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.

Person Specification

Criteria

Qualifications

• Essential

  • GCSE in Maths and English or equivalent.

• Desirable

Experience

• Essential

  • Experience of a customer/public-facing role.
  • Demonstrable administrative and/or project management skills.
  • Experience of planning and running events.

• Desirable

  • Understanding of the education sector and independent schools.
  • Experience of a sales-focused role.
  • Reviewing and reporting on an activity or a project.

Ability and Skills

• Essential

  • Possessing excellent written and verbal communication skills.
  • Possessing excellent people and interpersonal skills.
  • Empathetic to people who may be in difficult personal situations and comfortable delivering feedback.
  • Highly computer literate.
  • Confident when handling numerical data.
  • Able to work with senior members of staff while showing discretion at all times.
  • Able to manage a diverse workload within tight deadlines.
  • Able to consult with and advise colleagues of all levels to deliver appropriate messages and make adjustments.
  • Keen to explore and adopt new technologies.
  • A thorough proof-reader with excellent attention to detail.

• Desirable

  • Experience of SIMS, Hubspot or other databases.
  • Able to think creatively about promoting the School and bursaries, collaborating with colleagues to do so.

Personal Attributes

• Essential
  • Whole-hearted support for the charitable objectives of Highgate.
  • A commitment to equality, diversity and anti-sexism.
  • The credibility and professionality of manner to represent Highgate.
  • Communicable enthusiasm for admissions and event objectives; able to bring colleagues along on the journey.
  • A commitment to the highest standards of confidentiality.
  • Diplomatic and tactful, but also politely persistent.
  • A good sense of humour.
  • Flexibility and adaptability.
  • A positive 'can-do' attitude; self-motivated.
  • Common sense and a drive to improve