Southwest Baptist University’s Director of Residence Life modernized housing operations, handed students real choice, and saw applications arrive earlier than ever.

In spring 2026, for the first time, returning students at Southwest Baptist University (SBU) chose their own rooms. They picked their own buildings. They selected their own roommates. And they completed their housing applications at a pace the Residence Life team had never seen before.

By April 14, 2026, SBU had 50 more returning-student applications on file than at the same point a year earlier — a 27% increase for a campus where 600 students live on-campus. For Jacob Banks, SBU’s Director of Residence Life, that shift represents the payoff of a decision he led the year before: to modernize how SBU runs student housing.

“It opened up a lot of potential for us to put the students at the helm of their decisions with housing. That’s really what drew us to it.”

— Jacob Banks, Director of Residence Life, Southwest Baptist University

SBU is a small, residential community where relationship-driven living is central to the student experience. Because nearly every on-campus resident lives in just a few buildings, housing operations are highly visible — and how students experience the process directly shapes campus culture.

Spotting the Opportunity

Like many small residential campuses, SBU’s housing operations had evolved over time through a mix of spreadsheets, paper forms, and a legacy housing platform that came online post-pandemic. The platform worked — but Jacob and his team saw where it was falling short of the experience today’s students expect.

“It was very functional, had all the aspects we needed, but just missed what I would call the enhanced digital experience I wanted our students to have.”

— Jacob Banks

Under the existing setup, Jacob personally placed every student in a room each year — a hands-on approach that worked for a small, relational campus but absorbed meaningful time each summer, especially when students left for break before finalizing their applications. Mobile accessibility was limited, and some administrative actions required more navigation than the team wanted.

When SBU’s contract with its previous provider approached its end date, Jacob saw the timing as an opportunity, not just a renewal decision. He began looking for a platform that could put students in the driver’s seat and give his team room to focus on what matters most: community.

Choosing a Partner

Housing.Cloud reached out in early 2025, and the timing aligned with SBU’s renewal window. Jacob moved quickly but deliberately through the evaluation — his priority was making sure the team behind the product could support SBU through the transition.

“The personability of the people alleviated a lot of any concern I had. They were very quick to say, this is what we’re going to do, this is what we’re going to offer, this is how we’re going to implement.”

— Jacob Banks

From first conversation to signed contract: a few months. SBU signed its multi-year contract on the first business day of June 2025, the day after its previous contract expired.

Rolling Out the Right Way

Jacob’s implementation approach set the tone for everything that followed. Rather than treating Housing.Cloud as his system to run, he built it as a campus-wide capability from day one.

Getting the team aligned

Jacob pulled in as many team members as possible during implementation, including the admissions team, who now interact with incoming students about housing. He personally walked admissions through a dedicated product training session so they could speak confidently about the housing process with prospective and incoming students.

One moment from that training captured the team’s reaction. An admissions counselor who had previously been a student RA on the old platform came out of the session and told Jacob:

“This is leaps and bounds better. It’s going to be more helpful for the students, more helpful for your RAs, for your current student staffers. It’s going to be way more helpful, way more intuitive.”

— SBU Admissions Counselor, former student RA

Building awareness across campus

Today, SBU faculty and staff across campus are aware of the Housing.Cloud program and understand the student housing process — including the requirement that students register for classes before applying for housing. While they don’t have direct access to the platform, they know exactly where to point students, which means academic advisors, teachers, and housing staff all reinforce the same next steps consistently.

Before and After

One year in, the shape of SBU’s housing operation is visibly different.

The Results

Students applying earlier than ever

The clearest early signal: returning students are completing their housing applications at a higher rate and earlier in the cycle. By April 14, 2026, SBU had 237 returning-student applications on file — compared to 187 at the same point the year before.

The driver is student autonomy. When students can see exactly where they’ll be living, choose their own space, and pick their roommate, they engage with the process earlier and complete it more consistently.

“You get to see exactly where you’re living, the exact area you want to live in, and it gives them a lot more freedom of choice. We’ve been seeing a large increase in total completion of those applications. For me, that also ultimately saves a lot of time in the summertime.”

— Jacob Banks

A calmer operation

With students driving their own applications and administrative actions more discoverable inside the platform, Jacob’s team can spend less time on mechanics and more time on what makes SBU’s residential community distinctive.

“I didn’t really even have to ask the Housing.Cloud team. It just makes sense. It’s right there in front of you — administrative background things that only two or three people would ever need to know. The product is just that intuitive.”

— Jacob Banks

Consistent messaging across campus

Because faculty and staff across campus are aware of the housing process and know where to direct students, students are hearing the same guidance from every direction — which reduces confusion and reinforces the process.

“They’re not just hearing it from me. They’re hearing it from their academic advisors. They’re hearing it from their teachers. At every turn, the student is hearing, hey, you need to be going here to find access to that.”

— Jacob Banks

Jacob’s Advice for Peer Institutions

For other housing leaders considering a move to a modern platform, Jacob’s guidance comes down to people, not software:

• Bring as many team members as you can into the implementation. Distributed knowledge is more resilient than concentrated knowledge

• Don’t assume team members need a technology or data science background. If they can use Excel, they can learn a modern platform

• Keep educating your team after launch. The more people who understand the system, the easier it is to sustain

“Once you bring those people in, you should be continually updating and educating the people around you about the product. The more people who know about it, the easier it’s going to be.”

— Jacob Banks