What we learned from this year's Phon-a-thon

A big THANK YOU to all the parents of our first year students on the St. Paul and Minneapolis campuses who participated in our annual Phon-a-thon this past term. Our callers truly enjoyed speaking with parents and family members of our first-year students. We learned quite a bit; the following summarizes highlights and themes we heard from you.

• Our callers reached 48% of our families of first year students and left messages with another 39.5%;12% of the calls made were found to be disconnected or wrong numbers.
• Overall, parents indicated that they were very satisfied with their student's experience and the University as a whole. Eighty-seven percent indicated that the University had "exceeded" their expectations and another 4.6% indicated that their expectations were "met."
• Callers were able to conduct conversations in Hmong and Spanish for families for whom this was their primary language.
• A member of the Financial Aid staff was available throughout the evening to address families specific questions about their student's account and financial aid questions.
• Parents shared the following themes/examples of how their expectations were "exceeded":
• the fact that their student was making a very successful transition to St. Kate's environment
• having a very positive residence life experience including the responsiveness of the Resident Assistants
• the small classroom environment, the academic program their student was experiencing and the close relationships their student has with faculty, staff and peers
• the level of support their student was receiving
• the welcoming experience of orientation
• the parent programming including the parent orientation,the resource calendar and the parent speaker series offered

Of special note, parents of student athlete's shared much appreciation for the experience their students were having with the coaches, their team and the student's overall involvement and sense of engagement.

Concerns/themes that surfaced in which parents/families noted as challenges and less satisfied with was in regards to the weekend environment and the need for developing a stronger weekend community for students who remain on campus. Some parents indicated frustration over their student not being able to work on campus or, not having enough hours to work on campus.

Following up: Many families were provided follow-up information from specific offices either by phone or mail. Regarding the weekend atmosphere, a group of staff, students and faculty will be looking into developing strategies for addressing the weekend atmosphere issues that were shared.

If you were not able to share a concern or comment and still wish to do so, please feel free to contact Ellen Richter-Norgel, director of student retention at 651.690-8730 or erichter-norgel@stkate.edu.