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The What
The Saint Paul Conservatory of Music (SPCM), a nonprofit music school, was at a pivotal moment, facing strategic questions on relocation, enrollment growth, and program direction. I joined a Columbia University consulting team to design and execute a research-driven strategy that would align facility planning, student retention, and program development with SPCM’s mission of excellence and accessibility.
The How
Research Design & Data Collection
- Partnered with SPCM leadership to define core strategic questions on location, enrollment, retention, and programming.
- Designed and deployed two Qualtrics surveys targeting students/families and faculty, ensuring questions captured both quantitative trends and qualitative insights.
Data Analysis & Insight Synthesis
- Applied statistical and data analysis to identify patterns and trends across demographics, commute behavior, program participation, and satisfaction factors.
- Explored underlying motivations, pain points, and latent needs to uncover deeper insights beyond surface-level feedback.
- Segmented findings to identify high-impact opportunities such as sibling engagement, summer camp conversions, and faculty retention levers.
Strategic Recommendations & Consulting Deliverables
- Delivered a location short-list with criteria balancing accessibility, community cohesion, and safety.
- Proposed structural changes including centralized scheduling and improved teacher matching to address attrition drivers.
- Created a prioritized roadmap for program expansion into high-demand areas (piano, strings, chamber music, digital music).
The Impact
Strategic Clarity & Decision Enablement
- Delivered a prioritized facility location strategy with criteria balancing accessibility, community cohesion, and safety, guiding leadership’s relocation planning.
- Provided a clear roadmap linking program expansion with market demand (piano, strings, chamber music, digital music), ensuring mission-aligned growth.
Operational Improvements
- Recommended centralized scheduling and improved teacher matching to address top attrition drivers, improving operational efficiency and retention potential.
- Proposed converting summer camp participants and siblings of current students into year-round enrollments, creating new, cost-efficient growth channels.
Stakeholder Engagement & Alignment
- Produced actionable insights from Qualtrics surveys that unified leadership, faculty, and community perspectives into a shared set of priorities.
- Strengthened leadership’s ability to make data-driven decisions by delivering cleaned datasets, segmentation analyses, and a repeatable decision-making framework.
