The Outcomes Mandate: Enrollment Lessons from Higher Ed

The strategies I present in this article have been forged from direct experience. While I launched my career in the independent school community, as founder and CEO of the data-driven consultancy Measuring Success, I have spent the past ten years working with colleges and universities as a partner in the education practice at McKinsey & Company and Boston Consulting Group. Now working with both sectors as founder of Fierce Outcomes, I want to share what has undergirded the successes of colleges and universities that overcame disadvantageous shifts in demographics and cost structures. These lessons will be valuable for independent school leaders as they look to shore up their schools’ financial futures.

What’s My ROI?

The traditional university business model has been thrown into chaos thanks to a storm of weakening value propositions, eroding public trust and rising competition from career-focused alternatives. For many institutions, the response has been a desperate race to the bottom. The average tuition discount rate for non-elite universities has hit an alarming 56%, signaling that they are no longer competing on value but are simply “buying students” to make their enrollment numbers. Even elite universities, long spared from business model erosion, are now experiencing sustainability shocks thanks to federal government efforts to tax endowment income and cancel research funding in retaliation for the politicization of campus life and diversity policies.

For independent school chief financial officers and heads, it would be easy to dismiss this as a problem for another sector, but that would be a mistake. These headwinds — demographic pressures, intense questioning of return on investment and the rise of viable alternatives — will be felt at K-12 independent schools in coming years if they aren’t already. The ultimate success of our institutions hinges on a single, powerful concept: demonstrable outcomes.

For too long, many independent schools have coasted on the power of their legacy, the beauty of their campuses and the strength of their community. But the market’s definition of value is changing rapidly.

For too long, many independent schools have coasted on the power of their legacy, the beauty of their campuses and the strength of their community. But the market’s definition of value is changing rapidly. Families, who are facing ever-increasing tuition, are asking harder questions. They are looking past the amenities and seeking proof points. What is the return on this significant investment? How does this education prepare my child not just for high school or college, but for a dynamic and uncertain future?

The independent schools that thrive in the next decade will be those that can answer these questions with clarity and confidence. A strategic framework for a resilient future can be understood as a cycle, in this case a “Wheel of Fortune” or “Price Is Right” wheel.

It illustrates a virtuous cycle where strong graduate outcomes inform a clear value proposition, which in turn drives willingness to pay and enrollment, and ultimately ensures financial sustainability. This is not a theoretical exercise; it is a playbook for survival and growth.

Pillar 1: Defining and Proving Your Outcomes

If the center of gravity in the higher education marketplace was once an educational exercise in independent living and the expanding of the mind, that center is undergoing a seismic shift toward career pathways. While “quality” remains the top brand attribute parents and students look for in a college, “career-minded” is the only attribute that grew in importance post-COVID across all school types, according to research from Encoura consulting. A Gallup survey of college alumni likewise found that career preparedness and the presence of a faculty mentor in a student’s chosen career area are the top drivers in a college degree’s perceived value. The message is unmistakable: stakeholders are demanding a tangible return on their investment in the form of career readiness.

In response, my advice to my university clients has been to tie their own success directly to that of their graduates. Rather than asking students to take all the risk by assuming student loans and taking time from life to pursue a degree, some of innovative universities are sharing the risk. We helped one university shape an offer of free courses to alumni until they find a job in their field and another an offer to provide free reskilling courses online up to age 30. Others have built deep and authentic employer partnerships that influence curriculum design and guarantee pipelines for internships and jobs. This is the new frontier of accountability.

Beyond the College Placement List

This shift has profound implications for independent schools. For K-12 leaders, the core question becomes: What are the outcomes we are promising and proving?

Data and analytics from my former consulting firm Measuring Success clearly revealed what is important to parents. When parents are asked what drives their perception of value — as measured by their likelihood to recommend the school — the single most important factor is preparedness for the next academic environment (e.g., high school or college). This factor has double the impact on perceived value as the next most important drivers, customer service (specifically, proactive and reactive communications) and character development.

Are you surveying alumni to determine the impact of your school experience on their life satisfaction? Can you chart peer networks using LinkedIn or surveys to see how your alumni stayed connected to one another in business ventures, friendships or marriage?

The strategic imperative, then, is to move beyond abstract promises and begin rigorously measuring, tracking and marketing these specific outcomes. A glossy brochure with a list of impressive college acceptances is no longer enough. It is table stakes. To truly differentiate, schools must provide tangible proof of ROI, which might include:

• Access to Reach Colleges: Even if they are not admitted, do your students secure “privileged college access” because of your school’s reputation with admissions recruiters?
• Elevating College Preparedness Metrics: Go beyond the list of acceptances. Track and publicize data on your graduates’ success in college. Are they able to navigate college without student support services (the major source of increasing college costs)? Do they place out of introductory courses? Do they graduate with a high GPA and accolades?
• Developing Your Students’ “Spikes”: Admission to the elite schools has shifted. Strong grades, test scores and extracurriculars are now table stakes. The elite schools, who seek to admit the most diverse class of students possible (both by background and interests), seek students who demonstrate a differentiating “spike.” This spike differentiates a student from a large pool of applicants by standing out in a unique area with few other comparable applicants.
  Over the last few years, I’ve served on the alumni interview committee for my alma mater, Yale, and hosted the admitted class in my region. I’ve observed the correlation of admission to spikes such as being a highly competitive athlete in an unusual sport (e.g., fencing), to pursuing unpopular sciences like nuclear energy, to “double threat” students seeking to combine a STEM discipline with a humanities discipline.
• Making Internships a Differentiator: The high school internship experience is a powerful differentiator for a student’s college application given the pressure to produce students who can launch successful careers. Is your school actively facilitating these opportunities? Are you building the kind of employer partnerships that universities are now scrambling to create? Can you offer guarantees, such as dual enrollment in advanced courses or a secured internship placement, to make these promises concrete?
• Life Satisfaction: The data shows that in addition to career success, “life satisfaction” — defined by character, values and a lifelong peer network — is also critical driver of value for parents. Many faith-based schools focus on this. Unfortunately, I have rarely seen it measured, and it’s a missed opportunity. The ability to demonstrate how your school’s program intentionally cultivates resilience, ethical leadership and a supportive lifelong network is a powerful component of your value proposition. Are you surveying alumni to determine the impact of your school experience on their life satisfaction? Can you chart peer networks using LinkedIn or surveys to see how your alumni stayed connected to one another in business ventures, friendships or marriage?
• Career success: I have worked with several states and public higher ed systems to build their longitudinal data systems (combining data from tax filings, public higher education records and unemployment filings) and using private data sources such as LinkedIn to determine earnings by school and program of study. Could your independent school compile your alumni data to demonstrate career earnings outcomes?

Pillar 2: Forging a Defensible Value Proposition

Strong outcomes are the raw material of a powerful brand. The next step in building the virtuous cycle is to shape those outcomes into a clear, compelling and defensible value proposition. Too many educational institutions, both at the university and K-12 level, suffer from lack of focus, trying to be all things to all people without being able to develop excellence in any of them. The strategic goal is to achieve distinctiveness in the market and establish your “right to win,” that is, a value proposition that is highly compelling in your market. This requires identifying what your institution is uniquely good at and already known for, investing in those signature programs to make them pillars of your reputation, and ensuring all other programs meet table-stakes quality to buttress those pillars.

The university world provides sharp examples of this strategy in action. For instance, University of Tulsa leaned into its known reputation in cybersecurity and energy. Vanderbilt has successfully carved out an “anti-ivy” identity, building its brand on collaboration and interdisciplinary dialogue. The University of Pittsburgh invested in its world-class health sciences complex as its reputational anchor.

These institutions aren’t claiming to be the best at everything. They are defining a clear North Star and aligning their resources to it.

What Is Your School’s “Right to Win”?

For independent schools, the process of defining a value proposition is an exercise in strategic clarity and institutional courage. It requires looking beyond the generic promise of “excellence” and identifying the specific model that gives you strength in your market. Common typologies include:

• The Immersion School: Specialized schools focused on STEM, languages or the International Baccalaureate (IB) have a built-in distinctive value proposition. Their task is to relentlessly prove that their specialized model leads to quantifiably better outcomes than a more traditional curriculum.
• The Character Formation Independent School: Faith-based and character-focused schools face a unique challenge. Their faith formation is an expected competency — it’s why many families choose them. However, this very strength can, if not messaged carefully, cast doubt on the perceived rigor of the general academic program. The value proposition must seamlessly integrate academic excellence and faith formation.
• The Legacy “Ivy”: If you are one of the two or three historical independent schools in your city, your brand is a powerful asset. But legacy is not a strategy. The challenge is to innovate and respond to the market’s demand for new outcomes without alienating alumni and stakeholders who are deeply tied to the traditional brand.

A powerful example of institutional repositioning is Dwight School in New York City. It successfully rebranded itself from a school known for “rich, rough kids” to one centered on a “global leaders’ curriculum and network.” This was not merely a marketing campaign; it was a fundamental shift in the school’s program, outcomes and identity, demonstrating that a value proposition can be intentionally and successfully transformed.

There are only a few areas of life where independent school families may spend as much as they do on education: luxury homes, luxury cars, and perhaps high-end travel and jewelry. In each of these instances, the brand becomes part of a family’s and student’s personal identity for life. The question to ask yourself is, What is the brand that you want your students to carry for life?

Pillar 3: Driving Enrollment and Willingness to Pay

With clear outcomes and a defined value proposition, a school can fundamentally change its relationship with the market. It can move from “buying students” with discounts to commanding its price with confidence. In the university world, the practice of over-discounting has created a toxic cycle. It signals a commodity mindset to prospective families, who then feel empowered to “make a deal” by asking for more aid, and it reduces the confidence of alumni, who question if their donations are truly going to those in need.

Multiple studies of independent school tuition pricing and enrollment over the years have shown that increases in tuition do not inhibit enrollment; it is rather value proposition that drives enrollment, independent of tuition pricing changes.

The college data on willingness to pay, proxied by net tuition revenue (NTR), is irrefutable. My analysis of federally collected college data from IPEDS reveals two powerful correlations that every CFO and head of school should understand. First, as a university’s acceptance rate goes down, i.e., it becomes more selective, NTR per student goes up. Second, as the median post-graduation earnings of its students go up, its NTR per student also goes up. The conclusion is stunningly simple: selectivity and strong outcomes drive willingness to pay.

Engineering Scarcity and Busting the Price Myth

Multiple studies of independent school tuition pricing and enrollment over the years have shown that increases in tuition do not inhibit enrollment; it is rather value proposition that drives enrollment, independent of tuition pricing changes. This evidence should embolden school leaders to reject the culture of fear around pricing and instead focus on building the value that justifies the price. The strategy is not to discount, but to engineer demand. This includes:

• Define and Demonstrate your Outcomes: Akin to career earnings for colleges, this is critical. Translate it in your value proposition clearly.
• Apply the Scarcity Principle: You can create real and perceived scarcity by strategically managing enrollment. Cap the number of classrooms at your key entry grades (e.g., Kindergarten and 9th grade) at a conservative figure. Build a genuine waitlist. Only open a new classroom once you are certain you can fill it with full-pay or mission-critical families. This discipline builds pricing power and long-term brand equity. Make no mistake, the selectivity of elite private schools has been intentionally engineered. How did the elite universities achieve their highly marketed low single digit acceptance rates, which encourage accepted families to be willing to pay for it? Their number of seats hasn’t grown, while they have grown the denominator by making it easier for more students to apply. The Common Application has allowed universities to find new pools of talent while also raising the bar for getting into these schools.
• Deploy Financial Aid Strategically: Many non-selective colleges make the mistake of spreading financial aid (much of it “merit-based”) across all tiers of applicants, which reduces willingness to pay. Successful schools and universities use financial aid as a surgical tool to sculpt the composition of their incoming class, by attracting students who are exceptional academic fits or who advance the school’s specific mission, and manage the overall financial health of the institution.
  There is no sense in giving similar aid to high-academically prepared and low-academically prepared students, yet that is often what happens in non-selective universities. Allocating significant merit aid to low-academically prepared, high-income students significantly erodes willingness to pay.
  The University of Tulsa, in an effort to concentrate merit aid on high academically performing students regardless of income, gives any National Merit Scholar Finalists a full ride, making it the highest concentration of such scholars of any school. This has boosted the school’s perception for academic strength, and has influenced less academically rigorous students to want to pay more to attend a school with so many top students.

The Foundation: Financial Sustainability

This brings us to the base of the wheel and the ultimate goal for any institution: financial sustainability. Here, the central concept for every board member and CFO to understand is the “coverage ratio” — the percentage of a school’s operating expenses covered by net tuition revenue. The goal is to get this ratio to a manageable level, around 80%, where fundraising and auxiliary programs can comfortably fill the gap.

The path to this goal presents a choice between two powerful, opposing cycles.

The vicious cycle begins with a weak or diluted perceived value, which leads to decreasing enrollment. The first families to leave are often the full-pay families who have the most options. This departure blows a hole in the budget, creating a low coverage ratio and placing an immense burden on the annual fund. When fundraising inevitably falls short, the school is forced to make program cuts, which further weakens its perceived value, accelerating the downward spiral.

In stark contrast, the virtuous cycle begins with a strong, clearly articulated perceived value. This leads to increasing enrollment and, critically, growing waitlists. As demand outstrips supply, more full-pay families join and stay. This lifts the school to a healthy coverage ratio of 80% or more, with fundraising becoming a source for innovation rather than desperation. The school now has more money to invest in the very programs and people that strengthen its value proposition, which in turn attracts more mission-aligned families, reinforcing the cycle of success.

You cannot cut your way to success. The only way out of a vicious cycle, where lowered value position leads to reduced enrollment and more financial struggles, is to invest in value creation. This requires leaders to make hard choices and avoid “peanut butter spreading,” that is, distributing resources thinly across all programs in an attempt to avoid conflict. Investments must be targeted to strengthen the specific value proposition you have chosen.

The proof that these turnarounds are possible is powerful. The University of Tulsa aligned its budget around clear priorities, which drove a 33% increase in first-time freshmen enrollment, increased its net tuition revenue by $2,000 per student (a 16% jump), and simultaneously increased its mission alignment by enrolling more Pell-eligible students and increasing the racial diversity of its student body by six percentage points. This success demonstrates that it is possible to improve both the balance sheet and the mission.

To do this in an independent school context, you must be honest about which viable business model your school fits into:

1. The “Top Elite School” Model: This model is selective, accepting the “best families” by whatever measure the school chooses (wealth, academics, etc.). It operates on the scarcity principle and commands a top price, aiming for an 80-90% net tuition revenue coverage.
2. The “Scaled, Multi-Track” Model: This model is built on scale, emulating how top suburban public K-12 schools operate. It admits a wide range of students and uses “tracking” by subject to meet individual student needs, from advanced to remedial, across all grade levels. For this to work, your school needs grade enrollments of a few hundred kids.
3. The “Two-Track Mission” Model: This model, common in state universities and faith-based colleges, admits students who meet core mission criteria while also offering a distinct honors program for those with the highest academic expectations. Financial aid can be targeted differently for each track.

I have not listed “small and open-admission” as a sustainable strategy. Many independent schools have attempted or tried to justify this pathway, but it is rarely successful beyond early childhood and the early elementary grades.

A New Mandate for Leadership

The path to a thriving, sustainable future for independent schools runs directly and relentlessly through the pursuit of demonstrable outcomes. Executing this playbook requires heads and boards to take joint responsibility for school outcomes, use it to present a distinct value proposition, and to drive enrollment and willingness to pay. And it demands a culture of accountability where data is treated as the true “voice of the customer,” captured by the mantra, “In God we trust, all others bring good data.”