This Week in Edtech: October 25th, 2022

How Higher Ed is Facing an Existential Crisis... and how Edtech can Help

THE POST-PANDEMIC FUTURE OF HIGHER EDUCATION

Five different articles about the state of higher ed caught my eye this week, telling a very interesting story about where the Higher Ed sector may be headed.

Let’s explore!

1. Susan D’Agostino’s “A Surge in Young Undergrads, Fully Online” (Inside Higher Ed) noted the rise in traditional age undergrads at large customer-first online schools like SNHU and WGU (which usually serve older students), and posited that younger students may be getting more comfortable with fully online colleges, especially given the outsized return on time and financial investments.

“Soon after high school, 18-year-old Weger… enrolled at Western Governors. There, he pursued an accelerated online program that, like his father, allowed him to graduate in one year—at the age of 19. “I walked away spending only about $7,000. I also walked away with a [bachelor’s] degree and seven industry certifications,” Weger said. “It was a no-brainer.”

“…a national survey conducted in 2022 suggests that the number of high school juniors and seniors planning to attend fully online colleges has more than doubled since before the pandemic.”

2. In Blip In Online College Enrollment Doesn’t Mean What You Think (Forbes), Derek Newton calls out that this ‘doubling’ of online enrollments still results in under 1% of all younger students (0.72%) planning to attend online-only college, and that the rise in online enrollments at megauniversities only accounts for a small proportion of the overall decline in enrollments:

“Look at it this way – national education statistics show that since the pandemic began in 2020 “total undergraduate enrollment has dropped by nearly 1.4 million — or 9.4 percent.” … (while) those three schools – WGU, SNHU and UMGC recorded enrollment increases of about 50,000 students. That’s less than four percent of the 1.4 million undergraduates who stepped back from higher education since 2020.”

3. Michael Nietzel’s As Enrollments Decline, Colleges Respond With Technology, New Curricula And Business Partnerships (Forbes), describes Jenzabar’s Innovating to Create a More Flexible Path for Higher Education survey, citing that among the institutional respondents:

   1. Nearly half (45%) of the respondents reported that their enrollments had declined in the past year.

   2. Nearly two-thirds (64%) expect to increase their technology spending in the 2023-2024 school year.

   3. More than half (53%) partner with local businesses to provide in-demand skills training or workforce training.

   4. 60% of surveyed schools offer or plan to offer stackable degrees.

4. Jeffrey Young’s MIT Professors Propose a New Kind of University for Post-COVID Era (EdSurge) notes how online learning expert Sanjay Sarma of MIT and colleagues proposed ideas in a new white paper about how to make Higher Education more affordable and effective in an era of online learning.

5. Finally, Monica Potts’ “Is College Worth It? Voters are Split,” (Five Thirty Eight) highlights how much voters’ beliefs about higher education are tied to their political party.

   

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So what do these accounts tell us about the shape of higher ed in 2022?:

1. Higher education enrollments are far down in the wake of the pandemic, but not at all schools. Community colleges have seen the largest decreases (9.5%), while online ‘megauniversities’ (and a number of state schools) have actually seen increases.

2. Students and families are increasingly calculating how to get the best education at the best cost in a fragmented environment- which is leading some to online schools and innovative models.

3. Additionally, political polarization has led many Americans to deeply distrust both the returns of college and the core intentions of the entire education sector.

4. This environment is leading more and more institutions to seriously consider, and even lean into, innovative solutions, such as certificates, stackable degrees, curriculum sharing, and business partnerships.

What Is Edtech Doing To Address This Moment in Higher Education?

Edtech is right at the heart of this moment for Higher Ed, offering both alternatives and partnerships that can make meaningful differences for universities looking to navigate this perilous moment.

• Less Expensive Degrees: In recent months, Nexford University, Kibo School and Coursera (partnering with Indian university BITS Pilani) have all announced degrees that cost under $10,000 total, joining the Udacity/Georgia Tech Online Master’s in Computer Science, which proved years ago that degrees can be offered at scale at a much lower price point.

• More Transfer Credits: Transfer credits help decrease the cost and time commitment of college, but transfer has dropped significantly in the pandemic; companies like Straighterline, Outlier, Transferology and Edvisorly are all working to provide faster and cheaper college experiences through transfer

• Stackability as a Service: Coursera, 2U/Edx, Futurelearn, Woolf University and other online program management and MOOC providers have worked with university partners to embrace stackability, in which learners can earn credentials, including industry certifications, on their way to larger milestones.

• Inject High-Demand Courses into College Experiences: Bootcamp-university partnerships, such as UMGC-Springboard, USCD-Thinkful, SNHU-Kenzie or any of the Trilogy bootcamps, can be used to ensure that college graduates have practical skills in high demand fields.

• Industry Certifications Alongside Traditional Degrees: Pathstream, Coursera’s Career Academy and ANSI’s Workcred all allow students to earn industry certifications in alignment with their college degrees. Students who complete the Google IT Certificate can use it as credit for the University of North Texas.

• Passing the Cost of Higher Ed Onto Employers: Education as a benefit providers like Guild Education, InStride and Edcor (along with company programs like Amazon’s Career Choice).

• Offer Education That Bridges the Political Divide: Already, many of the most conservative colleges in the US embrace online learning, like Brigham Young Online, Bob Jones Online or Liberty University Online and you can certainly expect megauniversities, who target adults of all political persuasions, to carefully skirt the fears of ‘propaganda’ that resound in other university settings.

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HEADLINES

Lots of wild headlines and reports out in the last couple of weeks, well worth a look:

1. Understanding the Edtech Content Landscape: Report by Brighteye Ventures

Fascinating new market map from Brighteye looking at content through personalization and VR/AR lenses.

2. Lego’s Parent Company to Acquire Brainpop

Toy giant Lego acquires Edtech staple Brainpop in a mega-deal ($875M) that combines entertainment and education. Is Disney/Kahoot next?

3. Cambium: Learning Loss is Real and Larger Than Anyone Expected

Following the NAEP results, Cambium Education put out a study of 2.25M students, showing major decreases in both Math and ELA scores.

4. Byju’s Cuts Jobs and Raises Money

Byju’s is restructuring, having cut 5% of its workforce and raising another $250M of fresh funding. Byju’s continues to be the volatile mega-flagship of the Indian Edtech world, making spectacular headlines on a weekly basis.

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LISTEN

In this week’s Edtech Insiders interview, we interviewed Monica Ares, head of Immersive Learning at Meta. Check it out!

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READ

Check out the new book by Michael Horn (co-author of the seminal Disrupting Class):

From Reopen to Reinvent: (Re)Creating School for Every Child

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