MainStreet: Making a Good Impression

The University of Cincinnati’s MainStreet corridor is an outstanding example of how universities around the nation are transforming their campuses to appeal to today’s student.

College Planning and Management Magazine’s 2006 Construction Report found that college construction in 2005 totaled more than $14.5 billion, which the magazine reported as the highest one-year total in the nation’s history.

“Our strategic imperative surrounding MainStreet was that if we didn’t build MainStreet in a rather elaborate way, we would be less competitive in the marketplace. Students would go someplace else,” says Mitchel D. Livingston, UC Vice President of Student Affairs and Services.

For college admissions professionals wooing students to their universities, surveys conducted by STAMATS, a national higher education marketing firm, found that the campus visit is the most influential single act performed in the college courtship through admissions offices. A new national report released by Lipman Hearne – the nation’s largest marketing and communications firm serving non-profit institutions (including UC) – found that 74 percent of the nation’s high-achieving students polled in a 600-student survey said that the campus visit played a role in the application process.

“The completion of UC’s MainStreet has transformed the university into a destination campus,” says Tom Canepa, assistant vice president for UC Admissions. “Throughout our recruitment efforts our goal is to ensure that prospective students visit the campus.  Students (and usually their parents) are amazed with the facilities, the cleanliness and the functionality our campus offers. Then when they learn about our outstanding academic programs, they realize that UC is a university they should strongly consider to continue their education.”

UC had more than 1,000 freshmen participate in the annual report of the Cooperative Institutional Research Program (CIRP) Freshman Survey in 2005, a program regarded as providing the most comprehensive information about college students. That survey found that the three top reasons those UC freshmen had noted as “very important” in their college selection were:

1. Graduates got good jobs (57.9 percent, compared with 50 percent of the nation’s public institutions with medical schools)

2. Good academic reputation (55 percent, compared with 56.4 percent of the nation’s public institutions with medical schools)

3. They paid a visit to campus (36.5 percent, compared with 37.9 percent of the nation’s public institutions with medical schools)

“All things considered, after you choose two academic programs at different universities, it’s the fullness of student life that will make a difference in a choice,” says Livingston. “And the phenomenon is all about competition – what the students expect as ‘consumers.’”

So, are there signs that UC’s revitalized campus is wooing and winning more students? Here’s a look at recent enrollment figures, reported by UC’s Office of Institutional Research:

• Autumn 2005  35,244
• Autumn 2004  34,364
• Autumn 2003  33,823
• Autumn 2002  32,975
• Autumn 2001  33,085

Is the MainStreet corridor transforming what was considered a commuter campus into a bustling center of activity?

• UC’s Campus services reports that UC’s Tangeman University Center (TUC) had 650,000 visitors per year before it closed for renovation in 2001. Over the 2005-2006 academic year, that number has soared to 1.4 million.
• TUC is now open 113 hours per week, compared with 71 the year it closed for renovations.
• TUC held 34 events the year it closed in 2001. In 2006, the facility held 292 events, plus had 910 movie showings in MainStreet Cinema.
• The old recreation facilities served an average of 1,000 people per day. The staff at the new state-of-the art Campus Recreation Center report an average of 2,200 per day.
• UC Campus Recreation Center is open 114 hours a week, compared with the 90 hours per week offered by the old recreation facilities.

 “Since the opening of the first phase of MainStreet in spring 2004, the MainStreet transformation has come alive with events, programs, student activities and even off-campus vendors using MainStreet space to promote themselves to the campus community. MainStreet is truly a place to live, learn, work and play,” says Robert Tackett, director, MainStreet Operations.