Keystone Education Group has acquired German student-athlete placement agency uniexperts to reinforce its Keystone Sports arm.
The announcement comes after the company took over Sport-Scholarships KEG in late 2021, as it became Europe’s “strongest” college sports recruiting solution for student-athletes looking to study in the US.
“We are excited to welcome uniexperts into the Keystone Sports family,” said Erik Harrell, Keystone CEO.
“Our mission with Keystone Sports is to help student athletes in Europe and around the world to find the best US university for them to pursue both their academic and athlete dreams. Adding uniexperts will help us significantly expand our footprint and capabilities in Germany.”
“Joining Keystone Sports was a natural choice for us as we will be able expand our services and further our mission of helping guide students through the international education journey,” said Stefan Wirtz, who along with Roger Thiele, is one of uniexperts’s managing directors.
“Student-athletes will benefit from the combined competences of the world’s most experienced athletic recruiting consultants”
“Student-athletes will benefit from the combined competences of the world’s most experienced athletic recruiting consultants. They will be served with a speed and scale currently not offered by any other agency in the market,” Thiele added.
Since 1998, agencies under the Keystone Sports banner – CSUSA (Norway), AGM (Spain), Sport-Scholarships (Germany), Tennis Smart (UK) and uniexperts (Germany) – have sent over 9,240 international student-athletes to over 820 colleges in the US and Canada. In total, they have helped to secure over $582 million worth of scholarships.
Keystone has recently begun combining its Keystone Sports student-placement services with lead generation and marketing services for institutions in the US to build an end-to-end student recruitment offering. It pointed to the declining college-aged student population in the US, according to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center.
Since fall 2019, total US undergraduate enrolment has decreasing by 6.6%, it noted – a trend Keystone said is “expected to continue well past 2029”.
Keystone aims to “significantly expand” its international student marketing and recruitment services to “help bridge the gap”, it added. Keystone Sports forms a central part of this expansion, the company explained.
Read more about how sport is taking the lead in international recruitment for the UK.
