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Can you see the real me, can ya?
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In today's episode of "Online Education Across the Atlantic," we dive deep into the current state and future of online learning. We discuss how online education is not just a fleeting trend but a substantial evolution that's making education accessible for many, including those who had to abandon their studies previously. We explore the diversity of online learners, the necessity of flexible program designs, and the need of adapting to meet various life schedules. From discussions on the FAFSA fiasco's impact on enrollment to insights on the growth of platforms like Coursera and FutureLearn, our conversation is hopefully packed with valuable insights. Don’t forget—the future of education is being shaped today, and staying informed is key. Thanks for listening, and keep tuning in for more discussions!
00:00 Discussion on online education and current events.
04:45 Analysts react negatively, but improvements are noteworthy.
07:54 Online education demand increasing despite expected enrollment drop.
10:54 Blended learning key change, not just technology.
13:30 Two online student surveys reveal characteristics.
19:15 UK split reflects part time provision ratio.
21:41 Challenges of online education and its delivery.
25:12 Most online learners open to synchronous learning.
28:32 People want in-person experiences in addition to online options.
29:31 Diverse online learners need flexible teaching formats.
33:11 42% didn't finish their first program, online learning helps.
39:16 Second degrees often pursued for specific careers.
40:45 Online learning generates more data, cost matters.
43:55 Balancing education with daily life for access.
46:16 Emphasize value of annual student surveys, recommend.
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Transcript
Introduction to Online Learner Surveys
00:00:07
Speaker
Hello and welcome back to Online Education Across the Atlantic here with my colleagues Glenda Morgan and Neil Mosley and looking forward to a discussion today where in particular we're going to be looking at two surveys about online learners basically the characteristics of which students are taking online programs and what we can learn from it
00:00:30
Speaker
based on survey data. So that's going to be our main topic today.
US Educational News Highlights
00:00:35
Speaker
But like to sort of highlight some of the news that's going on, I guess to get started, the easy thing from the U.S. that you just can't avoid are two stories. And as always, with the Department of Education is deeply involved. One, I'm not willing to touch with a 10 foot pole in this podcast or the campus protest and the and the reactions to it.
00:00:59
Speaker
That's going to have to be a very deliberate decision of ours before we add commentary on that. But then the other one is the ongoing FAFSA fiasco, where I would note, and I have a post that's going to be coming out Friday looking at updated data.
FAFSA Fiasco and Implications
00:01:15
Speaker
It looks like a couple of things. There definitely have been improvements in the FAFSA completion from a 39% drop down to at least a 29% drop.
00:01:28
Speaker
which on one hand you'd say, well, that's pretty good progress in three weeks. But on the other hand, you're saying we're still at the point where 29% fewer students have completed the financial aid form compared to last year. I mean, that would be devastating, even if, let's just say you cut that in half, even if 10 to 15% of students, lower enrollment for entering students, we don't know what that's gonna be.
00:01:54
Speaker
But these two stories dominate the news, so even when the Secretary of Education was on Capitol Hill talking about the budget for next year, it sounds like the vast majority of the discussion came back to these two stories, the campus protest and the FAFSA fiasco.
00:02:10
Speaker
We just have continued stories there. One thing I will note is that I think we need to start looking at potential impacts. It's going to be reading the tea leaves, but like just how bad do we think this is going to impact enrollment next year? And because of that, just how many schools are going to go out of business because of AFSA? Yeah, it's striking to me, like in the US, schools have been closing on average one every week.
00:02:38
Speaker
And this week there were two. Yeah. And I think it's only going to go up from there. Basically, I'm already preparing a post that apologizes to Michael Horan and say, I feel bad for making fun of you and Clayton Christensen for talking about all the college closures. It's finally happening. I don't know if that's premature, but it's going to have a huge impact.
00:02:59
Speaker
And so that's over here, the big news. Any other thing, Morgan, before we move on that you've noticed from those two stories or more importantly, the FAFSA? They've been really sort of sucking all the air out of the room, I think, you know, in a way it's difficult to get anything else because I'm trying to put together my post for Saturday and it's dominated by those two
Coursera's Earnings and Student Numbers
00:03:22
Speaker
issues. I mean, this is also the week of earnings call. So there's lots of those going on, you know, a couple of big ones today.
00:03:28
Speaker
someone's earlier this week, Coursera, and so on. Well, before we move on, since you mentioned Coursera, I know that at one point we were talking about doing a standalone post on Coursera, but you chose not to do that. Is that because you're getting ready to travel to Norway? Is that because there's nothing really newsworthy?
00:03:47
Speaker
There was some news, they got hammered a little bit because their earnings were not quite up to expectation, but their earnings were still pretty impressive. Though the one thing that did strike me, I think they mentioned the number of 22,000 students in their degree sector, which if you divide by the number of degrees and certificates that they offer is only 400.
00:04:13
Speaker
which for many places would be a high number. But given their model of very large classes like the IMBA at Illinois or something, I was struck by how small that was. So that's 400 per program on average. Yeah. Well, you wonder how much of that actually is the IMBA at Illinois, right?
00:04:35
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, probably. Yeah, it would be fascinating to see the waiting across there. Although I do know plenty of unis over here who would snap your hand up at 400 in my degree. Yeah, they'd be happy for that. Well, it's probably like this actually explains part of the reason we're not investment analysts. Like when I first saw the release, my initial thing is, wow, degree revenue, their OPM business is up 10% year over year. The number of students is up even more. It's like, oh, they're doing great.
00:05:05
Speaker
Of course, it's the reverse reaction by analysts, partially because they changed their guidance of how much revenue they would make this year. But their OPM business, you might have this weird aspect you're talking about that it's sort of from a small base of students, but it is improving.
00:05:21
Speaker
Which is worth noting. Yes. Yeah. No, no. I mean, they added another university just recently Huddersfield in the UK. Somebody should have a word with them about optics though, because one of the one of the things statements that they made was that the margin on their degree business was 100%.
00:05:39
Speaker
Yeah, that's, I've disagreed. I think that's a financial reporting more than an optics issue. They basically say there's no cost to generate. You make a good point. There's no cost to generate a degree because they already have the content, which I disagree. They do create custom courses or push for certain courses in order to create a degree. So I disagree from the financial reporting, but I think you're right. That's also a bad message as well.
00:06:08
Speaker
just right now, just given the kind of politics around it. Yeah. So it sounds like the UK is somewhat propping up their business. Is that where a lot of their growth is coming in the OPM side? I wouldn't be able to say that at the moment, but certainly the last edition, and certainly they do seem to be adding there. That would be an interesting thing to actually break down and look at if one could get sort of the data on there.
00:06:33
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, the UK has always been, I don't know, they've always been pretty selective around the UK partners that they have, but I think that's starting to change a little bit over here. I think it's interesting around that for 2U, I guess, because 2U seemed to, in their last report, really only highlight partnerships with UK institutions, so it's interesting around those two.
00:06:58
Speaker
And FutureLearn added another client, another degree client recently, didn't they, with Roehampton? Yeah, that's right. They signed an OPM deal with Roehampton. And yeah, have been adding degrees to their platform pretty rapidly on a slightly different kind of model. So yeah, it's degrees, degrees, degrees. I sat across from a coffee table from Joe Johnson at ASU GSB. Wow.
00:07:23
Speaker
You don't get bigger than that. Although I cannot help but like wonder, like how do you, how do you see him and not ask how his brother's doing? Yeah. I'm surprised that that didn't come up in the, in the last episode, Morgan, such a highlight meeting or being in proximity to British establishment. Yes. Yes. Well, I, uh, I was tempted to ask him if I could take a selfie, often mistaken for his brother. Depending on the hair day, right? Yeah. Yeah.
00:07:53
Speaker
One thing I would note tying these together is I've been taking a look at, since we're expecting in the US to have pretty bad enrollment data and fiscal data starting in the fall.
Enrollment Trends: For-Profit vs. Traditional Schools
00:08:06
Speaker
And this is after it had started to improve last fall. But at the same time, some of the for-profit schools and the OPMs are showing increasing enrollment. So we're talking about Coursera is up 10%, Strategic Education, which is Strayer and Capella.
00:08:22
Speaker
and their, which is a for-profit model, but their enrollment, their revenue was up 20%. Coursera, I mean, beyond there, we're seeing other data where there is a, it goes back to what we talked about. There definitely is a demand, particularly for online education, at the same time that we're expecting to see pretty devastating enrollment numbers for the fall. So I can't quantify it, but I'm noticing a consistent story there.
00:08:52
Speaker
What about any other things from the UK side of the pond and what's going on?
Blended Learning Challenges in the UK
00:08:58
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, the one that jumped out on me was yet another report on blended learning in the UK. And there seems to be various sector organizations reporting about blended learning. So this one was called Digital Enhanced Blended Learning, and it was a report from a think tank.
00:09:19
Speaker
over here and I think there's some good recommendations in there for how blended learning is improved in higher education but I'm just struck whenever I read a lot of these reports around blended learning that it feels like they're always saying the same things and they're saying things that have been said
00:09:41
Speaker
over and over again, leadership buy-in, digital capabilities, you know, a whole range of different things and they addressed in the report the kind of monopoly of ed tech and thinking about how to solve that and I
00:09:55
Speaker
I also think over here we have an overinflated sense of how well we're doing around blended learning sometimes as well. So one of the things that really stuck out when the report came out was, you know, blended learning has become the sector standard over here and it's offering a more personalized experience. And I just, I'm not sure that that, I mean, that obviously is kind of PR speak a little bit, but
00:10:21
Speaker
I'm just not sure with some of these reports, ultimately, what the benefit of them is. But over here, there is that sense in which now we're all doing blended learning. And that's all that we're talking about. And I just don't think that that's quite where we're at, really. And I'm not sure how we go forward and how these reports kind of serve us in going forward when we're just constantly recommending the same things.
00:10:49
Speaker
By blended learning, are they talking about replacing some seat time with some online? No, I mean, this is a really interesting thing for me because I've always probably borrowed definitions from your side of the pond where those definitions have that reduced seat time.
00:11:07
Speaker
that definition doesn't really seem to be carried over here. And for me, I think that is one of the key facets of blended learning. And so my slight objection now with this sense of, oh, we're all doing blended learning now post pandemic is more that, you know,
00:11:24
Speaker
it's almost equated to oh we're a bit more aware that there's technology involved in delivering higher education than actually anything fundamentally changing or seat time being reduced massively and there's been reports in which you know it's been a pretty soft stance on the definition but I think that's a really
00:11:45
Speaker
Key component of blended learning and I accept it's contested but yeah, so it was an interesting report But it yeah, it kind of more irked me than inspired me if I can put it like that So what did you mean by a tech monopoly? What were they referring to?
00:12:02
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I think in essence, they were referring to the limited choice around different vendors. And although they weren't explicit, I think the VLE market, I mean, if you look at things like digital assessment, you know, turn it in has a huge monopoly. So I think that's what they were speaking to. But I'm not sure that they were the organization to
00:12:23
Speaker
suggest a way forward around that. I think in the report they suggested the Competition and Markets Authority looks into the way that EdTech does things. It seemed to be more the regulatory angle to try to deal with that than anything more sophisticated. Maybe we'll do an unpopular episode at some point where I talk about
00:12:45
Speaker
that EdTech is underpriced and that it would be a healthier environment if EdTech platforms and services charged more. And of course, less on the administrative side, but that'll be a popular episode if we do that one.
00:12:58
Speaker
Can we do a part two on why we shouldn't charge international students more as well? And then we can lose our listenership pretty quickly. I will have to get over my PTSD because once in an analyst meeting with the CEO of an LMS VLE company, I suggested that the price was too low. And I thought he was going to climb over the table and hit me. Yeah. See, I would think it would be like, don't say that out loud.
00:13:27
Speaker
For some reason, he got angry and wanted to punch me. Yeah. Okay, good. Well, let's move on to the surveys. And both surveys that we're going to be referring to are surveys of online students. And they're not perfect, of course, but they give a real sense of who the students are that choose to take online programs. What are their characteristics? How do they perceive things? They both have a common origin.
00:13:57
Speaker
that has started out the Learning House report.
00:14:02
Speaker
started like 10, 12 years ago, and they were always one of the best sources to get this type of insight. And then at a certain point with company sales and Learning House being acquired by Wiley, but the research team starting to work with education dynamics, I had written once that it felt like where you have two parents that are in a divorce and you got to figure out
00:14:28
Speaker
Well, I'm going to read both reports, but I feel bad about it. And we'll never have Thanksgiving together
Demographics of Online Learners
00:14:33
Speaker
again. But so we have these two reports. One from Wiley. It's called the Voice of the Online Learner. And then the second one is the Education Dynamics Report. And we'll start with the Education Dynamics. It's got more of a marketing flavor to it. A lot of the report gets into how students use social media, streaming media. Are they good channels to reach students?
00:14:58
Speaker
I think this might be something that you've already been looking at Morgan with their, uh, since you've been doing a lot of research on the marketing angle of online programs. So I don't know if you've read, you've, you've looked at other education dynamics material beyond this. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, absolutely.
00:15:15
Speaker
So I think that's, let's start with that one. In both of these, I will call out, they are, well, Wiley had an OPM business. They just sold it to academic partners, which by the way, we should have mentioned that in the news. They just got rebranded. They're no longer going to be calling themselves academic partnerships. Now that they've acquired Wiley, they're going to be called Rise Point.
00:15:41
Speaker
So I don't know if that had made it over. The news hasn't propagated that much. But they have had an OPM business. Education Dynamics, they have a quasi-OPM business, much more on the marketing and recruitment side. But what I like about both of these, they describe their methodologies. They have a little bit of tilting of the sampling towards
00:16:05
Speaker
students in their programs, but they also survey a lot of other online students. So it's not exclusively their customer programs. But you do need to be aware somewhat. But let's look at the education dynamics. And what I'm going to do is read their key findings on section one, and then we'll sort of discuss it. It's looking at who are they, demographics and attributes of online college students.
00:16:32
Speaker
So meeting the needs of online college students starts with understanding who they are. Respondents span a range of income levels and ages, but the majority do share some characteristics. In general, respondents tend to be female, white, and employed with no children living at home. This is where I cue up somebody to sing all the single
00:16:53
Speaker
Most are not the first in their family to enroll in college. The majority enroll in their state of residence and tend to live in suburban areas throughout the country. Undergraduate students, and they do a good job, I will say this, of always saying, here's the total findings. Here it is by undergraduate. Here it is by graduate. But undergraduate respondents are most commonly white women with a median age of 29.
00:17:19
Speaker
more than half are single, and they go through there. And then the median household income is $48,400. The largest proportion is working 40 hours a week. This is for undergraduate students, so I think we need to look at that. Graduate students have a median age of 32, older than undergraduate, makes sense. But with similar racial and ethnic background to undergraduate students,
00:17:48
Speaker
Now the majority of graduate have at least one child living at home. The majority works 40 hours a week and 65% are employed full time while they're taking their program. They have a median of five to six years of work experience and a median household income of $65,350.
00:18:08
Speaker
And for the education dynamics, they're not the first in their family to enroll in college and they tend to live suburban and urban. So given all that, let's start with your reactions. And maybe you guys have already been doing this research. Is there anything there that jumps out at you that's surprising or particularly noteworthy of the demographics they're looking at? The heavily women aspect of it sort of jumps out, obviously, you know, I mean, obviously higher ed has been tending towards
00:18:36
Speaker
more women, but the predominance is striking to me, I think. And why? I mean, there is the question of why that is. I mean, it definitely hit me as well, but I'm not sure what the explanation is. Yeah, I wonder as well. That would be something to really probe.
00:18:57
Speaker
and try and figure out. And, you know, a lot of the programs that I've sort of looked into deeper, like the Georgia Tech Online Masters in Computer Science heavily mail, you know, and so then I wonder sort of how those sort of things get balanced. But yeah, that is striking to me.
00:19:15
Speaker
I think it was interesting. I mean, I think in the UK, that kind of split is reflective of kind of part time provision. So that kind of ratio, in a way didn't surprise me if we kind of think about the UK context, just
00:19:33
Speaker
looking at it kind of in terms of part-time provision not online but that's can sometimes be a useful proxy for that kind of thing. I think I have to say at the outset that my reaction is just this is great that you've got this because
00:19:50
Speaker
you know we do not have anything similar to that in the UK and we've just had a delay in our official data reporting should have been kind of end of January and it's now was meant to be May and was now going to be August so
00:20:06
Speaker
My first reaction in general to these reports was more, wow, I just feel like I'm walking through a desert and this is the kind of water that I need in terms of data for online education that's we're so kind of bereft of at the moment in the UK. Well, I would say a lot of credit to that really goes almost down to a single source. And it's when Learning House was sponsored it and Carol Aslanian, I think that's how you pronounce her name, is the researcher who put it together.
00:20:35
Speaker
And so I think a lot of the credit that we even have this comes from whoever put up that initial data program 12 years ago and it's continued. But yes, it's valuable. I'm glad we have it. OK, so the one thing I guess it doesn't surprise me, but it hits me, you know, between the eyes is just how many hours a week online students are working and just reinforcing the thing of it's not lots of times we talk about
00:21:05
Speaker
online education, we have non-traditional students, they're working adults. And like I talked about that as sort of like a phrase, they're in a different life situation. But for me, this really
Working While Studying Online: Challenges
00:21:16
Speaker
hits. It even goes down to how many hours a week are they working while they're taking the program? And I was surprised how many students are full time working while they're taking a program, which has a lot of implications.
00:21:30
Speaker
of time frame. It's not surprising that it's true, but having the hard numbers really hit you about how big of an issue this is. Yeah, and it's interesting.
00:21:44
Speaker
I mean, there's not been so much reporting on that in terms of online education over here, but there's been a lot of reporting around just in general students having to work a lot more. And sometimes I wonder how good we are at
00:22:01
Speaker
kind of accommodating that in the way that, you know, we offer education has been a few examples over here where universities have been kind of investigated for one of the better phrase. And, you know, you just read the way in which they deliver education. And then you compare that with
00:22:20
Speaker
what reports have shown around the people who are studying and all of the demands and the things that they have going on in our lives. And I know that, you know, on the whole online education, that's the audience usually in work and things are geared up around that, but that's not always factored in, I think sometimes in the way courses are delivered. So, you know, I think in a way this is probably just another reminder that that is a really key consideration for
00:22:48
Speaker
online education, but also actually increasingly other forms of education delivery, I think, too. There was an interesting paper out this week, an economics paper, which actually looked at Uber drivers also doing online learning, and the way that online learning and the amount of work sort of balanced off against each other. And it's sort of like a wonderful
00:23:09
Speaker
quasi-experiment or sort of a source of data where you can get sort of a lot of data around demand. But obviously most people aren't driving Uber. They have jobs that they have to show up for at a certain time and things like that. Is that really true with remote work these days? In other words, I mean, yeah, Uber drivers are somewhat unique, but there's a lot more work from home as well, which does give more flexibility in the time as opposed to I'm in the office.
00:23:39
Speaker
Yeah, that's interesting though because I think one of the things that's kind of been in my mind recently and I think it's sort of simulated by a few things that I read was also that that combination is an interesting one in that you're at home in front of a screen for work and then you're at home in front of a screen for study as well and so there's been various things coming out around sort of I guess maybe digital well-being and screen time and all that kind of thing.
00:24:06
Speaker
I think I think that's an interesting dimension
Impact of Remote Work and Learning on Well-being
00:24:09
Speaker
of it. Yes, it kind of arguably accommodates that more, but it's I'm not sure when you think about I had a meeting today with someone who was telling me about back to back to back teams meetings.
00:24:21
Speaker
If you're then jumping online, is that healthy? Have you got enough in the tank to do that? I think that's an interesting aspect of that calculation too. It means I'm long on Warby Parker eyeglasses. That's what we need to be interested in. I know we're jumping around, but this brings up one of the key findings from the Wiley voice of the online learner because
00:24:48
Speaker
And the setup would be the natural conclusion.
Preferences for Synchronous Online Sessions
00:24:51
Speaker
What I've seen so much of the industry doing is saying this is why we need to have asynchronous courses is that so many students are so busy and they've got to fit it into the work life. That's why we need asynchronous. You can't do synchronous. Well, Wiley, one of their key findings is 79 percent, 79 percent. That's a large majority.
00:25:14
Speaker
of surveyed online learners are open to a synchronous virtual learning session at least one time per course, reflecting last year's findings. And if you look at the actual data, it's sort of split between students who say, I would like a blend of synchronous and asynchronous over time. And then students are saying, hey, I'd be fine if we add in one or two session.
00:25:39
Speaker
But then Wiley continues, even as the pandemic subsides, learners' experiences with synchronous video technology such as Zoom or Teams, to cover the usage over there, appear to have inspired greater acceptance of synchronous learning opportunities in online programs. And this openness to synchronous learning offers an opportunity to alleviate learners' modality concerns.
00:26:06
Speaker
so that using synchronous could help address worries about unclear expectation and limited instructor and peer interactions. To me, and this is not the first year they found that, but to me this is one of the huge findings is that even though there's a lot of reason for asynchronous,
00:26:26
Speaker
there's also a lot of reason for synchronous and what you're not seeing are students saying, I'm too busy or I hated the pandemic usage of emergency remote and I never want to do synchronous sessions again. What you're seeing is students saying, Hey, we should be adding this to the toolbox, not as let's do lectures synchronously, but add it to the class to get more interactions.
00:26:53
Speaker
And going back and forth so to me this is a huge and little understood finding that we're finding in this area Yeah, and I think it's I think it's a really interesting one. It's really interesting drawing the link between You know the kind of I guess the rise of video conferencing through the pandemic and then a kind of a greater sense in which the people kind of want that I mean I I I think sometimes the
00:27:20
Speaker
the preference or the kind of restrictions around just being asynchronous only, and that being the thing that you do for online. I think sometimes people hide behind that a little bit. And actually, there is benefits for synchronous activity. I don't think it has to be an either-or. But I just think back to my early experiences. I remember cutting my teeth supporting an online program.
00:27:50
Speaker
where we had four synchronous sessions a week, I think, on that programme. We had basically the same one repeated for different time zones and I kind of sat in on a number of those sessions and they were great and really valuable and they weren't always brilliantly attended but sometimes they were. So I think it is one of those ones where
00:28:15
Speaker
you know, we could be a lot more open to that kind of thing in programs and not be so. I just think it's one of those things where there's an orthodoxy that's built up around it. And, you know, I think this is a good potential kind of reset for the way that we think about things. I'm struck by the number of people I've spoken to who have run online programs and the amount that they've talked about that people actually want to come in person as well.
00:28:42
Speaker
like they're in town or something and they want a tour of the campus or those kinds of things. I mean, it tends to be more enhanced in sort of things like online MBAs or things like that, but there's this sort of need to connect, I think is there. Though contrary to that, I wonder if there's a division, like I'm always struck by the sort of the choice you have in renting cars. Okay, so there's enterprise rent a car.
00:29:10
Speaker
where the whole thing is that they talk to you, they engage with you, that sort of thing versus if you have status or, you know, in any sort of a membership deal in something like national, you just walk, you don't have to talk to anybody, you get in the car and you drive away. The latter is so much more appealing to me. I do not want to interact with anybody.
00:29:30
Speaker
I think that's a really interesting point because I remember reading something a little while back. It was a research paper on an online program over here. And one of the things that really stuck out on me was a couple of learners who were just like, I just want to do my thing. I just want to study and just get on with it. And I don't want to go onto the forums. I don't want to have synchronous sessions. I'm kind of paraphrasing quite liberally. But it was that kind of thing. And again, I think that is another way in which
00:29:59
Speaker
particularly kind of this surface in the pandemic community building is really important and being present. And of course, all those things are valuable. But, you know, if we're I think this report talks about formats not being one size fits all, but online learners aren't one size fits all. There are some that, you know, that are quite happy to just get on with with things. And I think in our in the orthodoxy that's built up around online learning, I think we forget that sometimes.
00:30:28
Speaker
Well, keep in mind that this observation came from the person who detest hugging and thinks that should be, should be banned. So I was at the ASU conference. I was meeting with Julian Thompson. He's from United Negro College Fund. They're doing the HBCUV. He's a hugger. And so when I went to him and he's like, oh, no, don't give me a side hug. Give me a real hug.
00:30:52
Speaker
And he's like, no, take your time. So he's like just a very warm, outgoing person. I said, I've got to get you together with Morgan and see it's like matter and anti-matter and see what's going to happen from that, that implosion. I really value that insight because me and Morgan have not met in real life. So I'm not going to go in for the hug. So that's good insight. Good insight.
00:31:14
Speaker
Yeah, that's my number one advice for her. But I will say that I think the key to me, well, we've mentioned two keys. One is not all online learners are the same. And what's so value about these reports is you're hearing from them as you actually hear different perspectives. But the other thing is where the synchronous is a huge opportunity is connectedness. And not just I feel good and I want to be in some
00:31:41
Speaker
Hokey Forum but like they talked about setting expectations. Well let me understand what's needed in the course. I want to be able to ask my instructor some questions and hear them talk about it or I want to have some ability to interact on the content with either my peer students or with things but
00:32:02
Speaker
Don't interpret it, I don't think you guys are, but don't interpret it as traditional online lecture for synchronous learning. And don't interpret it as like quasi activities that make you feel good, but give people opportunities to connect as I think a lot of what's happening in this area.
00:32:20
Speaker
Yeah, I think there's interesting ways of thinking about that. One of the things that my wife does periodically that doesn't really resonate with me, but it's kind of online co-working.
00:32:33
Speaker
you know, where there might be a small group of people and maybe a large group of people, but you're kind of working and you're all kind of on some kind of video conferencing platform. And I'm not sure that that's for everybody, but it's an interesting dimension and flavor to that idea of, you know, being connected in some way in order to kind of, you know, just discuss things and raise swings and ask questions. I'm not sure how much that's been taken on by those in online education.
00:33:01
Speaker
And I just get the feeling that's not your thing either, guys, but maybe just from your expressions. But it could be interesting for some programs. We are not necessarily representative of the broad market. Let's put it that way. And so here's another finding from Wiley that I think is worth going to. This year, 42% of respondents said they previously enrolled in college level degree or certificate programs they didn't complete.
00:33:29
Speaker
studies of traditional higher ed students reflect this finding. Nearly 40% of first-time, full-time freshmen at two-year institutions left school from 2019 to 2020.
Online Education for Non-Completers
00:33:41
Speaker
Basically, there's a huge non-completer population, and a lot of people in online learning allowed many of these former non-completers to return and complete their programs.
00:33:53
Speaker
And they're motivated to do that in very pragmatic terms. Generally, online programs provide greater access for students who've been previously left behind. Nearly half, 44% of returning non-completers, identify as first-generation college students. And these students are more likely to note struggles with the admissions processes.
00:34:18
Speaker
And then they go on to some recommendations based on this finding. But just the giving the opportunity for non-completers to finish a degree and that demographically a lot of that subsection, our first generation college students is striking to me. And I think it's important both in terms of how you service them, but how you think of the role of online learning. Anything stand out to you from that finding?
00:34:48
Speaker
I was struck by the people coming back to finish. Like, you know, I think that's a really important sort of finding and a good thing to bear in mind about online learning because it is a huge problem in the US, you know, 40% with some college, no degree and a way to actually get them over that hump.
00:35:09
Speaker
So are you really going to avoid the Education Department's stance on online learning and how it contrasts with this? I was waiting for this. Sorry. Yeah, you know, they're fighting the battles of 15 years ago when online was very different and they haven't sort of kept pace because they don't have anybody that works on online learning in the Education Department or
00:35:33
Speaker
in the activist organizations that inform it so yeah they need to get up to speed on this you know that different people take online than go on campus and it's often just a question of what is accessible so yeah completion rates are going to be lower online but it's also a question of who's going into it and it's a way of increasing equity I just also yeah you're getting me mad here again so
00:36:02
Speaker
I was just a little bit surprised to not hear you bring that up. Yeah, I was going into my safe and calm space for a while. You successfully dragged me out of it. Thanks for that. Okay, I'm happy. Neil, any thoughts? Well, my main thought really is that I think this is a really positive thing. I think sometimes often these things are framed in a negative way. Sometimes people just don't get through and actually this is a really compelling
00:36:30
Speaker
reason why our institutions should consider online because it just, you know, I often reflect on the kind of the slightly odd and perverse debates around, you know, online versus on campus. But for me, it's not really a kind of an adversarial thing. This is a form of education that, you know, provides access for certain people and higher education should be about that.
00:36:57
Speaker
It doesn't have to be about an either or. And so I think, you know, people, for whatever reason, life gets in the way or things happen and they don't complete things. And this is a great way of people being able to do that and a really positive thing. So I think that's my reflection. And I think this is something that, you know, some of our institutions should take on board a little bit more than they do, to be honest. Well, this also gets to the value of these surveys, but also maybe that there should be more people reading them.
00:37:27
Speaker
So Morgan, with your contacts within Arnold Ventures and within the Department of Education, you should help them read these surveys. You're poking the bear, Phil. Yeah. OK, I've already poked. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:37:44
Speaker
Now, the other thing is it's very pragmatic in online education, even at the undergraduate level. So one of the things to understand is that when people take an online program, usually they have a purpose. So one of the things looking at the education dynamics, what are their career objectives and their top ones like to start a new career to earn more money.
00:38:08
Speaker
And that's not just a graduate school. 45% of undergraduates said that was their top issue. 40% of graduate students said it was their top issue. And then there was also, to start a new career, more aligned with my interest. 23% of undergraduate students said that. 21% of graduate online students said that.
00:38:29
Speaker
And then there is a little bit smaller amount, which is to get my first professional salary job, 13% and 9% or getting promotions. So there's sort of a change. It's very pragmatic quite often for online students, greater so than on-campus students. But it's sort of interesting to me talking about
00:38:54
Speaker
as a tool to do a career change.
Online Learning and Career Changes
00:38:56
Speaker
It's like, hey, what I'm doing, it's not quite working. Use online education to shift, something more aligned to my needs and my values, and for better economic reasons, long term. So that really struck me, not just that it's pragmatic, but the changing career aspect of it.
00:39:16
Speaker
And I don't know that that is specific to online because I mean, we don't have data, but just if you think about people who have gone back to university or college to do a second degree, I mean, everybody I know that has done that has been because they wanted a specific kind of career that they did it. You know, my friend's wife went back, she had an undergraduate degree in political science. She went back and did a physical therapy degree, you know.
00:39:40
Speaker
my father-in-law went back to college after his PhD in Classics to get a librarian degree so that he could actually get a job because Classics is not a great preparation for a career, etc. So I think it's just in line with second degrees in general. I wonder if it speaks to a little bit of
00:40:03
Speaker
you know there is still, I still come across those kind of FAQs on online kind of websites of you know do employers kind of value online degrees or and maybe it speaks to if that was ever truly really the case a kind of a greater acceptance of online as a means of
00:40:26
Speaker
Changing career or developing in one's career. I don't know. Maybe i'm harping too back too far back to the past but I still see those Kind of things that seems to justify its value to an employer based on you studying online And perhaps this kind of yeah speaks of we've kind of moved past that There's a little bit of uh, also the element of with online learning. There's so much more data and reporting that's
00:40:52
Speaker
true, not just from these surveys, but from looking at learning outcomes. And so a lot of times we have a tendency to look at online education and say, well, here's a problem. But we don't have any of the same data for in-campus learning.
00:41:07
Speaker
I still think we should scrutinize online learning, but there is sort of a disparity. I want to bring up one other key topic while we have time on the podcast, and that gets to the importance of the cost of a program, which consistently comes up in both reports where they're looking at how did students choose which program to go to.
Convenience vs. Cost in Online Learning
00:41:27
Speaker
Well, first and foremost, there is the point of modality as first.
00:41:31
Speaker
students want online learning. That's what they're looking for. And if an online program is not available, but on campuses, that's a non-starter for most students. They're like, no, I'm looking for an online program. But within that field, there's a question of how important is cost. And one interesting finding from Wiley is they compared 2018 response to 2023 response. And there's been a change.
00:42:01
Speaker
In 2018, the largest question about choosing programs and what the tuition, the largest one was tuition for my preferred program is the lowest among the programs I evaluated, 28%.
00:42:17
Speaker
And essentially tied with it was people saying, tuition for my preferred program is higher than some, but the program's convenience and its format, schedule, and location are ideal to me. Fast forward to 2023, and there's a clear top priority, and it's that second one. Students increasingly are saying, OK, I'm willing to pay higher tuition than some. In other words, cost is not the only consideration.
00:42:45
Speaker
but the program's convenient is going to mean that I'm willing to pay a little bit more for a program to make it work. And then the other one is now second place. And it's much higher than the answer that saying tuition for my preferred program is higher than some, but the content is what I want. So two things for me, students are very price conscious, but that's not the only thing they're looking for.
00:43:13
Speaker
And the other main thing they're looking for is convenience. How do we fit this program into my life in terms of format, schedule, and location? And there's been a pretty big change in the past five years on increasing the importance of convenience over time.
00:43:31
Speaker
Yeah, that is interesting. I mean, it doesn't hugely surprise me because I think that just chimes with the way society's gone to a certain extent, but it's something to bear in mind for sure. I don't know whether that kind of cuts across what we were talking around synchronous learning or not, but I think it just reflects where we are more generally as a society around convenience. Well, one way I would tie it together, there is this consistent element of
00:44:00
Speaker
fitting an academic program within people's lives. And you can interpret that as making it too easy, but I interpret it more as there's a desire for more education and lifelong learning.
00:44:15
Speaker
as long as it's designed in a way that can fit within lifestyles. And that's the, not just an opportunity for institutions to make more money, that's the access question. If we really want to reach more students and help them from an educational standpoint, schools have to do an increasingly better job of fit it within their life and making it more convenient. And online education is sort of the vanguard of how we do that.
00:44:43
Speaker
Yeah, and I guess given where institutions are at, if they ever had the approach of we dictate the terms on which you engage with us, then that has to kind of change if institutions are inclined to think that way. I think you have to listen to where people are at and how they want to access education, not rigidly stick to the way it's always been done.
00:45:08
Speaker
And don't be so slow to change as well. I guess we're going beyond the survey pontificating, but things as simple as multiple starts per year.
00:45:19
Speaker
That's what students want. The data is so clear. If you want to be convenient, one of the most elemental things is you need to be able to start the program at multiple times within a year. Don't just say wait until September. Or wait on the highway, yeah. Yeah, and that's a case where I think higher education has just been way too slow to change. And it's also gets to, we're talking about the for-profits and the OPMs. That's one of the things they actually do.
00:45:48
Speaker
As they say, nope, from day one, we're going to do multiple starts per year. And little simple things like that, I think, are very important. And it's not just for a profit, Southern New Hampshire, Western governors, the at scale online programs do know this. Yeah, I found myself nodding with a lot of the high level recommendations, like mostly vigorously for the education dynamics report. And that was certainly one of them around the multiple entry points.
00:46:16
Speaker
Good. Well, these are great discussion, but also I really recommend any of our listeners and readers look at these surveys. And maybe we should even put it out into the newsletter as well, highlight these surveys again, because I think that just not just what they're saying, but the fact that you're hearing from students, the very fact that, as you had mentioned,
00:46:42
Speaker
You're in the desert and you finally have water to drink. There's some valuable insights and information from these, and I'm glad they're doing it. I'm glad they're doing it every year. So kudos to both Wiley and to Education Dynamics for doing this.
00:46:58
Speaker
Neil, we'll start up the UK branch of these surveys for next year. Yeah, look, I mean, if you could have a word and say, look, the UK is lovely, come over here, do a survey or two, we'll be very welcome. Okay, well, great. Hey, well, it's been great talking. Morgan, I know that you're doing your traveling, so I'm not sure if we're doing an episode. Are we recording next week while you're in Norway, pining among the fjords?
00:47:26
Speaker
Probably. Yeah, I certainly am not going to stop my fjord boat to record. That's such a shame because you could have battled it out with Phil in terms of the best podcast backdrop. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, that's a good point. Hey, well, then we look forward to talking to you guys again next week. Thanks.