55 Essential Duties of Remote Academic Administrative Assistants

With today’s tight labor market, remote hiring is one solution for organizations to be able to support their operations. The same goes for educational institutions.

The shift to online learning brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic came with its own challenges. Combined with the tight labor market in the US today, it has become more challenging for academia to fulfill its purpose.

A lot of these challenges can be alleviated by taking on the help of a remote academic administrative assistant. In this article, you’ll discover what these professionals have to offer to academic institutions, such as universities, colleges, high schools, trade schools, and other online education platforms in these tumultuous times.

What Are Virtual Academic Administrative Assistants?

Virtual academic administrative assistants are remote professionals who deliver services that further academia’s purpose and operation. They can fulfill tasks usually delegated to teaching assistants, faculty administrative assistants, and other campus personnel.

They can greatly help faculty and staff of schools and learning centers to deliver curricula, give student support, lend administrative help, and more.

Since in-person learning is still not fully back (and probably never will be), it remains that virtual assistants can be of great help to institutions to effectively deliver virtual and hybrid learning.

Here’s a list of some responsibilities you can delegate to a remote academic administrative assistant.

Administrative Faculty

The role of an administrative faculty primarily involves clerical and administrative duties. Here are some tasks from this role that you can delegate to an academic virtual assistant (VA):

1. Event Management: Plan and coordinate the programming, promotion, budget, production, and execution of faculty-hosted and student events.

2. Administrative Paperwork: Draft, proofread, and collate documents, grant lab requests, presentations, and learning materials that the faculty needs.

3. Calendar Management: Ensure faculty’s activities and deadlines can be executed in a timely manner. This includes making travel arrangements and scheduling consultations and meetings with students, parents, visitors, and staff.

4. Database Management: Use the student information system to prepare and submit reports to the school’s management and update documents, templates, and student records.

5. Financial Management: Audit financial statements, perform bookkeeping tasks, and assist the payroll team.

6. Concierge Services: Take calls and manage the faculty inbox, as well as translate inquiries into appointments, and redirect email correspondences. 

7. Inventory Management: Handle stock levels of materials needed by the faculty to function well on a daily basis, as well as schedule orders for new equipment, repairs, and maintenance.

8. Ad Hoc Support: Provide admin support to faculty members on a day-to-day basis to resolve problems that spontaneously arise.

9. Program Development: Provide supplementary research for curriculum development and instructional design.

10. Training: Train faculty and staff on online and hybrid learning tools and best practices they can use to better teach their material to students. 

Teaching Assistant

Aside from administrative work, a virtual academic administrative assistant can also fulfill a role similar to a teaching assistant. Here are some responsibilities you can delegate to them:

11. Respond to student inquiries and questions about the learning material and activities on behalf of the instructor.

12. Escalate unique issues of students to the instructor, and assist in the delivery of the resolution.

13. Assist with grading and monitoring student progress.

14. Monitor and increase student engagement by researching and implementing practices that encourage student participation.

15. Assist in lesson planning and syllabus design and ensure its consistent and timely delivery.

16. Design and execute feedback collection regarding the content of the class, the faculty, and the institution’s quality of service. This also involves preparing and submitting reports that arise from gathered data.

17. Assist in the facilitation of instruction and learning activities, which can include responding to clarifications from students.

18. Manage class calendar of activities and academic timeline.

19. Supervise class activities when instructed.

20. Provide adjunct support in virtual classrooms for the teacher and the students by operating or managing the conferencing tool and monitoring student behavior during class.

21. Provide an appropriate amount of guidance on academic workload outside of class and after class hours.

22. Assist in the delivery of a structured online experience by providing tech support and online conference troubleshooting.

23. Facilitate one-on-one student check-ins.

24. Assist in implementing student handbook regulations, including providing orientation and discussions on its content and preparing notices on changes and violations. 

Academic Advisory

An academic administrative assistant can also remotely perform duties similar to that of an academic advisor. 

This involves helping students learn about and evaluate their options for the next step in their education or career. 

Here are some advisory tasks you can delegate to a remote academic administrative assistant: 

25. Connect and introduce students to higher learning and professional development opportunities. This can be through informative programs, job fairs, promotions, brochures, and more. 

26. Respond to career planning opportunities from students, partner programs, and other school departments and organizations.

27. Offer advisory consultations to meet and advise students on their educational and career paths, options, etc.

28. Manage and update advisory material for students and parents.

29. Assist in establishing and enriching culture by programming activities that promote the values of the institution.

30. Organize and conduct informative sessions on career, learning, and personal development.

31. Provide counseling and resources to students who are troubled with their academic progress.

32. Redirect students to appropriate campus facilities, resources, or personnel for problem resolution.

33. Develop, recruit, and maintain a student mentoring program.

34. Plan and facilitate orientation sessions for incoming and returning students.

35. Support the development and promotion of the school’s outreach and recruitment activities.

36. Work with the registrar’s office to resolve student issues.

37. Respond to all other academic advisory inquiries and offer resolutions.

Admissions Assistance

A virtual academic administrative assistant can also perform their services in the admissions office of a learning institution.

Here are some admissions assistance tasks you can delegate to an academic VA:

38. Receptionist Services: Respond to admissions inquiries and follow-ups with a VoIP.

39. Admissions Concierge: Provide pertinent information on available programs, financial aid, and enrollment processes to students and parents through online consultations, email correspondence, printouts, electronic brochures, and more.

40. Facilitate the pre-admission process.

41. Assist in processing general student applications.

42. Assist in processing other student applications (financial aid, leave of absence, returning, etc.).

43. Work with other departments to develop and execute promotion and recruitment strategies.

44. Design and order welcome and admission materials.

45. Maintain and update a database for referrals.

46. Maintain and update applicant statuses.

47. Assist in screening application essays.

Liaisons and Outreach

A remote academic administrative assistant may also render services focusing on liaisons and outreach for an academic institution. 

These services include marketing services and correspondence with other parties on behalf of the institution and its stakeholders. 

Here’s a list of some tasks you can delegate to an academic VA for liaisons and outreach:

48. Assist with promotion and recruitment through website management and effective copywriting in all digital promotional materials.

49. Assist in developing and executing promotional activities.

50. Design promotional materials for school functions and digital marketing campaigns.

51. Create necessary partnerships for student activities, recruitment, and other school purposes.

52. Perform email marketing and outreach for the school’s internal audience, partners, and referral network.

52. Draft templates for campus-wide communications and notices.

54. Assist in overall internal and external communications through email correspondence, providing templates, and managing internal communications tools like newsletters, school publications, etc.

55. Social Media Management: Manage the school’s social media channels by creating content, scheduling posts, and monitoring engagement.

Hiring Remote Academic Administrative Assistants

Virtual assistants are known for providing administrative assistance to multiple industries all over the world. This long, ever-growing list of industries includes academic institutions, among others.

Hiring remote academic administrative assistants is one solution to cope with the possible effects of The Great Resignation, and the challenges that come with online and hybrid schooling.

Conclusion

Virtudesk offers online education virtual assistant services to the school and universities and its instructors. This can greatly enhance the facilitation of learning and quality of education being delivered, without adding a massive extra cost to the school’s budget.

If you’re curious about our academic virtual assistant services, fill out this form and one of our Consultants will get in touch with you.

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