Managing Events in Higher Education
Institutional needs and circumstances can vary drastically from campus to campus, but if there’s one thing all of higher education faces, it’s the dependency on student recruitment and retention.
After more than a decade of declining college enrollment, higher education is beginning to rebound. In 2022, there were approximately 18.58 million college students in the U.S., and that number is projected to reach 20.23 million by 2031.
With competition among colleges and universities fiercer than ever, creating memorable and effective campus events has become a key strategy for recruiting and retaining students, engaging alumni, and driving institutional success.
However, managing these events comes with unique challenges, from limited resources to complex communication needs. Fortunately, with the right event management software, higher ed institutions can ensure their events are easier to manage, more engaging, and more financially successful.
Why Higher Education Events Are Different
Higher education institutions face a broad range of challenges when it comes to event management. Campus events often cater to highly diverse audiences, including students, parents, alumni, and donors. The scale can vary from intimate gatherings to events involving tens of thousands of attendees, and coordination across multiple campuses only adds to the complexity.
Here are some of the most common obstacles Higher Education event management teams face:
- Limited resources. Planning an event for hundreds, or even tens of thousands, of attendees is no small feat. Yet it is often done with small teams and tight budgets. With so many events to organize, making the most of available resources requires highly efficient systems and processes.
- Communication. Higher education events require strong communication to attendees and across departments, satellite campuses, or external service providers. Without a centralized platform in place, vital information can slip through the cracks and lead to missed deadlines, scheduling conflicts, and unanswered questions.
- High-stakes goals. There’s a lot of pressure for event teams to make events “worth it.” Higher education institutions rely on events to achieve critical goals like student recruitment, retention, and alumni engagement. Ensuring a measurable return on investment (ROI) adds pressure to deliver high-quality events efficiently.
- Manual processes. Managing event logistics manually—whether it’s booking spaces, tracking invoices, or promoting events—can become overwhelming as tasks increase. Manual workflows often lead to missed details, inefficiencies, and inconsistent results.
What is a viable event management software for universities?
Choosing the right event management software for higher ed is essential for universities to streamline processes, reduce inefficiencies, and maximize their overall ROI. The most effective platform should meet your unique needs and scale with you over time, enabling your events team to manage every detail with precision and ease.
Brightly Software’s world-class event management software makes it easy to schedule, organize, promote and recover costs from events and facility rentals. With Brightly, higher ed institutions can simplify complex workflows around:
- Organization: Centralize all event logistics in one platform, including request approvals, task management, room configurations, vendor coordination, and conflict checks.
- Promotion: Promote your events and facilities effectively, track registrations, manage ticket sales, and customize event branding to align with your institution’s identity.
- Engagement: Consolidate public and private event calendars, offering subscription options based on event type or location. Gain a comprehensive view of all events across your campuses.
- Invoicing: Easily create invoices, manage fee packages, and securely process online payments for rentals, tickets, or services.
- Assessment: Analyze space utilization, collect attendee feedback, and optimize future events. Leverage insights to understand attendee preferences, improve marketing strategies, and measure ROI.
With Brightly’s event management software for Higher Education, event teams can work more efficiently while delivering memorable experiences for students, staff, and alumni. By streamlining workflows, improving communication, and centralizing processes, we empower colleges and universities to host more impactful, engaging, and profitable.
Learn more about our event management suite or discover other ways we help higher ed institutions achieve their asset and facility management goals.
FAQs for Higher Education Event Management
What are the biggest challenges of event management in higher education?
Resources, fragmented communication across departments and campuses, and the diverse needs of students, alumni, and donors can make event management in higher education a challenge. In addition, colleges and universities often need to plan for huge audiences – ranging from hundreds to tens of thousands – all while ensuring that events deliver measurable ROI for key metrics like engagement, revenue, or retention.
How can event management software benefit colleges and universities?
Event management software can streamline communication, automate workflows, and consolidate key tasks like scheduling, invoicing, and promotion. It eliminates manual processes, reducing errors and saving time, while also providing actionable data for assessing ROI. This helps event management teams optimize resources and focus on creating meaningful experiences for their school and community.
Why is student engagement important for college event planning?
High student engagement for events can help foster a sense of belonging and community, which is crucial for retention rates and students’ overall mental well-being. In the post-Covid era, institutions have increasingly seen the need for community and in-person events, especially as the popularity of online courses has grown. Engaged students are more likely to stay enrolled, participate in campus life, and later become loyal alumni who may contribute to the institution's long-term success, either through advocacy or donations.
What features should higher ed institutions look for in event management software?
There are numerous features to look for when considering event management software. The most important aspect is to find a robust and reliable system that can connect with your calendar and meet your specific operational needs. That can include organizational features for centralizing workflows around requests, approvals, task management, rental agreements, etc. It might also include promotional features to drive and track registrants, invoicing capabilities, engagement calculators, feedback collection, or real-time data analytics.
How can colleges and universities best measure the success of their events?
Some great ways to the success of events are by tracking attendance, engagement metrics, or revenue generated. You can also use attendee feedback surveys and data analytics to assess what worked, what didn’t, and how events align with institutional goals like retention, recruitment, or donor support.
