Background

Newspace Center for Photography (NCP) is a multidimensional photography resource center and community hub for students, working artists, professional photographers, educators, and photo enthusiasts of all types. NCP provides a wide spectrum of enriching photographic opportunities to the Portland/Vancouver community, including a full roster of course offerings, gallery exhibits, digital lab, darkroom and lighting studio access, artists’ lectures, portfolio reviews.

Challenge

Since its inception eight years ago, NCP has used an online registration system for its classes and events. The previous online registration system was overly simplistic with limited functionality and as NCP grew, three main gaps became apparent. The first was a pressing need for detailed reporting. “Without visibility into attendance breakdowns by class or by quarter,” says Chris Bennett, Executive Director of NCP, “decisions regarding class offerings and financial investments were difficult and essentially a shot in the dark.” NCP also wanted to create a better user experience for its students. Instead of redirecting to an unfamiliar site when paying for classes online, the NCP website needed to integrate with the online registration system to increase the comfort level of those paying online as well retain website traffic. Lastly, to cut down on administrative time spent fielding general questions, the NCP staff wanted to offer students the option to create online accounts where they could login to view their schedules and personal details.

Solution

In April 2009, NCP brought Active Network, Educate into the picture to provide the needed advanced technology solutions. Active’s system was more robust and could offer detailed reporting on any combination of the registration data collected, including attendance numbers, best-performing classes and revenue streams. Searching for or updating student and class information within the database became as quick as the click of a shutter. Payments and refunds could be easily submitted and processed. Time-consuming administrative work was reduced by giving students the ability to create online accounts where they could view their schedules, activity histories and make changes online. Plus, the registration system remained integrated with the NCP website and could be tailored by adding pages and elements to fit the personality of each class.

“Customization is key for an artistic organization like ours,” notes Chris. “The new system gives us much more flexibility and the overall support from Active has been awesome.”

Results

From 2008 to 2009, NCP has seen a 60% increase in enrollment and is expecting growth that equals or exceeds this in 2010. NCP has committed to quality in every aspect of its organization—from classes to instructors to technology. Classes are interesting, instructors are experienced, and technology is top-notch. The investment in better registration software is one aspect of the commitment to quality and has helped the staff operate more efficiently, so they can focus on more important (and fun) details of running NCP. With reporting that gives insight into every pixel of the business and an online registration process that is friendly and flexible for both staff and students, NCP now has a tool to grow as it continues to expand and diversify. Active's online class registration software made the life of everyone involved easier.

Active Network can help you streamline online fee payments and simplify student data management.

Call us today to learn more! 1.800.661.1196