Haydn Brown ’23, G’26 has the answers.
He can tell prospective students what it’s like to transfer to Kansas Wesleyan from a community college. Or how to be a student-athlete. What the difference is between remote learning and in-class instruction. What it’s like to attend Kansas Wesleyan.
He’s done all those things, so as assistant director of admissions for KWU, he can help navigate the admissions process, no matter where students are in it.
“I try to cover all those bases with every recruit who has a question about it,” Brown said. “It helps out a ton when you have answers to that and it’s not just a guessing game of, oh, maybe it is, maybe it’s not: ‘This is how all my friends did it. This is how I did it. This is what is easier.’
“It’s giving advice rather than just a guess of you should try that or maybe that will work. I’d like to say I’m experienced a little bit.”
Brown, from Gardnerville, Nevada, was on a trip with his junior college’s baseball team when a former KWU assistant baseball coach approached him. Brown came for a visit and liked the community atmosphere, and when the scholarship offer turned out to be the best he had, he became a Coyote.
“I kind of just liked the thought of going out to the Midwest,” he said.
He finished his bachelor’s degree in Mathematics with a minor in Science Technology in 2022 and his MBA in Sports Management this past academic year.
He started as an admissions counselor in 2022 and was promoted to assistant director in 2024, a full two years ago. He’s found the communication aspect of the MBA program has been most helpful in his job.
As assistant director, he coordinates a lot of the recruiting and traveling for the office. He’s also responsible for the organization and creation of student data, which is the biggest piece, he said. That part has gotten better, he said, because now it’s mostly online, rather than paper copies, which had all to be filed. His office still has stacks and piles of paper and folders, but it’s improving, he said.
The biggest problem he sees is getting students to send in official transcripts. He’s seen some transcripts that the grades can’t be read.
The best part of Kansas Wesleyan for students, and for him, especially, is the community.
“When I was a student here, and it’s still the same, the best is the community aspect of it. I was not a person who needed a large school to where I kind of flooded into the masses. I really appreciated and really thrived in being able to actually be known by the professors, the staff members and all my coaches.
“As soon as I got here, I met some of my best friends ever,” Brown said. “And even though I altered my degree path a little bit, staying here was the best choice I could have made.”
Story by Jean Kozubowski
