Job Description

Job Description

Job Description

Purpose

The Progression Advisor owns the student's transition from enrollment into active first-term learning — the first relationship a student forms with the institution. Working in Pod 1 (Start & Onboarding) of the Student Success & Progression lifecycle model, this role drives the 14-day onboarding window and the strength of first contact, because the first two weeks decide long-term retention. The role serves students in both Campus and Online modalities; Pod assignment is by journey phase, not modality. Responsibilities, performance metrics, and owned procedures are drawn from the Student Success & Progression Institutional Policy, SOP & Implementation Manual (v1.1).

  Essential Duties & Responsibilities (those that must be performed with or without an ADA Accommodation):

• Receive the enrollment handoff and confirm enrollment success and first-term schedule accuracy (SSP-S-01).
• Execute the 14-day onboarding window: first contact, orientation support, and financial-aid alignment.
• Monitor first-term grades and work the MIA list daily, from the 7-day non-participation trigger until each student is re-engaged or withdrawn per policy (SSP-P-05, SSP-S-02).
• Contact every at-risk student in the caseload weekly and document the attempt.
• Build the foundational advisor-student relationship the rest of the lifecycle depends on.
• Log 100% of contacts in the SIS the same day and execute a clean, zero-gap handoff to Pod 2 at the milestone transition (SSP-P-02, SSP-S-04).
• Meet Pod 1 accountability KPIs — first-term persistence, term completion rate, onboarding completion, and MIA/at-risk contact coverage — as defined in the SSP scorecard framework (SSP-P-04).
• Follow owned SOPs: SSP-S-01 New-Student Onboarding, SSP-S-02 MIA Outreach & Re-Engagement, SSP-S-04 POD Handoff Checklist, and SSP-S-08 Metric Logging & Scorecard Maintenance.

  Non-Essential Duties & Responsibilities (those that must be performed with or without an ADA Accommodation):

• The following are performed by this role but are not essential functions. They may be reassigned, redistributed, or removed without fundamentally altering the position. They are not used as hiring criteria and are not scored in performance review. An employee may request reassignment or removal of any function in this section as a reasonable accommodation.
• Staffing new-student orientation, open house, and welcome events, including tabling, session support, and campus tour assistance.
• Contributing to onboarding scripts, welcome templates, and student-facing FAQ content.
• Shadowing support and peer onboarding for newly hired advisors.
• Pilot and acceptance testing of SIS or early-alert features that affect onboarding workflows.
• Temporary coverage of another Pod 1 advisor's caseload during planned absence.
• Supporting cross-pod outreach campaigns during peak start periods.
• Ad hoc list verification and data pulls requested outside the standard scorecard cadence.
• Attending commencement, portfolio shows, and other institutional events.

Other Responsibilities:

Other duties as assigned by Manager, provided they do not displace or materially reduce capacity for the essential functions of the role.

Competencies | Knowledge | Skills | Abilities:

• Relationship-building and rapport-building quickly across phone, text, email, and video.
• Proactive, organized outreach with strong follow-through.
• Empathy balanced with accountability for outcomes.
• Attention to onboarding detail and same-day documentation discipline.
• Comfort managing a caseload across both Campus and Online modalities.

Education | Experience:

• Required: Bachelor's degree.
• Required: 1+ year of experience in academic advising, student services, admissions, onboarding, or customer-success and relationship-management roles.
• Preferred: Experience in higher education, career-college, or online-program environments.
• Preferred: Familiarity with financial-aid touchpoints and first-term student needs.
• Preferred: Experience with CRM or early-alert and student-success platforms.
• Preferred: Bilingual (English/Spanish) a plus.

Computer Skills:

• Proficiency with a Student Information System (CampusVue/Anthology) and same-day documentation discipline.
• Preferred: experience with CRM, early-alert, or student-success platforms.

  Environmental Factors (are those that are required and performed with or without an accommodation):

• Standard office environment with phone, text, and video advising; home-base location does not limit the students advised. Some schedule flexibility required to reach students across time zones.

  Physical Demands (are those that are required and performed with or without an accommodation):

• Ability to sit and work at a computer for extended periods.
• Frequent use of a computer, keyboard, mouse, and other office equipment.
• Ability to communicate verbally and in writing.
• Occasional standing, walking, bending, reaching, and lifting/carrying of office materials or equipment as needed.
• Ability to perform the essential functions of the position with or without reasonable accommodation.

  Emotional & Mental Demands (are those that are required and performed with or without an accommodation):

• Sustained emotional labor in first contact. This role builds every new student's first relationship with the institution, often while the student is anxious, uncertain, or overwhelmed by a new environment — requiring consistent warmth and patience across a high volume of first interactions.
• Repeated non-response without resolution. Daily MIA outreach means absorbing silence, disengagement, or resistance from at-risk students without certainty that outreach will be answered — sustained effort toward an uncertain outcome.
• Performance under a compressed, recurring timeline. The 14-day onboarding window and same-day documentation standard require maintaining accuracy and composure while managing a full caseload against a fixed deadline that resets with every new cohort.
• Absorbing early-stage student stress. New students often bring financial-aid anxiety, schedule confusion, or uncertainty about their decision to enroll. The role holds that stress long enough to stabilize the student, then routes issues outside its scope to the appropriate office rather than resolving them directly.
• Emotional consistency across a caseload. Sustaining empathy and individualized attention across many simultaneous student relationships, without one student's crisis reducing the attention available to others.

  This is not necessarily an all-inclusive list of job-related responsibilities, duties, skills, efforts, requirements or working conditions. While this is intended to be an accurate reflection of the current job, management reserves the right to revise the job or to require that other or different tasks be performed as assigned.

Job Tags

Similar Jobs