Recruitment Toolkit

Recruitment Continuum

This web page will assist programs and departments in recruiting racially and ethnically diverse students, and disadvantages and/or first-generation college students. Recruitment starts before you meet applicants; it begins when you develop an enrollment management plan that takes into account diversifying both your student body and faculty.

The first step is to look at the Inclusive Excellence Framework, and:

a) Assess the current composition of your student body, faculty, and staff. Assess your current practices in light of diversity, equity, and inclusion. Develop objectives and strategies to prioritize diversity, equity, and inclusion.

b) Assess the opportunities for your students, faculty, and staff to access professional development opportunities in diversity, inclusion, equity, and social justice. Create a culture that encourages and supports students, faculty, and staff to attend those events.

c) Assess your program/department engagement with COMO’s community leaders and population that empower and create access to an inclusive and diverse dialogue between the community and your program/department. Develop ways to engage with the community in a meaningful way.

As you create the foundation for diversity and inclusion, consider the five phases of the recruitment continuum:

1. Potential graduate students: these are undergraduate students, recently graduated students, individuals with master degrees, or specialist degrees. They are underrepresented in your field, or first-generation college students, and have the potential to be our graduate students. They have not interacted with you as of yet, but you would like to reach out to them. 
   1. Be prepared to convey: why pursue a graduate degree, what you can offer, who you are looking for, and potential career outcomes. 
   2. Suggested venues for recruitment are Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU), Minority Serving Institutions (MSI), Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSI), and Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCU). See a list of potential institutions in and around Missouri that we compiled.
2. Prospective graduate students: these are potential graduate students with whom you have made contact during recruitment engagements, faculty visits to other institutions, faculty, and staff interactions that led to a discussion about graduate education. They are underrepresented in your field, or first-generation college students, who are unsure of or started to explore graduate education. 
   1. Be prepared to convey: why pursue a graduate degree, how to apply to a graduate degree at Mizzou, what you are looking for in a student, and funding options.
   2. Identify some key people, show what you can offer – specifics on the program, data on diversity and inclusion-, and connect them with current graduate students.
3. Applicant: these are prospective graduate students who expressed a solid interest in your graduate program and began applying. They are underrepresented in your field, or first-generation college students, who may not have all the information needed to smoothly navigate the application process. 
   1. Be prepared to convey: information on how to use our application system, information about the city of Columbia pertinent to their interests, information about opportunities for family members to study, work, or live in Columbia, information relevant to their family situation like childcare.
   2. Connect them with resources on campus – including graduate students and diversity-focused initiatives, consider fee waivers, provide ample and clearly explained information on funding options, and be transparent about the admissions process.
4. Admitted students: these are underrepresented in your field, or first-generation college students, who have successfully been admitted to your program, but have not committed to come. 
   1. Be prepared to provide them with information about campus resources – professional development, graduate student groups and governance, housing, etc.; consider identifying a peer-mentor for their first year in the program. 
   2. Connect them with information on job opportunities for family members, and with the Division of Inclusion, Diversity, and Equity, and the Graduate School’s Center for Inclusive Excellence in Graduate Education.
5. Enrolled graduate student: these are underrepresented in your field, or first-generation college students, who have decided to come to Mizzou. They will face different challenges and struggles than other graduate students. Recruitment is connected with retention; therefore, you must:
   1. Be prepared to provide culturally appropriate mentoring, information about resources that support well-being, self-efficacy, building community, and diverse and inclusive scholarship. 

Recruitment Databases

We have access to a few databases to help support recruitment. Those are the National Name Exchange, the McNair Scholars Directory, and The National GEM Consortium. For the first two, you can request access to a list of names that you can reach out and cultivate potential graduate students for your program. The last one, prospective graduate students select Mizzou as one of their choices, and you can cultivate that relationship.
Read more about the databases in the Diversity & Recruitment Resources.

Holistic Admissions

Using Noncognitive Variables in Assessing Readiness for Higher Education. By Willliam E. Sedlacek

Holistic Review in Graduate Admissions: A report from the Council of Graduate Schools

Holistic Review of Applications for Admission to Graduate Degree Programs (Rackham Graduate School at the University of Michigan)

Navigating Holistic Admissions for a Stronger Graduate Program (ETS)

Equity in Graduate Education – Resources