A Proposed CS/CIS Admission Follow-Up Procedure
By Yue (draft)
Background
The enrollment of CS and CIS has dropped about 50% in recent years. This trend has not yet been reversed. Maintaining a healthy student population is not only important to our resources through state funding, it also impacts our budget directly. For example, the incidental fee we collected is tied directly to CSCI student credit hours (SCH). Perhaps more importantly, it is critical to the quality of the programs. Only when we have a good pipeline of students can we raise the admission standard to improve student quality.
One of the most important strengths of our programs is the close contact between the faculty and the students. The class sizes are small. Our offices are open. Each student has a faculty advisor to talk to. Even within UHCL, not every school assigns a faculty advisor to every student.
Based on the experience on the NSF CSEMS scholarship program, the single most effective ‘recruitment’ technique is direct personal contact, especially from faculty members. There are many instances where direct requests prompted the applicants to apply and close mentoring helped many scholars to do well enough to stay in the program.
IMHO, the key to improve enrollment and retention of quality students is to enhance communications between the students and us as early as possible.
Improving communications will not only benefit the students, but also the program and faculty members. For example, we can hear more feedback from the students about the program for improvement ideas. We can also identify and encourage students to do research in our areas in an early phase.
Thus, in this background, I propose the following admission and follow-up procedure.
The Proposal
The main ideas of the proposal are:
(1)When an applicant is accepted, a faculty advisor will immediately be assigned by the academic advisors.
(2)The program chair will then immediately send an email to the applicant, copying to the selected faculty advisor, academic advisor, international student office, etc. The email congratulates the student;dispenses useful information;and encourage the students to communicate with us; etc. A draft example is included below.
(3)The student can then communicate directly with the chair, the faculty advisor, the academic advisor, the international student office.
Thus, the admission and follow-up process is:
(1)The admission committee or the academic advisors process completed applications and generate a list of accepted applicants. This is the same as what we are doing now.
(2)The academic advisor assigns a faculty advisor to each applicant, using the formula we are currently using.
(3)The academic advisors send a list of accepted students, their names, email addresses, originated countries, and faculty advisors to the program chair.
(4)Based on this information, the program chair selects a canned email template and sends an email to the applicant.A draft example is included below.
(5)The email is copied to all parties so the student can begin communicating with them.
(6)The various participants can also initiate communications with the students by replying to the chair’s email.
An Example Email Template from the Program Chair:
The target is an Indian student, named Girish Peeris, who is accepted to the M.Sc. CIS program. Dr. Sharon Hall was assigned as his faculty advisor. Blue colored text is my comment.
To:Girish Peeris
Cc:Sharon Hall
Cc:Barbara Coleman
Cc:Dorothy Hogg
Cc:Sadegh Davari
Cc:a right person in the international office
Cc:the chairperson of Indian Student Association
Dear Girish,
As the chairperson of the Computer Information Systems (CIS) program at the University of Houston-Clear Lake (UHCL), I am happy to inform you that the CIS admission committee has just recommended your acceptance to our M.Sc. program. Congratulations!
I would like to welcome you to the program and provide you with some useful information.
Our program is known for its small class sizes and student-oriented faculty. In fact, a faculty advisor, Dr. Sharon Hall, has already been assigned to you. If you have any questions about the program, you may communicate either with Dr. Hall or me.
The CIS program is hosted under the School of Science and Computer Engineering. The academic advisors of the school are Ms. Barbara Coleman and Ms. Dorothy Hogg. They can answer general questions about the school and track your application status.(Barbara and Dorothy: is this a good description?)
If you need help in your Visa’s application, you may contact Mr. Xxx of the International Student Office.(Need to contact ISO.)
Houston has a large and vibrant Indian population. UHCL has a very active Indian Student Association (ISA) which is extremely helpful to its fellow students. ISA had arrangement many exciting activities in the past, such as Holi, etc. (need ISA input on how to write ths.)Their Website is and the current chair person is Mr. RajaSekhar Kolli.(Need to contact ISA)
I am copying this email to them so you may communicate directly.
There may also be a few Websites of interest to you. Information about the CIS program can be found at UHCL computing faculty research interest can be found at (to be added).
Houston is the fourth largest city in the United States. It is also one of the most affordable citiesin the United States and has a strong diversity. UHCL is located at Clear Lake, 25 miles from downtown Houston. Further information about ClearLake and Houston can be found in here, here and here (add links later). UHCL is adjacent to the Johnson Space Center (JSC) of the National Aeronautics and Aerospace Administration (NASA). JSC is the control center for the space shuttles.
Our computing programs are known for their excellent balance of theory and practice, small class sizes, dedicated and student-oriented faculty, up to dated resources, and diversity. We believe that each student makes a unique contribution to the vivacity of the program. On behalf of our faculty and staff, I welcome you to our program.
Sincerely,
Dr. Kwok-Bun Yue
Chair, Computer Information Systems