Country-level ambition is a useful horizon. It is a poor first operating unit. Student demand, partner quality, and cost of presence change sharply between cities.

Three filters for the first city #

Look for a student pool you can describe, a partner who already serves that pool, and a cost of presence the home campus can supervise. If one of the three is a guess, keep looking.

What a pilot should include #

A pilot has a start term, a stop term, and a number that would count as success. It also names the person on the home team who reads the local report. Without that reader, the representative is sending news into a void.

When to widen #

Widen only after the first city has a repeatable student journey. A second city copies a working pattern. It should not be used to rescue a pattern that never worked.