Customer Success, Retention

About the Role: 

The Retention Lead is responsible for defining and driving the end-to-end student retention strategy across partner schools, ensuring a clear, focused approach to improving student persistence and success. This role owns the identification, prioritization, and execution of the highest-impact levers across academic experience, student engagement, onboarding, and school operations. 

Operating at the intersection of strategy, data, and execution, this role leads a hypothesis-driven, test-and-learn approach to student retention while translating insights into enterprise-level priorities and actionable initiatives. This includes designing and scaling interventions, aligning cross-functional teams, and ensuring retention efforts are coordinated, measurable, and focused on outcomes that drive meaningful improvement.

Success in this role requires strong cross-functional leadership and influence, partnering with Enrollment, Academics, School Operations, Product, and School Success to align on priorities, drive accountability, and embed retention into core operating rhythms. Ultimately, this role ensures retention is managed as a strategic, shared outcome, strengthening school success, partner satisfaction, and long-term growth across the organization. 

Key Responsibilities 

Retention Strategy Ownership 

Define and evolve the end-to-end retention strategy across partner schools  

Identify and prioritize the highest-impact drivers of retention  

Translate strategy into clear initiatives, roadmaps, and measurable outcomes  

Ensure alignment between retention strategy and broader business priorities  

Retention Analytics & Insight Generation 

Analyze retention, persistence, and attrition trends across partner schools, cohorts, and student segments  

Identify key drivers of retention and disengagement, including academic, operational, and engagement factors  

Develop dashboards and reporting to provide clear visibility into retention performance and leading indicators  

Establish early warning indicators to proactively identify at-risk students and schools 

Hypothesis-Driven Improvement & Scaling 

Lead a structured test → learn → scale approach to retention  

Develop and test hypotheses on key retention drivers (e.g., onboarding, engagement, academic experience, communication)  

Partner with schools and cross-functional teams to design and implement pilots  

Evaluate impact and scale successful interventions across partner schools  

Enterprise Prioritization & Influence 

Drive alignment on where to invest to improve retention outcomes  

Influence cross-functional priorities across Enrollment, Academics, School Operations, Product, and School Success  

Balance trade-offs and ensure focus on the highest-value initiatives  

Act as a strategic advisor to leadership on retention performance and opportunities  

Performance Management & Governance 

Establish clear retention targets, metrics, and success measures  

Build and lead an operating rhythm (e.g., reviews, dashboards, performance discussions)  

Ensure accountability for retention outcomes across teams and schools  

Provide visibility into performance, risks, and opportunities  

School-Level Enablement & Scaling Best Practices 

Enable partner schools with insights, tools, and actionable guidance to improve retention 

Identify patterns and replicate best practices across the network  

Balance standardization with flexibility to meet local school needs  

Data & Insight Integration 

Leverage analytics to inform strategy and decision-making  

Ensure retention insights are translated into clear actions and priorities  

Partner with analytics teams to enhance visibility into retention drivers and leading indicators  

Key Outcomes 

Measurable improvement in student retention and persistence across partner schools  

Clear, prioritized retention strategy aligned to business goals  

Increased effectiveness of retention initiatives through testing and scaling  

Strong cross-functional alignment and accountability for retention outcomes  

Improved visibility into retention performance and drivers  

Qualifications & Experience 

8–12+ years of experience in strategy, operations, analytics, or related roles  

Background in consulting or comparable environments with strong analytical and problem-solving rigor, along with industry experience—ideally in consumer or customer-centric businesses 

Proven track record of driving cross-functional initiatives and influencing senior stakeholders  

Experience leading strategy development and execution at scale  

Strong analytical foundation with ability to translate data into action 

About Pearson Virtual Schools 

Pearson Virtual Schools (PVS) is a leader in the rapidly growing U.S. virtual education market, delivering high-quality online learning experiences to more than 100,000 K–12 students nationwide. Built on the foundation of Connections Academy nearly 20 years ago, PVS combines innovative technology, rigorous curriculum, and dedicated educators to expand access to exceptional digital learning. 

PVS serves students through three core offerings: Partner Schools, District Partnerships, and Pearson Online Academy. Partner Schools provide turnkey virtual school solutions for public school students across the country, District Partnerships deliver customized virtual learning programs for school districts, and Pearson Online Academy operates as an accredited private online school. 

Join us and help shape the future of K–12 education. 
 
Compensation at Pearson is influenced by factors including skill set, experience, and location. 

 
The full-time salary range for this role is $120,000 - $140,000. 

This position is eligible for Pearson’s annual incentive program. Information on benefits can be found here. 

 
Applications will be accepted through 6/5/26. This window may be extended depending on business needs. 

Pearson is an Equal Opportunity Employer and a member of E-Verify. Employment decisions are based on qualifications, merit and business need. Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, ethnicity, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, age, national origin, protected veteran status, disability status or any other group protected by law. We actively seek qualified candidates who are protected veterans and individuals with disabilities as defined under VEVRAA and Section 503 of the Rehabilitation Act.

If you are an individual with a disability and are unable or limited in your ability to use or access our career site as a result of your disability, you may request reasonable accommodations by emailing TalentExperienceGlobalTeam@grp.pearson.com.