Dr. Eric Groves joined the enrollment management team in 2014, bringing with him 15 years of higher education experience, as a director of undergraduate admissions for 12 years and as a director of development for three. In those roles, Eric was able to use data-informed decision making to achieve enrollment and fundraising success.
During Eric’s tenure at Point Loma, he led the university to new highs in overall enrollment, academic quality, net tuition revenue, and diversity. Using the RNL’s solutions for search, qualification, and econometric modeling, the diversity of Point Loma’s incoming class rose from 21 percent in 2009 to over 39 percent in 2014. Eric cites this achievement as the most important of his career, and he credits his partnership with RNL as contributing to this success.
As the director of development at PLNU, Eric grew the annual fund by 35 percent and completed the first fully-funded capital campaign in the university’s history.
Education
Eric has a PhD in higher education from Azusa Pacific University. His dissertation, “Perceived Academic Control in Community College Students: The Effect of an Online Attribution Retraining Intervention,” provided the industry breakthrough research on student success for community college students. Eric also teaches in the Masters in Leadership and Organizational Studies program at Azusa Pacific.
Eric brings a passion for enrollment management and a deep understanding of how working with RNL can help an institution achieve enrollment success. His experience and in-depth knowledge of higher education literature makes him an insightful and informative strategic consultant and researcher serving our partner schools in the West.