To protect your K-12 independent or private school’s revenue, it’s important to retain your existing student body. Low attrition also enhances your organization’s reputation, encouraging new families to apply. Easy-to-use, integrated technology simplifies and supports your retention efforts by empowering your school to create first-class experiences for students and families.
Learning about retention, typical challenges, and practical solutions will help you choose the best technology to reduce attrition within your school community.
Understanding Student Retention in Private Schools
The definition of student retention and standard retention rates are the ideal starting place for exploring the concept.
What Is Student Retention?
Student retention measures how many eligible students return to your K-12 private or independent school annually. Comparing these rates year-over-year tells you how well your organization is performing.
A solid retention rate contributes to your financial goals since it’s more affordable to keep your current students than acquire new ones. Healthy retention directly translates into a steady revenue stream and less recruitment spending.
Lower student attrition reinforces your reputation and confirms the value of your school. Prospective families often evaluate retention rates when considering the ideal school for their child’s needs—they see the metric as an indicator of academic success and how well the school is managed.
What Is a Good Retention Rate for Schools?
According to the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS), the average industry attrition rate was 10% between 2020 and 2021, meaning 90% student retention.
When evaluating your school’s rate, remember that many factors influence retention, including:
- Cost and financial aid availability
- Student happiness with the curriculum, social environment, and activity offerings
- Perceived value compared to the investment
- Educator competence and qualifications
- Family relocations
- Family legacies with other schools
- Senior leadership and vision for the future
Measure your school’s current retention rate as a benchmark and establish goals from that number. You can periodically compare your unique rate to monitor your progress toward improvement and celebrate growth.
Typical Challenges with Private School Student Retention
As schools look for effective methods to keep their existing enrollment, it’s helpful to understand academic and financial challenges and explore potential solutions.
Academic Challenges
Students and their families often choose independent schools because they offer unique, high-quality educational opportunities. To meet this expectation, it’s important to ensure students and teachers have access to the tools they need to maximize productivity and academic potential.
A centralized solution like Ravenna Student Management™ helps reduce attrition by creating supportive, engaging learning environments. Opt for technology that empowers students and staff to:
- Upload and complete assignments easily.
- Access resources and learning materials around the clock.
- View tasks and grades in real time.
- Send essential communications or ask and answer assignment-related questions in a secure portal.
Financial Challenges
Your school serves students and families with different backgrounds, and your financial aid options are critical to providing a high-quality education to more applicants. These initiatives also help your school support its diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs while building stronger communities.
The right technology transforms financial aid management with streamlined, simplified processes. For example, Ravenna and School and Student Services (SSS) seamlessly integrate and provide full visibility into assessing a family’s financial situation. Your team enjoys a single platform with centralized information to support fast, accurate awarding decisions for scholarships and grants.
Combine these features with best-in-class tuition management software to make it even easier for families to pay for their child’s education in the way that works best for them. Customizable technology offers automated reminders for caregivers, frictionless tuition payments, and configurable payment options—ultimately helping your school retain students.
Effective Retention Strategies
Boost retention rates at your school with digital solutions and strategies that support better interactions and insightful decision-making.
Create Effective Onboarding Processes
Lower attrition starts with the first step of a family’s journey with your school—admissions. When you effectively deliver exceptional experiences from the beginning, you build a solid foundation for ongoing attendance.
Leverage technology options like Ravenna ADMIT to streamline your admissions processes. The best solutions offer functionality to simplify every workflow, from the initial application to new student onboarding. Your software should provide customizable features to help:
- Guide families through the application process.
- Track and nurture student applications.
- Promote efficient internal collaboration during application review and admissions decisions.
- Keep applicants and caregivers informed of crucial information.
- Manage interviews.
- Publish decisions.
- Welcome new students and families with automated invitations to orientation events.
Take Data-Driven Action
Your student retention rate is more nuanced than a basic percentage calculation of returning students. The other side of the equation is attrition. Why do some students transfer instead of return?
Capturing and investigating data with powerful software like Ravenna Student Management will help answer that question. Track student information across multiple data points with built-in reporting and analytics. You can drill down into specifics to pinpoint patterns and gain insights into where challenges exist. Predictive analytics can even help identify students at risk of transferring, enabling proactive intervention to prevent attrition.
Revealing trends in your data analysis also help you uncover improvement opportunities for your school and its workflows. Use the information to make data-based strategy adjustments and enhance student and family experiences.
Implement Best Practices for Community Engagement
A supportive school community contributes to higher student retention by directly influencing student and family satisfaction. Increasing community engagement is a cost-effective way to create and nurture that environment.
Consider technology like Ravenna Student Management to help your school encourage caregiver involvement in their child’s education. These tools provide families with their own logins, allowing them to:
- View, update, or correct student information.
- See upcoming assignments and assessments.
- Review past tasks, exams, and grades.
- Consult the school calendar for important dates.
- Complete and submit required forms.
- Choose tuition payment options and make payments.
- Communicate with educators, administrators, and other school personnel through a secure portal.
- Review attendance.
Technology also helps support higher caregiver engagement by automating the delivery of essential information. For example, it’s easy to segment students by crucial demographic data so only families of fifth graders receive reminders about the upcoming sixth grade orientation. Streamlined communication helps create interactions that keep families loyal to your school.
Increase Student Retention With Ravenna
Consistent student retention demonstrates your private or independent school’s commitment to meeting family needs for academic rigor, value, and community. The metric also boosts your organization’s reputation and bottom line. Technology is the key to effectively growing and supporting student retention by eliminating common challenges. With the right software, your school can provide better family journeys, leverage unique data, and implement best practices.
The K-12 suite by Ravenna is a full-featured platform to unify students, families, and staff across every touchpoint. High customizability and easy-to-use interfaces contribute to simplified, personalized experiences that promote better communication and engagement, improving retention rates.
See the platform in action with a free demo, or contact us for more information.
