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HES Support Services
We provide education, training, assessment and advisory services, to supplement and enhance your staff.

On-Demand Financial
Aid Training

Silent Service Assessment

Specialized Advisory Services

Foundation Services

SUPPORT SERVICES

HES Support Services are especially helpful to schools and organizations wanting to enhance enrollment outcomes through improvements in compliance, the quality of student service, operating efficiency, and systems management. In most cases, we customize support services to meet on the client’s needs and goals. Some examples of support services include:

HES On-Demand Financial Aid Training™
HES Silent Service Assessment™ – Secret Shopping
HES Specialized Advisory Services™
HES Foundation Services™

HES ON-DEMAND FINANCIAL AID TRAINING™

The acute shortage of individuals with financial aid experience combined with high rates of turnover of financial aid staff presents a significant human resource challenge for many colleges and universities. In addition, this lack of experience is causing many schools to face compliance risks related to complicated financial aid regulations. Higher Ed Strategies, LLC offers on-demand specialized financial aid education and training designed to help an institution get new financial aid staff with little or no experience up and running as quickly as possible. In addition, because our firm specializes in consulting services only conflicts of interest do not exist as they might with other companies that offer financial aid training. The advantages of HES On-Demand Financial Aid Training™ include:

Helping new employees make meaningful contributions as quickly as possible to maintain continuity of service to students
Helping minimize compliance risk by having staff training in the basics of financial aid as early as possible after date of hire
Reducing the burden on existing staff of providing training on allowing them to continue to focus on their job responsibilities
Reducing the reliance on financial aid professional association training dates that may or may not meet the institution’s needs or may not be scheduled within a reasonable timeframe from the date of hire
Providing new staff immersion training and education that is customized to meet specific institutional needs, thereby improving departmental operating efficiency quickly
Help leadership and human resources assess new employee fit with financial aid positions

HES SILENT SERVICE ASSESSMENT™ - SECRET SHOPPING

Many major industries use some form of secret shopping to help evaluate the quality of their services and products. It is very common for a bank or major retailer to secret shop their customer service operations to evaluate whether the service provided by employees is meeting both company and customer expectations. In our work with colleges and universities, we find that the quality of service provided by enrollment staff to prospective and returning students influences enrollment outcomes.

Higher Ed Strategies, LLC is now offering a service to the higher education community that provides institutional leadership a tool to both evaluate and monitor the quality of service provided to students. Our Silent Service Assessment™ makes use of secret shoppers trained to collect data and conduct evaluations of products and services according to specific research protocols within the higher education market. We consider all forms of service delivery including print and online media and the “in person” experience. This third - party unbiased perspective on the quality of service provided to students and parents helps colleges and universities develop student - centered customer service approaches by:

Identifying gaps between institutional customer service expectations and reality
Identifying opportunities for operating efficiencies by testing policies and procedures and how they affect the student and parent experience
Improving enrollment management operations by identifying delivery system chokepoints and areas for improvement
Improving enrollment and retention through better service delivery
Coordinating services across departments. top

HES SPECIALIZED ADVISORY SERVICES™

Higher Ed Strategies, LLC can provide Specialized Advisory Services™ to small institutions or programs seeking assistance with the administration of financial aid. These services augment an institution’s existing staff with a consultant or small group of consultants who are experts in financial aid. It offers the small school or program the ability to capitalize on the knowledge of experts in financial aid without having to incur the expense of hiring a full-time financial aid staff.

Most of our Specialized Advisory Services™ clients hire a seasoned professional who assists with the day-to-day administration of financial aid while using our Specialized Advisory Services™ team to help meet compliance requirements and periodic assistance with financial aid processing. In today’s working environment where frequent staff turnover is a reality, having a team of experts ready to help maintain compliance and cash flow is critical to both student satisfaction and cash flow requirements of small schools and programs.

Some of the benefits of this service include:
Assistance with Program Participation Agreement completion
Assistance with FISAP completion
Compliance guidance
Policy and Procedure development and monitoring
Compliance audit and program review support
Processing support
Assistance navigating the financial aid system
Technology recommendations
Due diligence related to the sale of transfer of a school or program. top

HES FOUNDATION SERVICES™

HES works with charitable foundations and non-profit agencies charged with the responsibility of managing college scholarship programs. Our Foundation Services help clients manage the scholarship application process and conduct financial aid need analysis on scholarship applicants. Given the strong connection between scholarship committee members and their communities, clients find that HES is able to serve as an impartial third party, eliminating potential conflicts of interest among committee members or the organization’s board members and scholarship applicants. top

info@higheredstrategies.com
18A Pasco Drive

East Windsor

CT 06088