Digital Communications & Data Assistant Intern

The Digital Communications & Data Assistant Intern supports the Admissions Operations team by helping build CRM-based digital communications, analyze communications performance, and support data-informed enrollment strategy. This role is intended for a quantitatively strong student or early-career professional with interest or experience in digital communications, CRM email production, data analysis, reporting, Python, statistical modeling, and applied AI tools.

The assistant will help create, test, and improve HTML emails in the admissions CRM, while also using admissions, campaign, web, event, and engagement data to identify opportunities to improve how the admissions team communicates with prospective students and families. The position will also provide support for dashboards, reports, predictive models, recommendation tools, and other decision-support resources used by admissions counselors and enrollment leadership.

Essential Responsibilities:

CRM Email Production & Digital Communications Support

• Assist with building, editing, and testing HTML emails in the admissions CRM.

• Help create clear, mobile-friendly, and brand-aligned emails for prospective students, applicants,

• admitted students, families, and other admissions audiences.

• Support basic email quality assurance, including checking links, images, formatting,

• personalization, audience rules, and mobile display before messages are sent.

• Help maintain reusable email templates, content blocks, and campaign materials in the CRM.

• Collaborate with Admissions Operations and communications staff to improve email design, readability, engagement, and overall effectiveness.

Digital Communications Analysis

• Analyze email, text, portal, event, web, and campaign engagement data to identify patterns in student behavior and opportunities to improve communications strategy.

• Evaluate subject lines, calls to action, audience segments, timing, content themes, and channel performance to better understand what drives engagement and conversion.

• Build repeatable reports and visualizations that summarize communication performance across the admissions funnel, including open rates, clicks, event registrations, applications, deposits, and other meaningful outcomes.

• Assist with attribution and journey-analysis work that connects student touchpoints to desired outcomes while clearly documenting assumptions and limitations.

• Translate analytical findings into practical recommendations for admissions, communications, and leadership teams.

Data, Modeling & Recommendation Support

• Contribute to the development, testing, and refinement of models related to inquiry engagement, application likelihood, admit engagement, yield, melt risk, and other enrollment outcomes.

• Prepare, clean, join, and validate data from Slate, campaign tools, event systems, financial aid sources, and other institutional datasets for use in analysis and reporting.

• Assist with data analysis, model comparison, validation, and performance monitoring using Python, SQL, R, Excel, Power BI, or similar tools.

• Support the development of recommendation logic that helps staff identify which students may need outreach, which messages may be most relevant, and which actions may improve outcomes.

• Create documentation that explains data definitions, model inputs, assumptions, performance results, and appropriate use cases for non-technical stakeholders.

Systems, Documentation & Collaboration

• Collaborate with Admissions Operations, communications staff, admissions counselors, and other stakeholders to understand business questions and translate them into communications, reporting, or analytical work.

• Document workflows, data transformations, code, model logic, CRM email processes, testing procedures, and reporting processes to support continuity and future maintenance.

• Follow responsible data practices, including attention to FERPA, privacy, access control, bias, data quality, and appropriate interpretation of student data.

• Perform other related duties as assigned to support enrollment analytics, CRM communications, communications optimization, and admissions technology initiatives..

Other Information:

This is a part-time (approximately 25 hours a week), temporary position intended to provide support in CRM communications, HTML email production, data analysis, reporting, analytics, and applied AI tools for the Admissions Operations team. Work hours will be scheduled around departmental needs and the selected candidate’s availability, with the expectation that some work may be completed independently after appropriate onboarding and direction. Hourly rate: $16

About HWS

A liberal arts and sciences institution, Hobart and William Smith is known for consistent success in preparing students for meaningful lives and fulfilling careers through an outcomes-based focus on their futures. Our nationally ranked faculty are accessible teachers and scholars known for the impact of their research and distinguished by the depth of their mentorship. World challenges are studied in the classroom where critical thinking, problem-solving, and communication skills are honed. In the field, knowledge turns into discovery. In office hours, plans are carefully crafted to tie interests and talents to an academic path that motivates beyond graduation.

Our location in the heart of the Finger Lakes allows faculty, staff and students to live and work collaboratively on the banks of a resource-rich lake. Student-athletes play for 30 varsity teams boasting 24 national titles, including the 2023 and 2024 NCAA DIII Men’s Ice Hockey Championships. With three graduate programs, students can build on their undergraduate degree with a Master of Arts in Higher Education Leadership, Master of Arts in Teaching, or a Master of Science in Management. Together, the experiences and mentorship at HWS prepare students to lead lives of consequence.

Required

• Current enrollment in, or recent completion of, coursework in Data Analytics, Computer Science, Mathematics, Statistics, Economics, Operations Research, Engineering, Marketing Analytics, Digital Media, Communications Technology, or a closely related field.

• Demonstrated proficiency with Python for data analysis, including experience with libraries such as Pandas, NumPy, or comparable tools.

• Working knowledge of statistical analysis, data modeling, forecasting, attribution analysis, or machine learning concepts.

• Experience working with structured datasets and the ability to clean, transform, join, validate, and analyze data from multiple sources.

• Familiarity with SQL, R, Power BI, Excel, ArcGIS, or other data analysis and visualization tools.

• Familiarity with HTML and basic CSS, or a willingness to learn how to build and troubleshoot CRM-based HTML emails.

• Strong quantitative reasoning, problem-solving ability, and attention to detail.

• Ability to communicate technical findings clearly to non-technical audiences and translate analysis into actionable recommendations.

• Ability to work independently, manage assigned tasks, ask clear questions, and maintain confidentiality when working with student data.

Preferred

• Experience building or editing HTML emails, email templates, landing pages, web content, or CRM-based communications.

• Experience with Slate, higher education admissions, enrollment management, student engagement data, or CRM-based communication workflows.

• Experience with marketing analytics, multi-touch attribution, Markov Chain models, logistic regression, predictive modeling, or recommendation systems.

• Experience analyzing digital communications, advertising channels, web behavior, CRM engagement, or customer/student journeys.

• Familiarity with email testing, accessibility, responsive design, deliverability best practices, personalization, segmentation, or A/B testing.

• Experience creating dashboards, web apps, maps, or interactive tools that help operational users search, filter, and act on data.

• Experience with Git, collaborative coding workflows, API integrations, data pipelines, or cloud-based analytics tools.

• Multilingual communication skills and comfort working in a diverse, student-centered environment.

KNOWLEDGE, SKILLS & ABILITIES

• Ability to approach admissions and communication challenges through both technical analysis and practical business judgment.

• Ability to build, review, and troubleshoot CRM communications with attention to accuracy, design, accessibility, and user experience.

• Ability to evaluate whether patterns in the data are meaningful, actionable, and appropriate to use in decision-making.

• Ability to balance experimentation with careful documentation, quality control, and responsible use of student information.

• Curiosity about how AI, analytics, CRM communications, and decision-support tools can improve student recruitment, staff effectiveness, and enrollment outcomes.

• Commitment to producing work that is accurate, understandable, useful, and aligned with institutional goals.

The Colleges are an equal employment opportunity employer and prohibit discrimination and harassment in their programs and activities against employees or applicants based on race (including traits historically associated with race, such as hair texture and protective hairstyles), color, religion, creed, national origin, ancestry, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions), gender, gender identity or expression, age, sexual orientation, physical or mental disability, citizenship, genetic information or predisposing genetic characteristics, marital status, familial status, domestic violence victim status, caregiver status, military status, including past, current, or prospective service in the uniformed services, social class, or any other category or characteristic protected by applicable law.