The Turning Point Series Part 2: Private School Marketing Strategies for the Crisis Era
Private schools are facing a period of significant disruption. But if you’ve been watching the signs closely, you’ll recognize something essential, we’ve been here before. The current enrollment pressures you may be facing aren’t new but rather a part of a larger historical rhythm, a pattern that was illustrated to me in the book The Fourth Turning by William Strauss and Neil Howe, and later, the updated sequel The Fourth Turning Is Here.
Whether its affordability, the increase in competitive schools, shifting parent expectations, or any other multitude of enrollment woes, we attempt to decode and look to the past for insights and understandings in our summer blog series aptly titled The Turning Point: Independent Schools Through the Cycles of History.
Today we begin working in reverse, looking back at the last 15+ years to learn, or remember, what lessons we can draw from the era we’ve been living through since 2007, the Crisis Era. Because history doesn’t just repeat, it tends to offer blueprints.
The modern “Millennial Crisis Era” began with the Great Recession of ‘07-’08 and has continued to accelerate through wars, increased polarization of absolutely everything, and of course no crisis era is complete without a global pandemic. For our purposes we will stick to the events that most affected the way schools operated and adjusted the most to.
The COVID Boom: Two Very Different Outcomes
COVID was a shake-up unlike any other for schools, however, not all private schools struggled with enrollment when things started to open back up. In fact, many experienced an enrollment surge, what we have often referred to as the "COVID Boom."
There were two primary reasons for this, each with their own subset of influences, but broadly caused by:
Migration patterns. Remote work allowed families to relocate from dense urban centers to suburban and rural areas. In many cases, they brought children with them who needed new school placements and fled the stricter COVID policies of densely populated cities and areas.
Public school policy reactions from frustrated parents. Extended closures, inconsistent virtual instruction, and political battles over masking and mandates left many searching for alternatives.
Private boarding and day schools that were agile enough to reopen earlier or offer hybrid options often became a lifeline. In communities where public school trust eroded, independent schools filled the gap.
This wasn’t just about offering in-person learning either. It was about clarity, consistency, and communication. Schools that messaged confidently and with purpose didn’t just attract new families, they earned long-term trust.
The 2008 Recession: A Wake-Up Call
The other major event that shook school policies, investments, and enrollment was the global financial crisis in 2007. Triggered by the collapse of the housing market and financial institutions, it introduced a wave of economic insecurity for families across all income levels. Private day schools, often tuition-dependent and localized, were especially vulnerable, but the effects of the market crash were global, adding deep vulnerabilities to boarding school revenue models as well.
Schools saw drops in applications and higher attrition. Families who had previously seen private education as attainable were suddenly rethinking their priorities. Institutions that leaned on prestige or long-standing reputation found that it wasn’t enough to maintain their normal enrollment goals any longer. Add in what seemed to be the overnight changes in international student markets and shifting parent opinions on boarding schools in the domestic market, and you have a recipe for some of the most challenging times that private boarding schools have had to endure since the 1930’s.
The present and future looked grim for most but the schools that responded strategically, began laying the groundwork for long-term resilience immediately. It is during this time period that we saw the re-emergence of strategies not seen for decades, whether those school leaders knew it or not.
Flexible tuition programs were expanded or introduced.
Retention strategies moved to the forefront of marketing and admissions planning.
Mission clarity was strengthened as a selling point for anxious families.
New reliance on international boarding students from a single nation (China) to keep enrollment budgets in the black.
The common thread here? These schools didn’t just adapt to a crisis, they used it to become more nimble, parent-focused, and clear about their value (outside of unique boarding strategies of course). This was a crucial first step as it set in place a decade of “survival” strategies and processes that slowly began to unwind with the general rise of new technologies, global investments, and in the end, more families capable (and willing) to pay high tuition costs.
Opportunity Out of Crisis: Strategies That worked
The new strategies of readjusting affordability, emphasizing the core values of your institution, and recommitting to community involvement to drive enrollment efforts were centered around building trust and togetherness, both foundational in the responses to the broad effects of every moment that challenged (and continues to challenge) private school enrollment in the Crisis Era.
While every school had their unique challenges to overcome, from 2008 to now, certain patterns emerged from schools that successfully navigated change that could be applied more broadly across the industry.
Investment in digital infrastructure. Schools that had learning management systems or flexible digital learning options were able to pivot quickly.
Sliding scale tuition or indexed tuition models. These helped families feel that the value was worth the cost.
Retention-focused admissions. The shift from "filling seats" to "deepening relationships" kept families engaged.
Community-first messaging. Rather than marketing prestige or exclusivity, successful schools highlighted care, values, and purpose.
Investments in campus safety and hygiene. Schools took a heightened interest in campus security, digital security, and overall safety and cleanliness procedures and policy, successfully addressing not only local or state mandates but also growing parent concerns around these subjects.
More importantly these weren’t just short-term fixes to the current state of the market, they became core to these schools’ identities moving forward. While these tactics and shifts of attention may have come from a reactionary mindset to the “crisis” events that pulled us every which way over the last 15+ years, but in a very real sense they were proactive redirects for the changing parent generations that we are experiencing right now.
The lived experience of millennial parents places very strong importance on core values, safety, character development, and a strong academic and social foundation to successfully adapt to a wildly unpredictable future. A natural effect from the cause of growing up in an Unraveling Era, and coming to age in a Crisis Era.
Schools that have thrived in the Crisis Era share some common traits that not only addressed specific events, but transitioned their school culture and policies towards the changing perspectives and expectations of this new parent generation. Schools will survive and thrive during most situations of the Crisis Era so long as they:
Lead with clarity. Families aren’t guessing about the school’s values or priorities.
Invest in retention. Every new enrollment is treated as a multi-year relationship.
Prepare, rather than react. Scenario planning, tuition modeling, and enrollment forecasting are ongoing.
Understand their local markets. Pay close attention to local public school dynamics, housing trends, and parent sentiment.
Today, we are still experiencing the turmoil of being in a “Crisis Era” of history and while the days of COVID and the ‘08 financial crisis may be behind us (knock on wood), there are still signals that we have yet to cycle through the worst of this era. Between constantly renewed recession fears, affordability issues from inflation and consumer debt stressors, teacher and staff burnout that is leading to staff shortages and lower morale, or even the cultural polarization and politicization of everything that is undoubtedly making its way onto your campus through students and families, there is no time to take our foot off the pedal in adapting and preparing for the times ahead.
The good news, these aren’t new problems, just updated versions of the same stressors we saw during the 2008 Recession and COVID disruption. This makes our mission clearer: use what we’ve already learned to shape what we do next. Even more optimistically, these approaches proactively align with the pendulum swing of Boomer/Gen-X parents of the 80’s, 90’s, 00’s, and 10’s to the Millennial parents of today.
What schools do now determines how they will weather the next disruption. We are still in a Crisis Era. But history tells us that the schools who pay attention, adapt early, and stay grounded in mission will be the institutions families rely on when the world feels uncertain.
This is the moment to do that work. The window is open. The cycle is still turning.
