones. Do schools really want to communicate to students that ethical lapses are okay, if you have empty beds, or really, really want something badly enough?

Luckily, an increasing number of colleges are rejecting “agents” just as IECA rejects them from membership. Despite our hard line, our international membership has doubled in the last two years and we continue to expand to new countries. What makes this growth all the more exciting is that we can say internationally what we’ve said domestically for over 30 years: that IECA members take no money from schools and programs and their only obligation is to advise families based on the needs of the student.

I look forward to the day when colleges, too, can make the same ethical claims domestically and internationally.

By Peter Baron, AdmissionsQuest

By Brian Fisher, AdmissionsQuest

Dr. Nido Qubein, President of High Point University, shared his zest for life and his philosophy during Thursday’s conference lunch. Part tent revival, part comedian, part practical philosopher, part story teller, Dr. Qubein affirmed the importance of education and the transformational experiences that schools and educators provide students.

Preaching to the choir he made the case for the responsibility that educators carry and the great affects they have on their students.

Environment. Environment. Environment. He likened students’ abilities to grow and adapt the adaptive abilities of the Koi fish. An environment rich in opportunities, expectation, and support grows the healthiest students.

Focus, expectation, and modeling drive his interactions and decisions for his students. He’s brought student centered learning to his alma mater, High Point University.

I laughed more during Dr. Quebein’s talk than during any keynote I remember. What I write doesn’t do justice to Dr. Qubein’s public speaking.

By Peter Baron, AdmissionsQuest

Erin Avery, Avery Educational Resource, IECA member, talks about what she enjoys about the conference- from conference sessions to the networking opportunities to the quality discussions with schools, colleges, therapeutic programs & vendors.

Ben Kavanaugh, Bucknell University shares the college perspective on IECA Charlotte:

Cyndy McDonald, College Consultant Assistant, shares her impressions of the conference.

Clint Williams, Maine Central Institue, talks about why he values the IECA conference.

Sharon Laney, Three Springs tells us about the networking opportunities and conversations that happen at IECA.

By Brian Fisher, AdmissionsQuest

I spent a few minutes in Barbara Cunningham’s (Summit Preparatory School) Wednesday presentation “Intellectually Gifted Underachievers: The Oxymoron Unraveled.” She’s done nice work in establishing some correlations and common experiences of kids who fit this profile and developing strategies to move them toward fulfilling their potentials.

In a word, these kids require engagement. They want to be actively involved and benefit from strong relationships. They want their thinking to contribute to the future.

Good work always seems to come back to reaching out and connecting.

By Brian Fisher, AdmissionsQuest

Pink, author of A Whole New Mind: Why Right Brainers Rule the Future made the case for faster changes in American educational structures- arguing that we’re missing the future by basing our school educational models on our past.

It’s tough to shift our thinking, basing our educational approaches and philosophies- not on what worked best in the past- but on our best judgments of what will be best for the future.

Past approaches worked for me; it worked for my parents; it should work for tomorrow. We seem to leave the constant of change out of our educational planning.

Arguing that the abilities of the future mater more than the abilities of the past, our educational system needs to begin looking forward- preparing students for future economic and cultural realities.

Making the case that routine tasks, automation have become commodities and will seek the lowest labor costs, what, then, does the future hold for the US economy and educational systems- complexity, premium design, and new products.

Creative engagement based on looking toward the future.

Education, Pink argued, isn’t moving fast enough to build and support the shift away from the routine production based economy. The tools and approaches that worked in past decades aren’t necessarily the best tools for the future.

What worked for parents in the past stands in the way of updating our childrens’ education for the future.

To prepare for the future we must let go of our past-based assumptions- “myth of metrics,” “myth of math, science and engineering,” and move beyond the motivation of “if-then incentives.”

Our best economic and educational future lies in moving our world and educational view from compliance to engagement- not just doing, thinking creatively about your environment and how to do things differently.

Success in a complex world requires engagement.

“Compliance will get you through the day. Engagement will get you through the night.”

By Brian Fisher, AdmissionsQuest

Everyone on campus or in your office conveys messages and sells the school or your services. We all think we practice pretty good customer service. Do we?

Beth Black, Cherokee Creek Boys School, made the case for service in her presentation, “Everything I learned About Marketing, I Learned from a Mouse.”

In schools we assume our customer service is pretty good. But, in my school experiences, we never sat down and worked through constituent/customer service from beginning to end. What does it mean and what do we need to do make sure that we respond as well as possible in every situation?

Bluntly, we never had customer service philosophy or plan. We just assumed that everyone had good sense of customer service- responding to families in the best, most effective way.

Black took participants through the eye opening exercise of customer service from the customer’s perspective and the ways in which organizations can define and build systems and philosophies that keep the customer at the fore of every employee’s action.

The bottom line, “Quality service lives in the hearts and minds of the staff.”

Schools tend to become wrapped in their routines and daily events. Consultants with solo practices or small shops sometimes forget about a clean parking lot or warm entryway. We let our external connections slip.

Customer service basics weigh heavily in the equation; returning phone calls and returning e-mail matter more than ever.

The best anecdote of the meeting- the school maintenance man who greeted campus visitors and was equipped to provide an introduction to campus. The family- purposefully visiting this campus unannounced- appreciated the warm greeting. Their student enrolled.

Why customer service here and now? It’s a topic/concept that we often let slip in education. Education sells itself right? Not necessarily.

By Brian Fisher, AdmissionsQuest

A new conference approach has enhanced the way educational consultants & schools exchange information. Hello Speed Meetings. Nice to meet you.

The speed meeting approach gives admission officers and educational consultants a quick, defined time to exchange substantive information. It could be a new introduction. It could be catching up on what’s new.

This new approach represents a purposeful exchange. Schools & consultants agreed that it’s an excellent modification to the conference format.

By Peter Baron, AdmissionsQuest

Enjoy this set of photos from the opening day of the conference. You can check out the originals by visiting the IECA’s Flickr pool:

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.