Admissions Officer (7+)

Lead 7+ Admissions:

You will lead the 7+ admissions process from initial parental enquiry through to the induction of new pupils.

Planning, strategy and marketing:

Set, communicate and maintain timelines and priorities for your entry point.
Assist the Head of Admissions in formulating our overall strategy for Admissions, including reflecting on the efficacy of existing systems, customer service and proposing improvements.
Help identify marketing and communication opportunities to promote events and encourage conversion.
Maximise the communication and marketing potential of the application database, HubSpot.
Suggest applicants at 7+ and current pupils/leavers suitable for market research and support colleagues with collating feedback from families / pupils or information that might be required.
Liaise with the Communications team to create video and photo content and other marketing collateral to support 7+ entry

Events and admissions process:

Work with the Principal of the Junior School, the Head of Admissions and other colleagues to devise and implement the 7+ Open Morning, tours and other admissions events – including conversion events for offer holders – working with colleagues across the school
Organise the academic assessments including entry tests and interviews, encompassing the production of examination papers, organisation of tests, requesting of references, correspondence with parents/carers, organisation of interviews, processing of results and their publication to parents.
Arrange any assessments for candidates living abroad.
Monitor applications as the arrive, check their accuracy and monitor payments.
Obtain all documentation pertaining to learning differences (e.g. educational psychologist report), agree any adjustments with the academic team and communicate this to parents.
Acknowledge acceptances, verify payments and documentation in line with statutory requirements.
Manage the reserve list, filling further places as appropriate.
Liaise with staff to ensure new pupil inductions are fully arranged and appropriate, timely correspondence shared with parents, and new joiner information is completed.
Support the other members of the admissions team by attending events and undertaking any other support tasks as required

Building relationships:

Correspond with prospective parents via email and telephone, building positive relationships.
Manage registrations for open events via website and telephone and support the event with quality communications beforehand and afterwards.
Act as an ambassador during open events and offer holder events, helping with anything from offering drinks to putting up banners.
Gather feedback from parents about the event/process and report on this, making recommendations as appropriate.
Provide accurate, timely and consistent feedback to parents after assessments
Ensure that the Head of Admissions is asked for support, if needed, and/or updated with any difficult conversations or situations arising within your entry point.
Act as the lead contact for feeder schools at your entry point, both state and independent, providing assessment outcomes and arranging events, with colleagues, where required.

Systems and Regulatory:

Understand Safeguarding and GDPR requirements, including the data retention policy. Ensure that work follows regulations at all times.
Ensure that the School is compliant with visa regulations. Obtain relevant documentation for non-UK citizens joining the school, and record their information
Use relevant systems such as Hubspot, My School Portal, SIMS and other systems.
Carry out the safeguarding follow up for all joiners at the entry point and all Senior School leavers.
Keep the relevant admissions policies under review and make recommendations for change.

Reporting:

Use Hubspot to build lists, reports and dashboards to monitor the entry point.
Collate statistics to share with the Head of Admissions and senior colleagues.
Arrange, prepare for and actively participate in the Admissions Panel meeting where decisions are made.
Working with the Admissions Department, review, implement and manage the process for monitoring the number of 7+ applications from different cultures, making any recommendations to encourage applications from under-represented groups and breakdown any barriers, perceived or real, to applications from different cultural groups.
Alongside other colleagues, implement processes which allow changes to the diversity of the pupil body to be measured and analysed.

Occasional Places:

Keep abreast of details of any pupils leaving the Junior School.
Respond to enquiries and maintain waiting lists for places.
Liaise with Head of Admissions and Junior School Leadership team to run any process required (likely to be infrequent).

Bursary Process:

Developing an understanding of the barriers faced by bursary applicants when applying to academically selective schools and suggesting ways to overcome these.
Ensure that the admissions process enables bursary candidates to succeed
Working with colleagues across the School, welcome bursary holder pupils to the Junior School, and engage with planning of methods through which to support families.
Work with the Comms team and other colleagues to raise awareness of bursaries amongst low-income families, in particular strengthening links with partner primary schools
Attend Parent Tours and similar admissions events; be a point of contact for parents/carers looking for information about 7+ bursaries.
Manage the relationship with the external provider of bursary assessments to ensure high levels of service for applicant and bursary holder families. Resolve any issues and keep ways of working under review. Collaborate to review and propose changes to bursary parameters, financial thresholds or processes as appropriate.

How we work:

We ‘pitch in’ and assist each other at busy times, whether that be staffing events, stuffing envelopes or answering more than our share of phone calls.
We are committed to continually developing our expertise by reading blogs, attending conferences and courses, and contacting colleagues in other schools.
We think critically about how we can improve our processes, gain efficiencies and improve the experiences of our prospective families.
We work collaboratively and think creatively about how best to solve problems as a team.
We communicate clearly and with empathy at all times with prospective families.
Our written communications are always courteous, accurate, warm and understanding.
We continually build our understanding of all aspects of school life to enable us to sell the school to prospective families.
We collaborate with the Communications team, sharing intelligence gleaned from working with prospective families to inform our marketing and communications.
These duties and responsibilities are intended as a guide. They are not exhaustive: the Admissions Officer will be expected to undertake any reasonable task or responsibility as required by the line manager.