In the spirit of increasing postsecondary credential attainment of the region, P20 began a partnership with CollegeAPP in the Fall of 2024 in an effort to help our communities navigate options for finding, enrolling and paying for postsecondary programs within the region.

CollegeAPP identifies adults with educational intent through large sample surveys and machine learning predictive analytics.

P20 wants to identify these adults and to increase their awareness about their financial aid opportunities for public and private training providers in the region as tuition and related costs represent one of the largest barriers for our adults to pursue their academic and career goals.

This data platform has been a key component of the NCReconnect program. However, this partnership between P20 & CollegeAPP allows us to expand the recruitment beyond “stop-out” (students that were previously enrolled, but didn’t complete their program of study) lists to focus on the broader adult prospects that may have never attended a postsecondary institution, that may be looking for programs outside of their last academic focus area, etc.

We have identified individuals in our four-county region with intent to enroll using CollegeAPP’s predictive technology and have honed in on meta ads (Facebook and Instagram) to increase awareness of NextNC and Need-Based Scholarships. This first campaign in February-May has a community college focus with our upcoming fall focus to shift to universities.

*The CollegeAPP Intent to Enroll Models and the expertise of their Digital Marketing Services team have made it possible for their Media Placement Services to see an average engagement rate of 9.75%  (Higher Education Industry Average on Instagram is 1.4% with a platform average of 0.7%).

By exposing more people to the possibilities of financial aid, we are helping to bridge more gaps between our academic institutions and the communities they serve.

In summary:

• Identify adults with intent to enroll
• Community College list: 28,658 individuals
• University list: 37,477 individuals
• Target an ad campaign focused on financial aid opportunities
• Augment current recruitment endeavors at our public and private institutions to increase awareness of programs with more prospective adult students
• First draft of February ads available here and text here

Performance Update (As of May 2025)

So far, it’s clear that these ads are reaching people!  Using certain tools within the NextNC marketing  (such as their video) has fueled the upwards momentum.   Below is a summary of how the ads have performed collectively from Feb-May. We have far surpassed the industry benchmarks  (the video addition moved our engagement rate to 12.27%, as seen below!).

This is promising data showing that there is a curiosity and need for more information about NextNC and Need-Based Scholarships in our region.

CollegeAPP – Land of Sky P20 Council Report 021725 051625 for web by Hannah McNamee

Performance Update (As of June 2025) Thanks to these efforts, 390 new FAFSA applications were completed! We’re gearing up for a second campaign Fall of 2025 and are excited to build on this success. Stay tuned as we continue bridging the gap between education and workforce in our region!

Examples of the ads:

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