Last fall, William Jewell College announced that tuition would be reduced by 45%, from $33,500 to $18,360 per year. This decision was made, in part, to show prospective students that Jewell was both affordable and accessible.

Jewell’s marketing team increasingly focused on this tuition decrease in recent advertisement campaigns targeted toward prospective students. The advertisements from the College – which can be seen across a variety of social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram – focus on the tuition decrease, new programs at Jewell and the quality of a Jewell education.

When determining the topic of advertisements, the marketing team aims to display programs that Jewell wants to grow and display the majors that are in high demand.

“Once we have developed our messages, we use the platform that best targets the intended demographic,” said Eric Blair, vice president of enrollment and marketing at Jewell. “Our media buyers then use analytics, trends and even predictive modeling to advise us on best practices for the messaging that will yield the best click-through rates, opens, engagement, shares, etc. We analyze performance and can make changes accordingly. We also use the recruitment cycle for determining advertisement content and placement. Early in the school year, we entice campus visits, then move to apply and deposit for seniors with general college messages to sophomores and junior inquiries.”

Overall, the marketing department wants each advertisement to reflect the brand of Jewell as The Critical Thinking College. The branding of Jewell as a critical thinking institute is embedded within all media produced by the College.

However, each advertisement might focus on a different topic or theme. For example, current video advertisements produced by William Jewell focus on the new women’s wrestling program and tuition decrease.

“Because most ads are delivered in short-term consumption mediums – billboards, digital ads, 15-30 second videos – messaging focuses on a differentiator – the change in tuition, new women’s wrestling program, no ACT/SAT required –and the graphic design or logos will support the underlying brand,” Blair said. “Our direct mail and email campaigns used to nurture interest is where we take a prospective student on the deeper brand journey and what it means when we refer to Jewell as The Critical Thinking College.”

In Jewell’s current advertisement campaign, there is a notable focus on marketing Jewell as an affordable, private education.

In a photo campaign that appears on Facebook and Instagram, advertisements feature pictures of various student activities with captions that include “Give your student access to a world-class private education” and “The world-class private education your student dreamed of, but never believed was within reach ̶̶ now $18,360/yr.”

“Ads this academic year are focusing on affordability, opportunities and accessibility [and] equity,” Blair said. “These include several topics, such as Jewell’s new wrestling and powerlifting programs, the Oxbridge Honors Program, tuition cost, holistic admission, the value of a private education, three-year degree options and critical thinking. In focus groups and ad engagement, we’ve seen the most interest in messages of cost [and] no ACT/SAT admission requirement.”

In this particular advertisement campaign, there is just one stock image being used while all other images are of Jewell students. This stock image features two Black women laughing against a plain backdrop.

The image can be found on Unsplash – a site where users can download stock photos that are copyright-free. Though this advertisement campaign uses a stock image, the marketing team prefers to use images of real students when possible.

“We always prefer images of our own students when possible,” Blair said. “In this campaign, we used one stock photo. This particular ad was used primarily on Facebook and targeting adults 40-65 in addition to our typical high school audience. The intent is to convey visually where the students are at the current moment – in high school – and the copy asks the viewer to ponder the future. By using a photo that is not of Jewell students it leaves the mind open to what could be rather than what is. There will be other times in the future when we use stock photos for wholly pragmatic purposes as well. We take a lot of photos of students each year but there may be a need for a specific setting, with a particular demographic of student in mind that also conveys the right mood that we just don’t have to work with. In those instances, we will acquire a stock photo or change our strategy.”

Jewell students might notice a Jewell advertisement in their Snapchat and TikTok feeds this year. The marketing team has begun to expand its use of social media platforms beyond Facebook and Instagram to reach prospective students. Sites such as Snapchat and TikTok are generally used more by a younger audience pool, between the ages of 15 and 25. 

“You have to find your audience where they are, and prospective students like Snapchat and TikTok,” Blair said. “Of all social platforms, Snapchat yielded the largest number of form submissions. Our videos on YouTube also have performed well. The women’s wrestling ad has done very well on Snapchat and TikTok in terms of views and swipe-ups. We’re very excited to continue to leverage these social outlets in the future and build a stronger Snapchat and TikTok presence.”

It has been almost a month since William Jewell College students were first notified about the 45 percent discount to tuition that will be implemented starting in the fall 2021 semester. The initial panic caused by the announcement has since ceased, but some students still hold concerns over their hard-earned scholarships being reduced as a result of the tuition drop.

“We are eliminating that perception barrier by making our published tuition more in line with the true cost of attendance that our students experience now. In turn, this will keep more prospective students considering Jewell longer and give us a chance to show more families all Jewell has to offer,” said Eric Blair, vice president of enrollment and marketing.

The dramatic cut to tuition means that the scholarships are also being reduced dramatically in proportion to the new cost structure. The allocation of aid dollars between the academic, athletic and need scholarships does not significantly change percentage-wise, but how the awards are managed within each category will be shifting. The most notable change is the size of individual awards, and for some awards the qualifying criteria may have changed slightly as well.

The criteria for academic scholarships that must be met and maintained to qualify for financial aid have not changed substantially but have been posted on the Jewell website as follows.

Incoming first-year students must have a minimum 3.3 cumulative high school GPA and either a minimum 24 ACT or 1170 SAT score in order to qualify for academic scholarships. These rewards are renewable for four years with the maintenance of a minimum 2.5 cumulative GPA. For incoming transfer students, a 3.3 cumulative GPA is needed to qualify for aid and is renewable for two years as long as a minimum 2.5 cumulative GPA is maintained. Higher amounts of initial aid are awarded as GPA and test scores increase.

The athletic scholarships are another aspect of the new financial structure that will be experiencing change, mainly concerning how the aid is awarded within the individual athletic programs. The athletic programs will have more flexibility in this new system as to how they will award scholarships within their budget. Coaches will also have the ability to adjust the awards for players that are considered more significant contributors to the team.

The major changes for the rest of the scholarships that the school offers are based on dollar amount. Talent scholarships offered for cheer, dance, debate, athletic band, vocal and instrumental music, and theatre performance and design/tech now range in amount from $500 to $3,000 per year. The need-based scholarships have also been reduced in size, but Blair reassures that a priority towards these awards such as the Shape the Future grant and the Housing Impact award will be maintained under this new system.

One program that has experienced significant change in financial aid is the Oxbridge Honors Program. Previously, students accepted into the program all received $26,000 per year. During the junior year, that amount was given as a Journey Grant for study abroad. In the new scholarship structure, instead of all the students receiving the same Oxbridge scholarship, there are now three types of scholarships. These include $9,250 a year to eleven students per class, 100 percent of tuition given to two students per year and 100 percent tuition as well as room and board given to two students per year. The main concern for the Oxbridge students is the aid they were promised for the junior year abroad, but it has been reassured that they will still receive proportional aid with a significantly increased dollar amount during that year.

To engage further transparency in the affordability of Jewell, the amounts of various awards not previously disclosed prior to acceptance will be published on the website. This will allow prospective students to get a better idea of the aid they are eligible to receive and hopefully prompt application to Jewell.

As well as making Jewell seem more affordable and achievable for prospective students, the College reassures that they are making a commitment to keep the total out-of-pocket cost at a relatively similar place for current students, most students will even be paying $300 to $500 less next year.

“We are committed to ensuring students pay no more net tuition and fees than they were prior to the change in the published price with the goal of giving some dollars back to as many students as possible,” said Blair.

In-depth information on the scholarships beginning in the fall 2021 semester is available here, and students who have questions about the effect of the tuition reduction on their financial aid package can schedule a virtual meeting with the office of financial aid here.

On the morning of Aug. 31, William Jewell College students received individualized letters from Eric Blair, vice president of enrollment and marketing, alerting them to a 45 percent discount to tuition set to take effect starting in the fall of 2021. Jewell’s full-time undergraduate tuition, which currently stands at $33,500, will be reduced to $18,360. Room and board costs will also be slightly reduced.

Along with being alerted to the tuition reduction, students were told in these letters that their Jewell scholarships would be reduced – so that students will have approximately the same net cost at the new rate. However – due to reduction in room and board costs – Blair shared that Jewell students, on average, would actually be paying between $300-$400 less under the reduced tuition, despite the proportional reductions in institutional aid. Each student who received this letter was given an approximation of the new cost of attending Jewell for the 2020-21 academic year. 

When explaining why the College decided to make this nearly 50 percent reduction to their tuition cost, Blair shared that the move was chiefly motivated by a desire to make Jewell appear more transparent, accessible and affordable than its previous sticker price had led prospective students to believe.

“When we looked at data and perceptions of students and families in the market, they did not understand the true affordability and the value of Jewell. The price point that we were at and where it placed us in the market – the sticker price – that $45,000 [tuition plus room and board] cost in the market created the perception that Jewell was inaccessible and unaffordable by many families to which it is actually accessible and affordable once we were able to engage them in an aid conversation and give them scholarships,” Blair said. “Our goal with the change is to create clarity to the marketplace as a whole – and that includes current students – to what would more closely resemble what it truly costs to go to Jewell.

“So, that’s to establish [the] long-term viability of the College, to make sure that we are being authentic in what we’re asking students to pay…,” Blair continued. “What we came to see is that this region does not respond well to elite-level price points for the sake of creating an elite-level perception. What the region responds to is elite-level outcomes, which Jewell has and isn’t changing.”

Blair explained that the College significantly increased the cost of tuition in the mid-2000s in order to create a perception of prestige through price. The goal of this change was to increase interest in Jewell as a prestigious college because its sticker price would be competitive with other national private liberal arts colleges. This increase in price corresponds to the beginning of a steady decrease in enrollment.

“The biggest thing that coordinated with our negative trend in enrollment was the decision by the College in the mid-2000s to move to a higher price point… [Around 1996 to 2000], we were at a more competitive price point with other private colleges in this region… In 2006 – right before the recession in 2008 – the College made the decision to elevate this price point with the intent of elevating a perception of prestige, [with] the intent to become a national liberal arts brand. There were ways that could have been executed differently, but ultimately, it just doesn’t position any kind of organization well in this middle-of-the-country market. [The market] doesn’t respond to prestige through price like you see in other geographies,” Blair said.

Several students, upon receiving their letters alerting them to this change, contacted Cardinal Services and the office of financial aid to ask about the reductions to their scholarships, worried that their cost of attendance would increase significantly.

However, even if students saw some of their scholarships reduced significantly or eliminated completely, their total cost of attending has actually been reduced a few hundred dollars, as Blair explained.

“[O]ne could term that as a reduction of the scholarship, but from a value standpoint, it’s the exact same as it was. In fact, for many students it was bettered slightly by three to five hundred dollars because of that change to room and board,” Blair said.

“Not every aid category could be adjusted the same way, and so subsequently some students are seeing three unique scholarships go to two or one or, because it was pretty nominal, go to none because it was reduced past the point of what the scholarship provided against the old price… I do understand they may be perceiving it as if they lost some sort of recognition, in fact, they haven’t,” Blair continued.

Daniel Holt, associate vice president for institutional strategy, led the effort of applying the new tuition model to students so that they would see either no change in total price of attendance or a reduction of a few hundred dollars. Holt sorted through each student’s financial aid package individually and adjusted their scholarships on a student-by-student basis.

The scholarship model will be completely overhauled, and new standardized scholarships and aid programs will be instituted for incoming students in 2021. Current students will continue to pay their current rates and will not receive the new standardized scholarships. 

The College made the changes in order to change the perception of Jewell’s affordability. To financially compensate for the changes and reduced payments for several students, the College will need to recruit an additional 23 students.

One of the programs most impacted by the reduced total scholarship amounts is the Oxbridge Honors Program. The scholarship was previously $26,000 per year, and that amount was given as a Journey Grant for study abroad during the junior year. The scholarship is now $9,250 per year at Jewell. Blair confirmed that students will still receive proportional financial aid during the junior year abroad – so the dollar amount of the scholarship will be significantly increased during that year. Additional scholarships will be made available to a select number in the program to provide full tuition and room and board. 

While students generally understand the changes in tuition, several expressed concerns with the ways the decisions were made. The initial news about the changes either left students assuming their education would cost significantly less – with the news of reduced tuition – or significantly more – with the news of reduced scholarships. 

The primary student complaints regarded the methods of communicating the changes in tuition and scholarships. Trent Brink, sophomore business administration major and member of the football team, offered his perspective on the announcement.

“My Monday brunch in the Cage was soon interrupted with a swarm of panicked students ripping their mailboxes open to discover a rather confusing letter from the school,” said Brink. “I decided to join in on the frenzy and see what the deal was. When you open the letter and see the nearly half drop in tuition, it’s super exciting. But myself along with everyone else – athlete or not – found their scholarships reduced by 20 to 30 percent.”

“While I understand that we end up paying the same or, for some, even a few hundred less, and that it’s designed to bring more students to campus, I feel like the communication could’ve been stronger here,” Brink continued. “A preemptive email would’ve been nice. It’s not like everyone checks their mailbox, so I think a lot of the panic was because of that. It seems that the [confusion] has died down. But [amidst] the coronavirus, added confusion is the last thing any Cardinals need.”

Isabel Warden, sophomore public relations major, described her reaction to learning of the changes. 

“I had the notion that since tuition was going down, I would have to pay less since my faculty scholarship stayed the same. However, that was not the case. I still had a theatre scholarship, but my Jewell access grant was cut in half and my Faculty Scholarship went down to zero. It just makes me feel like I worked hard on my academics for no reward. I mean, obviously, college is a great reward, but it’s expensive,” Warden said. 

Olga Morales, sophomore public relations and theater major, expressed a similar sentiment. 

“I do believe [Jewell] tried to be better, as in more affordable tuition to prospective students, but I do believe they should’ve asked current students’ inputs of [making changes to tuition] as well. Mainly because some of [the current students’] scholarships were reduced by a lot (for example, my theatre scholarship went from $22,000 to $5000), and others who had certain scholarships no longer have them due to the tuition cut,” Morales said.

“Although they stated it was ‘proportional’ I don’t really believe it was because it did [affect] a lot of students being able to afford college especially those paying out of pocket,” Morales continued. “Especially for some who now [need] to pay more the next academic year than this current year. Hopefully they’re open-minded over helping current students to fix their financial aid due to budget cuts.”

Morales’ perspective is representative of many students whose initial reaction to the news was stress about potentially no longer being able to afford Jewell. This miscommunication was a point of criticism about the announcement of the changes. 

Jewell alumnus JD Daniel, ‘19, reflected on his experience with the College’s communication process, and remarked that he thinks further transparency is needed.

“The reaction from my fellow alumni seemed to be that they felt it was unfair to them and they were shocked and indignant. I think this reaction defeats the purpose of positive change, and there’s no way Jewell can issue back pay to alumni while also having the funds to keep tuition reduced for the future… I’m inclined to view this as a positive change. However, I’m still unclear on what finances are actually going to look like for students going forward,” Daniel said.

Every student should have the same, or a lesser, total cost for the 2021-2022 school year, according to Blair. If a student thinks their total cost is increasing, they should contact the financial aid office, as any increase in cost is the result of a mistake in calculating individual scholarships and aid. 

Blair expressed his understanding that students, and others in the community, may disagree with the process but emphasized his commitment to the College’s handling of the situation. While Blair understands students would want input in the decisions, he explained that collaborating extensively with students could have led to rumors of changes, misinformation and stress. The College emphasized their desire to work out concerns through one-on-one meetings to make sure individuals are clear on their own positions.

The tuition changes are ultimately framed in the larger discussion of Jewell embracing radical inclusivity.

“[Radical inclusivity is] the greater story. What you’ll see in terms of the messaging is that we’re not going to be posting firesale billboards all over Kansas City that we’ve reduced [tuition] 45 percent. Our message is ‘Opportunity Without Barriers’ because it’s around the greater sense of becoming a more accessible and equitable institution,” Blair said.

“That, [becoming a more accessible and equitable institution], starts with authenticity with the price point. That starts with removing barriers like a $300 enrollment deposit, [which] we began taking that away last year. And, it’s only going to be $100 going forward because we were seeing that as a barrier,” Blair continued. “It’s moving to holistic admissions and not putting so much weight on the standardized test. Instead, [the standardized test is] one way a student can demonstrate [qualification] but there are other primary ways by presenting their citizenship, their co-curricular engagement, through their writing sample, as well as in their GPA – which has shown, statistically, to be a better indicator of long-term academic success and work ethic over the standardized test, especially for students who may be middle-tier on standardized tests.”

Blair noted that plans for this reduction in tuition have been in development for approximately two years. Jewell’s enrollment and marketing team did extensive research into colleges and universities that rolled out similar plans – including Kansas City area institutions like Avila University – and specifically focused on elements that made the reduction either successful or unsuccessful.

“Unsuccessful cases are institutions who reduced that and then had to continue to reduce further because they weren’t positioned well from an outcome standpoint – they didn’t have that strong of a product from a college experience perspective,” Blair said. “They didn’t do enough research on where they needed to be priced within the market, and subsequently, it just created concern and they got back into a not as high of tuition but still a high discount perspective.”

Given that these plans have been in development even prior to Blair stepping into his role in May of 2019, COVID-19 was not a factor in the decision to reduce tuition.

“[I]t was not a response to COVID. It was something that was planned and would be happening to us regardless of COVID… Our enrollment was up in spite of COVID. We did some really good things… We want more students to become critical thinkers because we believe it’s going to benefit the Kansas City region and the globe as a whole to produce more Jewell graduates.”

Students who have questions about the effect of the tuition reduction on their financial aid package can schedule a virtual meeting with the office of financial aid at https://calendly.com/williamjewell-finaid.

A recent decision by the College’s administration has resulted in all four of Jewell’s resident specters being charged room and baord. Charges include every year that each ghost has remained on campus. I asked the ghosts what they thought of the recent changes in their campus status.

After meandering through stacks of admission pamphlets and Jewell coffee mugs, I was able to reach Mona, the girl who lives in what is now called “pool storage.” Mona did not appear to me in physical form, but she did communicate through drops of water falling from the ceiling.

“I’m worried that I won’t be able to pay off this much money,” Mona said, “I haven’t ever had a job, since I died when I was eight. It doesn’t help that I can’t even count to 100 yet.”

Only a small distance away resides the ghost of Peter’s Theatre. According to him, he had not filled out his FAFSA for the past 50 years. This would determine whether or not he would be able to officially apply for work-study, even though he had been helping backstage with theatre productions since his unfortunate death.

The laborious climb to the top of Jewell Hall allowed me to interview a particular Civil War soldier. When asked about the change in his financial status, he said that tuition already costs and arm and a leg, and since he’s lost both, he doesn’t have any way to pay for the new charges.

“Also, the business office is really taking their time responding to my emails. I emailed them 32 years ago about being paid for my historical contributions to the campus, and I never heard back. I’ve just decided to unleash a swarm of wasps and lady bugs upon Jewell Hall until they decide to respond to me,” the soldier said.

The ghost of the horse in White Science offered a singular “neigh” in response to questions regarding being charged admission.

Photos by Elizabeth Messina.