Higher Ed

Maryville Uses FormAssembly to Connect with Students from Inquiry to Enrollment

Brian Heger

Associate Director of Communications

Case Study Snapshot

Maryville University uses FormAssembly in a variety of use cases to serve students from the time of their initial inquiry, to the time that they enroll in classes. Staff members are able to streamline form data with Salesforce to keep their processes simple and organized, while simultaneously ensuring that their student data is clean. The automated web form system improves the user experience easier for everyone, including prospective students and their families.

About Maryville University

Named one of the top 3 fastest-growing universities in the nation
Offers over 90 degree programs, with 25 online degrees available
8,000 undergraduate and graduate students from 50 states and 60 countries
School mission involves promoting a revolution in student learning that expands access and opportunities for all

The numbers

15

percent rise in enrollment in the 2017-2018 school year

10,000

students reached by 2022 – projected strategic vision

The Need

Lack of Powerful Problem-Solving Capabilities

I’ve come to really appreciate FormAssembly, as it solves a lot of headaches…If you’re a prospective student and the university can’t get you to the right person, it can turn you off to the university,” Heger said.

Before adopting FormAssembly as their web form solution and integrating to a Salesforce platform, Maryville was handling data manually; the resulting work was time-consuming and burdensome. Additionally, certain processes for incoming and current students were complicated and led to frustration. Before they implemented a web form system that connected to the school’s CRM, staff found it difficult to communicate changes in student enrollment and to solve basic student requests, like moving from on-campus to online.

Maryville relies heavily on the Prefill Connector to reduce irritation and to eliminate duplicate records. Staff members also keep data clean and organized through formulas, field mapping, and send-as values. These tools help sharpen the overall form experience, while providing streamlined integration with data in Salesforce.

The Solution

A Simplified, Student-Centric Experience

A lot of people don’t think [interface] is a big deal, but it is. If it’s unappealing, it’s not conducive to a good work environment,” he said.

Staff Commitment

Heger described Maryville’s staff as a group of higher education professionals committed to providing a seamless journey for students throughout their years at Maryville, so they can focus on their academic and personal success. Through collaboration and creativity, the staff at Maryville are dedicated to making administrative processes easier and more enjoyable for students, both in and outside of the classroom. FormAssembly is a means to improve and consolidate the everyday practices that make administrative steps easier.

On a campus dedicated to innovation, technical advancement, and student growth, FormAssembly is changing the way that Maryville conducts business.

Easy for Beginners

Heger arrived at Maryville less than two years ago, but he was able to quickly master and expand the use of FormAssembly on campus, particularly for the Office of Admissions. As a beginner form-builder, he developed new tools and leveraged the maximum potential of each form without extensive HTML or coding knowledge.

“When I came in, I didn’t have any prior experience with FormAssembly. I was surprised by it. The drag-and-drop feature to add and reorder questions is nice, and being able to change the format is pretty user friendly,” Heger shared.

User-Friendly Interface

Heger also described FormAssembly’s form builder and interface as an enjoyable one.

With integration to the school’s Salesforce records, FormAssembly has helped Maryville accomplish a great deal with a minimal amount of technical work or extensive IT support.

Use Cases

Student Information

Request for Information (RFI) forms are embedded throughout the university website.

FormAssembly helped Maryville create a simpler process for recruitment staff and a more user-friendly experience for students.

“We all know how important it is to keep CRM data clean, and FormAssembly has helped us in this effort. We’ve automated and standardized much of the data input into our CRM (Salesforce) through forms, while making the experience easier for our users and prospective students,” Heger said.

One of the ways that Maryville leverages web forms is through their request for information forms on their website. These Request for Information (RFI) forms are embedded throughout the various pages, and they’re designed to collect basic information from visitors who may be curious for more information. Heger said that this effort allows Maryville to reach students where they’re at.

“FormAssembly provides an outlet for us to help students who don’t want to talk on the phone,” Heger said.

Search and Recruitment

Recruitment forms engage students through creative elements.

Additionally, Maryville leverages dynamic web forms as part of their search efforts. Recruitment staff have created forms with engaging memes, conditional logic, and interactive questions. The goal with this style of recruitment form strategy, Heger shared, is to provide the student with a bit of entertainment as they progress through routine steps.

When it comes to recruitment procedures, Heger said that there’s a significant benefit to having the ability to standardize data they collect from prospective students by using web forms. This is especially true for recruiters, as they travel the country and collect information from prospective students. When that recruitment data is brought back to campus, it’s processed by a team of student workers. With FormAssembly, recruitment staff can ensure that information from leads is consistent and accurate.

Status Check

Student decisions are trackable with enrollment agreement forms.

Faculty Uses

Web forms help support important academic decision processes.

Maryville leverages FormAssembly’s capabilities to creatively streamline some of their internal processes, like scholarship forms and surveys.

At the graduate school level, some faculty members help in the admissions decision process. FormAssembly provides a workaround for faculty who need student information, but don’t have administrative access to a Salesforce account. To address this issue, Maryville uses a two-step form with prefilled data, in which faculty can make admissions decisions directly within a student’s form based upon the populated information.

Web forms also help the university alleviate frustration in the process of awarding scholarships. Most recently, Maryville used a two-step Presidential Scholarship form that current students and faculty/staff used to evaluate prospective student interviews. As a result of the new process, the university was able to deliver scholarship decisions to students more quickly and efficiently.

“Ultimately, this gives prospective students a quick turnaround time,” Heger said.

What’s Next?

Although successful enrollment numbers are the result of several dynamic factors, Heger reported that Maryville’s student numbers are increasing across all areas of the institution. Enrollment in 2017-2018 rose 15 percent over the previous year and has doubled in the past decade. With a strategic vision to reach 10,000 students by 2022, the university hopes to continue removing any red tape that stands in the way of an excellent student experience.

“A lot of interactions we provide to students come down to forms,” Heger shared.

As the need for up-to-date student information continues with the school’s growth, powerful form features will help Maryville University reach their goal of opening educational pathways for all students.

Thanks to Maryville University for sharing their use case!

If you enjoyed this study for higher education, make sure to find out how the University of Michigan uses FormAssembly to handle surveys, event management, and internal business processes.