Currently only operating in the UK, Enroly has partnered with more than a quarter of British universities who use their CAS Shield platform to support international enrolments.

Unlike other tech platforms, the Enroly software sits within the university walls as part of admissions dashboards and, as a consequence, hundreds of thousands of applications are now passing through the system in real-time.

It also allows more than 5,000 international agents to self-serve application updates on behalf of students, including notifications on when they have received their visa.

Another crucial factor is that this growing data lake includes postgraduate applicants, the study level with by far the largest international student growth in the UK, as well as undergraduate applicants.

As a consequence Enroly is now the biggest single source of data on international students confirming places in the UK sector, rivaling the size of UCAS or any major global recruitment agents, and can actually show significant insights into cross-sector patterns that have been previously unavailable.

The latest update from Enroly now allows licensed partners to compare their own performance on metrics like speed of offer, global market share, popularity of courses against the sector and essentially where to divert their operational resources.

Speaking about the development, Heath Aster, head of international operations at University of Chester, said, “Being able to look in real time at how an institution is doing in terms of attracting students and managing the visa and compliance processes, compared to a competing university or the industry average is powerful.

“This insight can help to improve the student experience and ensure the onboarding process runs smoothly. There are so many ways a tool like this will help the sector succeed,” Aster continued.

In addition to the University of Chester, other institutions who have been quick to embrace the new data tool include Aston University and Oxford Brookes University.

Institutions can analyse their own information easily using data insights to monitor progress towards business goals too. The tool can help them track performance towards targets on international student recruitment and cut the time it takes to move students through the compliance process, in accordance with UKVI requirements.

Many universities work with UCAS and analysts such as dataHE to interpret application trends across the sector and improve forecasting within their institution. Many senior leaders will now be looking at Enroly as a potential window to postgraduate insights and seeing the benefit of unilaterally using the same platform to record accurate data.

A similar situation exists in Australia with the majority of institutions choosing to work with StudyLink to support postgraduate applications and achieve a sector wide view of destination data and service standards.

“Out of date data stifles the sector’s ability to drive efficiency and shift quickly”

“One of the major issues key decision makers in international student recruitment face is that the information they need can take months or even years to collate, so it is always already out of date by the time they receive it. This stifles the sector’s ability to drive efficiency and shift quickly in response to changing global markets,” Jeff Williams, CEO and co-founder of Enroly, said.

“The data insights now available on our platform gives universities the tools they need to be data-driven. It puts real-time information into the hands of those who need it to get students onboard more efficiently, with a better experience, and makes it easier for them to tap into developing markets to offer quality higher education across the world.”

The latest development is another example of innovation from the private sector outstripping institutional or government level systems and the increased reliance on public-private partnerships in higher education to keep pace with global competition.

What other ways are UK institutions gathering sector-wide international application data? How do you feel about a private sector company tracking application flows rather than government or public agency? Comment below or email us at editorial@thepienews.com