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No doubt the precogs have already seen this
127 Plays5 days ago
Predictions for 2025: What Lies Ahead?
In this episode, Phil, Morgan, and Neil discuss various topics related to online education, including the impact of generative AI on the market, predictions for 2025, and the future of language learning apps. They explore the potential for university bankptcies, shifts in assessment practices, and the increasing trend of international online learning. The conversation also touches on the evolving role of AI in educational platforms and the challenges faced by established companies like edX.
Chapters
00:00 Introduction to New Recording Era
02:44 Live Podcast Recording at Leeds University
05:35 Generative AI Panic and Market Reactions
08:19 Impact of AI on Education
11:10 Predictions for 2025: Assessment Trends in Higher Education
13:54 Student Success and Vendor Accountability
16:53 University Closures and Financial Challenges
21:05 The Impact of Online Learning on International Education
24:06 Shifts in VLE and LMS Market Focus
27:23 The Revolving Door in Education Politics
29:54 Challenges for Language Learning Apps
32:28 The Future of edX and University Platforms
36:54 Generative AI's Sustainable Use in EdTech
41:07 New Chapter
Recommended
Transcript
New Recording Software & Video Components
00:00:08
Speaker
Hello and welcome back to Online Education Across the Atlantic. We're back with you and this time with some new playing around with different recording software. We're going to see how that goes. Basically, the shift to adding video has added a lot more complication to this process than I realize. We all have our glasses on and we even had to like line up our heads. So this is this is a new era for us. I'm really excited. This is like a different level of choreography, isn't it really?
00:00:36
Speaker
And i I feel, I feel, uh, usually normally in my life, I'm the one with the biggest forehead, but I'm the one with the smallest one. And that's particular but lane four. So.
Teasing Live Podcast at Leeds University
00:00:47
Speaker
And we probably, we don't have full news to share with our listeners right now, but we'll tease it. We've talked frequently about the Leeds University conference. And one of the things that we're working on and we basically have agreed in principle is we're going to have our first live podcast recording.
00:01:07
Speaker
onsite that's going to be happening this summer at Leeds. So there's an online conference, online learning conference at Leeds. What's the name of it, Neil? It's the Online Learning Summit. But I i also, you know, when you said live in Leeds, that reminded me of the Who album. So thank you. this is So when we were on the phone with Margaret setting it up, that's all I could talk about. And can I go to the student hall where they did the Who live at Leeds? And Morgan's just rolling her eyes.
00:01:36
Speaker
She wants to see some cricket field or something. Yeah, we can go to heaven afterwards, Morgan.
Blending Online & Live Elements at Summer Conference
00:01:44
Speaker
But this July, we're going to be recording live as part of a conference. I really like the idea. So we're going to, one of the sessions of the conference will be us doing the podcast live. We have to work out how to get the questions involved in there, but that's going to do a couple of things. Get you two to meet each other in person, finally.
00:02:04
Speaker
um Let us do this, also do a live podcast, live streaming as we go, but also we're thrilled to be working as part of that summit, which I know, Neil, that's been one of your favorites, um and we're really looking forward to participating. So thanks for pushing us this way, or at least triggering us to start, I guess, ah begging for them to put us on, and they finally did.
00:02:29
Speaker
Yeah, it's going to be a good one. is If for a couple of years there's anything to go by, it was yeah definitely one of the best ones. ah No pressure on Margaret et al, but it was good. Yeah. She's the most frequently mentioned person in our podcast and now we've upped the ante. so So we're looking forward to that and we're going to share more information with our listeners on that soon. And that's going to be a lot of fun this summer.
Falsifiable Predictions for 2025
00:02:52
Speaker
Um, before we get into our topic is we wanted to, well, for the main topic, we wanted to do predictions for 2025. And I'm pushing that they have to be falsifiable predictions. So this is the Karl Popper episode that we're going down. But before we get to that, um, a couple of things
Generative AI Panic Day in the US
00:03:12
Speaker
are happening. What is, I don't know how it is in the UK, but in the U S it's a generative AI panic day because of deep sea.
00:03:21
Speaker
and what that's doing so to the markets and what that is causing a lot of people to rethink a lot of common assumptions around generative AI. And I think it's going to have a longer-term impact, even though we're during recording we're in the midst of the overreaction phase that we like to do here.
00:03:40
Speaker
But I don't know if that's hitting you guys in the UK as well. Yeah, it's it's been in the news, maybe not not um to the same level, perhaps. But i I think it's just a fascinating story of the ways in which you can place restrictions on people, but they'll find a way around. I mean, it's amazing with the kind of restrictions around the chips and what they're able to do. I mean, irrespective of the kind of geopolitical come competitive aspect of it all, um I suppose I like that.
00:04:11
Speaker
element of the story that, against some adversity, um they were able to innovate and potentially do this thing at a much lower cost, I think.
Critique of AI Restrictions - Ben Thompson
00:04:21
Speaker
Yeah, I don't know if you've read ah Ben Thompson's piece on on that this morning in Stratecury. That was pretty useful, I thought, in talking about some of the ways around, ah working around some of the restrictions. that was I found that very useful.
00:04:36
Speaker
And it was good with pretty much his conclusion, just slamming open AI for all of their work of trying to encourage regulation and protectionism and do-gooderism. And in one weekend, it all just got blown away by a Chinese company that was willing to get down to the assembly programming level of these Nvidia chips.
AI Cost Breakthroughs in EdTech
00:05:00
Speaker
which then gets around the whole chip restrictions and the way we've been trying to regulate them and puts out something that's just in a completely different efficiency and cost level. So I did like how Thompson ended up by taunting OpenAI saying, hey, that whole defensive approach just blew up and it is valid. How about if you try to compete now?
00:05:23
Speaker
Yes. Sam Altman's had a bad stretch, hasn't he? Because wasn't he kind of criticized by Musk on said platform as well? Yeah. Well, i well, that's a routine occurrence, I think. yeah The most recent criticism of Altman was also getting into the whole Stargate and $500 billion dollar ah massive AI investment of which a colossal $10 billion dollars is actually lined up ahead of time.
00:05:52
Speaker
I think that's important for our world because what it pretends and everything I'm reading is the cost of doing AI could have a radical shift because of this breakthrough.
NVIDIA Chips & University Computing
00:06:05
Speaker
And if the cost of AI drops, that's going to dramatically increase the ability to actually have products that are being used. So I think it's going to open the gates in edtech for a lot more feasible, real um usage of generative AI, not just the pilots and proof of concepts that we've been looking at so far.
00:06:28
Speaker
Assuming that that NVIDIA plays along, I just finished reading the book about NVIDIA, which was which which which came out recently, which was pretty interesting. And the one part which I was particularly interested in, in part because it involves universities, was the use of um NVIDIA chips to address some HPC issues. um you know And a guy at UC San Diego and you know developed ah a program that ran on NVIDIA chips rather than in in um supercomputers and and made it much more accessible and democratized access to that and really drove a lot of insights in biology. But then Nvidia wanted to stop selling him those chips. They wanted him to buy the more expensive chips. yeah yeah Well, there might be a similar theme there, but it certainly appears that some of the protectionist behavior of some of the leading AI companies is um
00:07:21
Speaker
questionable or best and likely actually harming them in the long run. Well, I guess in the short run, it's no doubt Nvidia has taken the biggest hit today.
National Sovereignty's Influence on AI
00:07:32
Speaker
I think that's an interesting part of the dynamic though, that because I think the protectionism to an extent is that it's also driven across national boundaries, isn't it? And I think that's going to be really interesting in the kind of year ahead to see and the ways in which, I don't know, um sovereignty, if I could put it that way, kind of influences the way AI goes and protectionism and all of those kind of different factors.
00:07:58
Speaker
I think that's all the news we've had over here in the past week. Is that right, Morgan? Anything else happening? Yeah, just lots of little bits and drips and drabs of places having hard times, you know, just hardly news. It's business as usual now, but um just a ah yeah constant drip of those kinds of stories.
00:08:19
Speaker
Well, I was actually talking, referring to the new presidential administration and the onslaught of actions. Oh, you're being snarky. You're being snarky. Yes. Yes. It's been a constant onslaught of things that people can hardly, the zone is being flooded with, so to speak, with shit and other things. Yeah. Well, I do have to say that we will be covering this, but there's so much happening so fast that I do want to take a little bit of time to digest it and have something beyond noise to add to the conversation. I will point out one thing, it's getting a little bit wonky, but it's interesting that the Department of Ed has ah i' several new appointees and they come from the same group, the America First Initiative, AFI, something.
00:09:08
Speaker
yeah um that Linda McMahon comes from, who's the nominated Secretary of Education. So we need to understand that group and what they've been pushing because ah it's certainly starting to come out of it that that group is going to be more influential than the Heritage Foundation, which is the one who wrote the Project 2025. So we do need to start writing it, but the onslaught of news is hard to digest at this point.
Oxford's Exam Changes & Criticism
00:09:34
Speaker
Yeah I think um one thing that I wanted to flag actually ah in this in a very small way kind of relates to some of the stuff happening over there because I think similarly we've had lots of kind of you know the gypsum jobs of kind of bad news and around certain institutions usually financially but We also had a ah had some stories recently around assessment, so University of Oxford, I think they kind of agreed that they were going to maybe try to move away from yeah in-person kind of traditional exams and embrace things like closed book.
00:10:07
Speaker
and take-home kind of stuff. And our ex-Prime Minister, I don't actually remember her list trust, she was kind of around for not a very long time, but she she was yeah she was very opposed to this. And she actually said on X, and I quote, please can we have an executive order that bans this anti-meritocratic nonsense So, you know, whilst executive orders are going on over there, they've they've blown across to um higher education in the UK through list trusts complaining about, you know, Oxford's move away from in-person exams. um So many people listening to this trust right now.
00:10:49
Speaker
I really hope not. I don't think so to be honest. that Certain figures have got their own media platforms that they can go onto and those media platforms are the ones that she's onto and I'm not sure how big her audience is but um she's not the most loved ah former prime ministers. Let me just put it like that. Also kind of an interesting report I think that came out today around just some trends in assessment.
UK Education Trends & Gen AI
00:11:16
Speaker
Over here Gisk put out a report um which is interesting, I mean nothing revolutionary there but just I think the main trends were talking about a move towards programmatic assessment which is interesting given you know there may be moves in the future to more modularized provisions so that's kind of an interesting tension there and then just kind of documenting some of the moves universities are making around
00:11:42
Speaker
I suppose, combating Gen AI and more in-person and interviews and fever type assessments as well. um So yeah, assessments being on the agenda over here um for a combination of reasons. yeah Well, Morgan's trying to raise their profile and I think you're going to be reading about it more about the cost of online education.
Online Learning Costs & Course Development
00:12:05
Speaker
Yeah, so WCT, an organization here in the US came out with the a survey, they'd done one in 2016, published in 2017 about the costs of online learning and I wrote about it this weekend. But I also sort of threw out a ah an offer to anybody who, you know, are you interested in the costs? Because I'm sort of a little tad OCD about the issue. So I sort of collect lots of issues as I go around. So um I've gotten actually a surprising number of responses of people who are who are interested in costs. And so i'm I'll probably be be writing a little bit about them sort of starting perhaps with course costs.
00:12:44
Speaker
How much does it cost to to develop an online course um in the in the American sense of that smallest but smallest level of analysis? um It's a good thing that we don't do advertising funding for the work that we do, because ah talking about assessments and the cost of online education might be hard to get sponsors for that. But they're fascinating topics, at least to us. Yeah, that sounds that sounds interesting. I shall learn. I shall look out for that.
00:13:15
Speaker
Yep. All right. Well, let's get into our
Hosts' Predictions for Student Success & AI
00:13:17
Speaker
main topic today. We ah wanted to play around with um with predictions, what we think we're going to be seeing coming forward and with the real emphasis, as I said before, on falsifiability so that I guess we could do an end of the year post and make fun of each other for.
00:13:32
Speaker
what we attempted to explain, but I thought it'd be fun to give this a try. um And so I think we've done a complicated scheduling and Morgan, we're going to start with you. So ah each of us is going to share three predictions for the coming year. And we'll talk about that. Why don't we start when don't we do one go round of one each so that, so that yeah. Real-time planning. So we'll start with Morgan's number one.
00:13:58
Speaker
Sometimes you'll have to tell them the story of of when you were in London with your daughter and and she begged you to plan at least one day. That was an awesome time, but please can we plan just one day? um ah So my first one, which you you you simply ask that they be falsifiable, not that they be somewhat unpredictable. ah But, you know, I think we're hitting one of my predictions for this year is that we're heading into crunch time with student success in terms of things like retention graduation. I think we're going to have that's there's going to be a whole lot more focus on that. And as a consequence, I think some of the vendors in the space are going to
00:14:38
Speaker
essentially come unstuck. They're going to be shown to have all the problems inherent in some of their platforms are going to be ah come into into stark relief. Because and I think that is a way overdue time as well. Because I think it's a space where there's all kinds of um stuff that goes on that that that shouldn't. So I think student success, and it's going to cause a bit of a shakeout in the vendor space supporting it.
00:15:03
Speaker
i'm interested I'm interested in what this is going to shed a light on in terms of the vendors, more specifically, and their practices. and you know One is, is they they some of them, for example, are actually more than one. sell essentially um ah systems that aren't that helpful. I mean, if i can i've i've I've heard multiple stories over the years of vendors saying to saying to to to customers and and charging them you know ah a lot of money for this to say, your number one predictor of student success is GPA. That is literally a quote, more than one. and so So they sell circular kinds of things. and and you know
00:15:48
Speaker
I think some of that is going to go up. Some of the clunkiness, you because a lot of what these student success tools are, are essentially CRMs and they're clunky and and not really up to up to snuff really. and And you've got a proliferation of these kinds of things so that you've got yeah your student success CRM and you've got Salesforce and you've got something that the career center is using and and so on. So I think you're going to see a lot more critical commentary um and maybe that's one of those self-fulfilling predictions because it's some of it's going to come from me. We know you're writing for the for the next year. ah That's a good point. So falsifiable that you can't game the system. What will use those rules for next year, not for this year then? But you're really getting into
00:16:37
Speaker
It's sort of callingul calling the bluff on student success systems. And they're going to have to rethink and say, no, no we haven't solved the problem yet. And we've got to do things differently, um particularly from the vendor communities is, I think, what you're predicting. Yeah.
00:16:55
Speaker
So, okay, well, Neil, let's go with yours. What's your first
Is a UK University Closure Imminent?
00:16:59
Speaker
prediction? Yeah, my mine mine is um that I think, my mind I don't know how mine transposes to the US because I feel like um in one sense it's a small prediction, but I think this year, unfortunately, I think we're going to see one relatively significantly sized university go under. That's my prediction.
00:17:21
Speaker
which i mean I know in the uk and the US, because I've read the commentary, know that's kind of a lot more commonplace, and in the UK we've seen small providers, but I think this year, you know there's just been such a crescendo around all of the other financial challenges that I think we will see a notable university go under this year. I might be wrong, I hope I am wrong, but um I just think it's getting to that stage where there's not really much relief from government,
00:17:48
Speaker
There are inevitably universities in bad positions, maybe not necessarily down to decision making, but there'll be some that have made poor investments or poor decisions in the past under a different climate that I think we will see you know a bigger ah bigger player. um Well, when you say go under, does that a how does a merger play in there? well like think Will you win if it's ah they get absorbed by another university?
00:18:17
Speaker
No, the the merger and um what would happen I guess is kind of a big question mark. I suppose what I'm saying is I think a big notable university will get to a stage where they can't operate anymore. What actually happens? The sector doesn't really know. Is the government going to get involved? Is it going to be a merger? I think that's an availment of uncertainty in the UK at the moment as well because there's plenty of talk about the financial troubles but there's also this question mark of would the give government step in? I think they said, I think they were on record of saying they they wouldn't or maybe they fudged the question a little bit and just said, look, at universities have to be financially sustainable. But yeah, um i'm happy for I'm happy for my prediction to be that this institution goes away and then, you know, hopefully someone interviews and I'm proved wrong. I'm happy to be proved wrong on this one. That's a good one. Ball.
00:19:14
Speaker
I, well, then I'm going to reverse the order since we're doing one each that I'm going to reverse the order that I had planned on doing things and sort of play along a similar view of what you just described.
00:19:25
Speaker
And that is, I predict that we're going to have at least two bankruptcies or going out of business. um One in the college and university space, similar to what you're saying in the UK. I think we're going to be seeing that in the US. It cannot operate anymore. It's got to be absorbed or cease operating. But also one that's outside of that space.
00:19:50
Speaker
And so what I add here is we've talked about to you went bankrupt, but it actually reorganize and came out of bankruptcy in two months um written about OLC that's now in bankruptcy. However, it has virtually no debt and it certainly seems like they're going to come out of it and maybe even be stronger written recently about anthology skipping an interest payment, but they're not even going bankrupt.
00:20:17
Speaker
And if everything works out, you know, then they're going to be going through. So I'm not talking about a structured way to deal with the balance sheet. What I think we're going to see is closer to, do you remember the new media consortia? That's where my mind went immediately. It's like, we're going to see NMC Mark II. Yeah. Okay. Well, then I could do this a lot quicker. We're going to see NMC Mark II in 2025 of either a vendor or an association type of group.
00:20:48
Speaker
And we're going to see Neil's prediction applied to the US, at least a midsize a college or university that's going to be insolvent in either have to go away or deal with it some way. Yeah. Cherry, cherry times. Yeah. Well, you can't avoid it because even when enrollments are going up, financers are going down and, um, yeah, can't avoid it. Okay. So there's round one. So now let's go. We're keeping up with the.
00:21:17
Speaker
No more usurping the plan here. So Morgan, we're going to keep with the same order. What is your second prediction? So I'm actually going to shift mine as well, because I i was going to go somewhere else. But um I actually think we're going to see a sizable increase in online learning that happens across international borders. um So international or transnational, as I think um Neil col call calls it. So not not companies like Emeritus or Beacon that that take degrees there, but just international students choosing not to come physically to the country and studying online in substantial numbers. um and And again, you people could criticize me for for saying maybe that's obvious, but it's it's I think we'll actually see it happen this year and and it's not going to be easy, but I think it'll happen.
00:22:09
Speaker
Well, I do want to ask before we get going, did you read Neil's post this morning? I did not. No, I. had Great timing. i um i I had plumbing issues. so ah not okay guys so um not checking um I was wondering where ah where you saw the drivers for that because it in the UK, if I was making a similar prediction, I'd kind of probably say the drivers are from the universities themselves looking to that market. But it sounds like you're saying
00:22:42
Speaker
that international students are going to think differently and think actually, why can't I do my degree at a US university online and snap, not trek over there. i think um I think it'll be both a supply and demand issue. So I think universities certainly are doing that. I know that many of them are. um And ah increasingly because of visa controls and things like that, ah um and then the sort of growing tension around travel and things, students are going to think, well, I still want this sort of thing, maybe qualities at a point where it
00:23:18
Speaker
It can really sort of bring me those things. I think one of the implications is university is going to have to get far better at facilitating networking for a lot of these programs so that students can actually make the connections and and get some of the experience. But I think it's going to be both supply and demand driven. Well, great.
00:23:37
Speaker
And I'm sure Morgan will now be reading Neil's post right after there. By the way, it's all about people misunderstanding international online markets. That's why it was there was trepidation when you came out with your prediction. Oh, sorry about that. No, no, no, no. It was more about the university's misunderstanding it and applying, making it similar to on-site international. You have to read it. it's ah It's a great post now. I really enjoy it. I really agree with it on that little synopsis.
00:24:04
Speaker
sorry All right, Neil, your second prediction. So my second prediction is around the VLE LMS market, um and it's probably a little less specific. But I think this year, I think the last year or so has been characterized by AI product features that have been really focused on teachers and educators and so I think this year we'll see you know a number of student focused AI product features within VLEs and LMS is being launched. I think it's going to be a
00:24:39
Speaker
kind of a shift of focus towards you know the companies developing something that's a bit more focused on students. I know that there are examples of things like that. I think Instructure have the discussion board summaries. um I'm not sure if they've rolled that out fully yet, but I just think there'll be a slight turn of focus towards product developments that are more directed towards students within the VLE rather than You know, here's a rubric creator or here's a learning outcomes generator or here's a quiz
Shift in AI Development Towards LMS Tools?
00:25:13
Speaker
generator. I think we'll start to see more of that embedded in, in VLE product features. So away from faculty and course designers and taught in student usage.
00:25:25
Speaker
I think so, because I think there's that be that period of, you know, that that's a safer audience of the audiences that those products serve, I think. um Because there's also that element of that audience being in control of those things.
00:25:42
Speaker
I think the student one is a bit risky because you're kind of if you're an educator that has a particular view on AI and you the product that your institution uses you know helps facilitate that in a way that you're maybe not comfortable with, I think that's a bit more of a challenge. But I just think that's ah kind of a more of a natural direction for them to go around some of this kind of things. um So I think we'll just see more more products more product developments that are aimed at students.
00:26:11
Speaker
Maybe it'll tie in with what you were saying around the Student Success Morgan as well. like Maybe maybe that that could be a theme, maybe conjoining the two. Well, I think i think the first LMS company or VLE company that can come up with a consistentizer, you know at an AI agent that goes and makes the course consistent for the students yeah with all the other courses that they take on the same platform. I think that'll be a winner.
00:26:35
Speaker
But who what about a Gen AI tool that makes all of their courses have consistent navigation and locations? That's exactly. Yeah. Yeah. But you know, what would be amazing is if the faculty member sees the thing that they created, but the student sees something consistent, yeah that would be a amazing. Oh, you still have academic freedom and you're doing it your way. Nobody else is using it. Oh, that is a genius idea. Okay.
00:27:04
Speaker
So, by the way, if it doesn't work out, I know the post I'll write about you, which is, yeah, but people students don't pick LMSs. No, I know, I know. So it's a risky prediction you have. I love that. I've kind of, I decided to go for it, and I'm happy if all three are miserably wrong.
00:27:22
Speaker
Okay, so my second prediction is quite specific, and it's almost too easy, and it's very US-centric, so apologies for Neil. But ah James Quall the current Undersecretary of Education. Morgan could at this point write my prediction. He's going to accept a job with one of the main organizations funded by the Arnold Ventures Coalition. So New America, Center for American Progress, TCAS again, the Century Foundation. um Basically it's payoff time. Job well done. Now here's your job that you can take. So I don't think he'll be the only one from the Department of Education.
00:28:05
Speaker
making these moves. We already saw Wesley Whistle make that move to New America last year, and picking right up with what he was working on. But James Quall will be the big name. It'll happen in 2025, and he's going to be a big player in one of these organizations. So the Revolvador works. I have a writer on that, and that in at the end of the year, I'll still be pronouncing his name wrong, as James Quall.
00:28:31
Speaker
Well, I'm one of the few ones who insist on pronouncing it the right way each time. So I think you're safe with a with mispronouncing his name. It sounds like he might be remunerated well for this move as well, possibly. um ah We don't need to worry about his future prospects anyway. No, I do not think so. and By the way, that comment, since we're getting into really dangerous territory here, um is not as much it's not a qual comment. It's, this is how the revolving door works in political circles around education in the US.
00:29:09
Speaker
is You hire all these people, then when your administration wins, you staff the administration, and then they know they have a well-compensated job coming out of it. Job well done, come back to it. So yes, you're exactly right, Neil. I just want to clarify. My lawyer just sent me a note and said to clarify, this is a this is an industry-wide problem. I'm not just speaking about James Quill.
00:29:35
Speaker
And the same thing will happen at the end of the Trump administration with the AFI people going back. It's just, yeah. Yeah. this Different dynamics, but because in the previous Trump administration, you also, it wasn't as heavy on the NGOs. So you also got into the for-profit sector and stuff like that. So revolving door, but of a different type, I think is what we'll be seeing. So.
00:30:00
Speaker
All right, Morgan, let's ah wrap up with the third round. What is your third prediction?
Will AI Replace Language Learning Apps?
00:30:06
Speaker
So I think this is going to be a rough year for language learning apps. they They are being ah you know some of the darlings of the market, you doing well and and and prospering as people try and especially learn English. And I think essentially AI is going to make it less and less necessary to do that. So I think we're going to it's going to be a rough year for language learning um apps and and and other kinds of things.
00:30:32
Speaker
Anyone in particular that you're and thinking of? like i well i look I'm just going to put it out there because I'm a Duolingo cynic in general. so um yeah i Certainly there they're the biggest, and you know ah but it is it is addictive. I've i've got 1,050 days or something on Duolingo. Still can't speak Spanish.
00:30:59
Speaker
Yeah, i this is this is my central, that describes my central problem with Duolingo. But yeah, we probably shouldn't go there on this episode. episode yeah So basically, Duolingo is going to do a check this year. Maybe not that bad, but but approaching that as well as you know the other ones, I think are going to run into rough times because I think the the the technology is is is catching up and ah people will eventually say, hey,
00:31:27
Speaker
You know, I need to maybe just go find a person to teach me English or Spanish or whatever. Yeah. I definitely agree with you on this. It is remarkable.
00:31:39
Speaker
the improvement in things such as ah auto transcript language based work, such as auto transcription. um I just, oh, Morgan and I got an email from a friend of ours who deals a lot with the Norwegian at tech market. And he sent us a website or information. He said, you guys can use your browser or whatever to translate into English. And so I used the auto translation that's obviously powered by Gen AI now.
00:32:09
Speaker
It was remarkably smooth, the translation, and it didn't just read like a very stilted, poor translation. So I think that's a great prediction. All right, Neil, are you going to be positive or negative with your last prediction?
00:32:27
Speaker
um It depends if I'm allowed to kind of embellish a bit on the prediction, but um go for it. Maybe I'll do that. um Well, I'm going to start negative and I'm going to be quite specific and it's not because I don't bear any ill will towards them, but I think i think this year we might see edX in a funny position and maybe
00:32:53
Speaker
maybe maybe not around in the current guys any more you have to have predictions that hadn't happened yet I know, I know. but i but but ah Well, I wonder if they'll continue to exist in the way they are now. I just think they're a platform that's been meandering for such a long time.
Future of edX Amidst Coursera Competition
00:33:12
Speaker
The 2U strategy of leveraging them to reduce marketing costs doesn't seem to have worked. I think De Waalshar of Class Central put something up recently around The way in which Coursera has just massively surpassed them in terms of the numbers of enrollments in 2024 for their courses and I just don't really know what they're doing with that and where it's going so I just I feel like this year could be the crunch for for edX and my embellishment was going to be
00:33:47
Speaker
um I think there's going to be some UK universities that are going to seek to develop their own online short course platforms. There's a bit of that already, so it's not kind of totally a prediction. But I think that bears some relationship to what I'm saying about edX specifically um around universities And if you think back 10 years ago, universities kind of going away from maybe having, you know, hosting stuff on a platform, but actually having a platform of their own for that kind of sub degree online short course side of things. So there's, yeah, there's a bit of a relationship there, but I think, I just think edX is one of those platforms that's just really meandering. And I, it has been for a while and I just think 25, 2025 is the crunchier for, for that. And something may happen.
00:34:37
Speaker
So when we go back in time, um the most successful ad tech investors in the past decade have proven to be Harvard and MIT. ah They created that. They made 800 million at the perfect time in cash and got out of it.
00:34:56
Speaker
Um, and here we are with all the talk about disruption, stuff like that. And it's Harvard and MIT that have benefited the most. If you really look at it in cold, hard terms, I i can't imagine that's great, but there you go. But yeah, I take your point. Well, I'm just, it's remarkable. oh You're right. You're right. Yeah.
00:35:18
Speaker
I will point out there's one thing to help back up. This is a less risky prediction in my mind, and part of the reason for that is, to you, just announced a new CEO, Case Bowles. Case Bowles was coming over. He was CEO of Boundless, which had been Pearson Online Learning Services, but also Matt Levy, who was at Pearson eCollege when they started the ASU work.
00:35:47
Speaker
and that he was also over at Wiley and they reported to him or he's responsible for a lot of their OPM work and he's a very sort of hard-nosed, practical, what's really happening or what do we need to do and he's now Chief Operating Officer. The point is, 2U has a new executive team. They have a new board.
00:36:08
Speaker
and they have a new, hey, we're not going to live on the past. If something doesn't make sense, we're going to make a change. They just got out of the boot camp business, for example. So when you combine all of these changes and their willingness to say, we're not pretending anymore, there's a lot of solid basis for your prediction. So good one on this, I would i would argue. I might even get one right.
00:36:31
Speaker
and so For my final one, it's hard to figure out how to word this in a way that's falsifiable.
Sustainable Revenue from Generative AI in EdTech by 2025?
00:36:39
Speaker
Basically, this will be the first year that generative AI provides a real sustainable use case in edtech. What I mean by sustainable is there's actual revenue benefits in the ability to fund the use of gen AI.
00:37:00
Speaker
um And we've seen and I've certainly written about anthology has been the most aggressive in the BLE LMS market investing in this area and good for them. They're getting interest. But if you say, well, how did they monetize it? Well, they they've chosen not to directly monetize it. So they only monetize it if they win an account.
00:37:20
Speaker
that they wouldn't have otherwise and they're sort of more of a let's just invest and see what happens and it's certainly raising their profile but I would not argue that's a sustainable use case certainly not yet um you know we've seen other companies do things I think that in the edtech market we will see for the first time something where we say oh my goodness that funds itself that is sustainable that bet is already starting to pay off Part of the reason that I say that is today's news. Going back to this is where I think Deepsea helps things out is all of a sudden there's sort of a reset on people's expectations on what Gen AI inference, the actual products that people use can be. And that's going to enable a lower cost structure of using Gen AI. So I combine those together. By the end of the year, I think we'll be able to say, look at that product line or that company.
00:38:21
Speaker
And that gen AI based product is sustainable and is already generating its own revenue. So there's my final prediction. And particular do you have any inkling on what that thing might be? Or what way like in terms of?
00:38:40
Speaker
You know, you said like product line or a company, like, do you think assessment or tutoring or, I don't know, sorry, I'm putting on your spot hit on the spot here, but. If I knew that, would I be doing a free podcast with you guys? No, I don't know. Well, I mean, we've already given away that great new LMS feature, haven't we, of consistency. So, you know.
00:39:06
Speaker
Yeah. We insist our lawyers have put out a rider that if anybody creates that product, they at least name it after, uh, after the podcast or after Morgan. So we won't make money, but at least we'll get another variety from it. thanks That's our business plan. Well, good. Well, that's a interesting set of predictions. And I think this would be fun because it actually, well,
00:39:31
Speaker
Morgan's in particular, she could be the one actually writing about it, so it's a little bit of a cheat there. but um I think it can help us focus on some of the things that we're covering ah and the movement we're expecting to see as well. So that was fun. we We definitely have an episode um lined up for the end of the year as well, don't we? We can collectively mock one of the... We could have an end of year award, worst prediction, you know best prediction. Yeah, we can get some names as well. you Worst analyst of 2025.
00:40:06
Speaker
Yeah, perhaps perhaps we can make one award the Eddie after that, that chatbot from the LAUSD that. um Oh my goodness. I don't, yeah, but I'm not sure that that one, uh, it's going to be hard for anybody to match that collapse. I wish we had done this ah prediction a year ago.
00:40:25
Speaker
because then that would have been the one to predict. But you know but maybe we can name our our our award for the worst prediction the IDI award or something and we can make it look like that little chat button yes. Well good. Hey well thanks ah enjoyed the conversation and we will be back in another two weeks and we'll also share more information about what I'm really excited about for this summer too. I already listened to the extended version of live that leads after we had our call with Margaret. So for that and many other reasons, I'm really looking forward to this summer should be fun. But ah thanks and I will talk to you too in a couple of weeks.