Emerging Technology

Demand for liberal arts education has declined in recent years as students increasingly eye college programs that directly prepare them for jobs. But according to many tech and college experts, as businesses launch advanced AI tools or integrate such technology into their operations, liberal arts majors will become more coveted. 

That’s because employers will need people to think through the ethical stakes and unintended consequences of new technologies. Companies may also need people to help improve the written commands given to chatbots or resolve challenging customer service disputes that AI can’t handle. 

College leaders therefore need to take action as AI changes the workforce, scholars say. 

While robotics in the 1990s replaced many blue-collar jobs, AI will replace jobs that require college degrees, or even graduate degrees like attorney positions, predicted Ray Schroeder, a senior fellow at UPCEA. Schroeder estimates big changes will occur over the next three to four years.

“This is really a significant factor in employment and of course, those of us in higher education are monitoring it closely because we want to be able to give our students the skills that will enable them to thrive in this emerging workplace environment,” Schroeder said. 

The need for the liberal arts

ChatGPT and the large language models are predictive based on existing knowledge, said Cecilia Gaposchkin, a history professor at Dartmouth College. 

One could train a computer about the ideas of ethics, human morality and a basic sense of human dignity, but that kind of reasoning is instinctual for humans, Gaposchkin said. And the tools and capacity of AI will be subordinate to the decisions people make and their priorities, Gaposchkin said. 

While AI makes past knowledge available at one’s fingertips, liberal arts education trains students to creatively think, problem-solve, synthesize information, manage ambiguity, ask questions and come up with new ideas, Gaposchkin said. 

“To outsource the higher-level orders to an object that doesn’t have that ethical grounding trained by human reason is a dead end,” she said. 

There are many settings where people would like to use AI but the cost of failure is high, said Rebecca Willett, professor of statistics and computer science at the University of Chicago. That includes certain AI tools for healthcare, real estate, finance and criminal justice, she said. 

A 2023 study from Stanford University’s medical school, for instance, showed that AI tools regenerated debunked medical ideas that were racist and could lead to worsened health disparities for Black patients.  

And in 2016, ProPublica found software used by courts disproportionately labeled Black defendants as being at a higher risk of commiting a crime compared to White defendants. ProPublica, in its analysis, compared groups of defendants who did not commit a crime — throwing into question the fairness of a tool used to help with sentencing and parole decisions. 

People with strong liberal arts backgrounds will contribute with “not only the technical development of these tools, but also to thinking about, how should we approach them? And what are the trade-offs associated with the choices we might make?” Willett said. 

Liberal arts versus technical degrees

Students who earn degrees in liberal arts and humanities may actually have an advantage in the job market over those who specialize in STEM-based programming, argued Robert Gibson, director of instructional design at Wichita State University Campus of Applied Sciences and Technology.

That’s because liberal arts students could provide a more humanistic perspective on the technology, with an eye to ethics, privacy and bias, for example, Gibson added. 

“They don’t sort of wildly go off and promote the use of this technology without sort of stepping back and saying, ‘Maybe this is how we can look at this a little bit differently,’” Gibson said. 

Noting that employers are now posting job ads seeking workers with AI skills, Gibson also said AI is being used in marketing campaigns or customer relationship management systems by small businesses nationwide. That includes businesses ranging from art stores and business retailers to production companies that want workers who can wear two hats, he said. 

They want workers who are not only adept with using those technologies, but also who have customer service experience, or other human experiences required for their businesses, said Gibson.

Liberal arts students could also be instrumental in developing and operating AI chatbots. “Prompt engineering,” which programs chatbots to converse with users, is an English writing capability and requires adaptability and continuous learning, Schroeder said. 

Now AI can actually write code faster, and in many cases, better than humans can, Schroeder said. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projected the number of computer programming positions to decline 11% between 2022 and 2032. Companies will instead need a supervisor to troubleshoot what AI generates, Schroeder said.

“If you are in computer science and if you are coding, your job may be in jeopardy,” Schroeder said. 

Schroeder said he’s also seen an uptick in companies seeking applicants with interpersonal skills such as critical thinking, creativity, emotional intelligence, communication, collaboration and ethics. 

“We see those more and more often in position descriptions,” Schroeder said. “While they don’t specifically say liberal arts degrees — because it’s possible to obtain some of these skills outside of college — those are skills that we emphasize in the liberal arts.”

Willett said she does not believe liberal arts will replace all technical workers. Rather the two need to work hand in hand, she said. 

But between two candidates with backgrounds in data science, many employers will find the one with a liberal arts education “extremely attractive" as that allows the employees to contextualize the technical work they might be doing, Willett said. 

What should colleges do?

Roanoke College is among the liberal arts institutions having discussions about where AI fits into its curriculum, said Brian Reed, vice president for student success and the Roanoke Experience. 

Reed said he would like to see the small Virginia-based college create a place in its general education requirements for students to work with AI in intentional ways.

The emergence of AI will provide “a real renaissance for the humanities,” Reed said. But higher ed institutions, including liberal arts colleges, are often not great at explaining how critical thinking skills that students learn can be applied to technology like AI, Reed said. 

“Institutions have to be much more clear about the skills and competencies that the students gleaned from liberal arts in really straightforward language,” he said. 

A lot of higher education institutions are already starting to aggressively introduce programs or entirely new colleges around artificial intelligence, said Gibson. Institutions that are larger “thought leaders,” in particular, are poised financially for leadership to build those conversations around AI across disciplines, he said. 

Earlier this year, Arizona State University announced it has been incorporating generative AI into many of its English Department courses, allowing students to use the technology to, among other things, brainstorm topics, assist with research, and help edit their papers. 

Some smaller colleges are starting to have those conversations, although not as fast as Gibson said he would like. 

“This is still on the periphery,” he said. It’s harder for small colleges to implement wholesale change, like cross-disciplinary courses on AI, due to bureaucratic procedures that can slow down that process.

 

To prepare, Gibson said institutions need to start building into their liberal arts curriculum some conversations around the moral and societal implications of AI.

Reed said higher ed leaders would be doing a disservice to their liberal arts students if they are not having conversations about how they can help them embrace AI technology — so they become comfortable with it and know how to harness it in responsible and ethical ways. 

Liberal arts students will need to gain competency on the technical side, said Reed. But the emergence of AI will also require people who are “really thoughtful about: How [do] we prompt? Should we prompt in certain instances? How do we sort of filter bias? How do we see through phantom responses?”

Employers are significantly more likely to offer job interviews and higher salaries to job candidates with experience related to artificial intelligence, according to a new study published in the journal Oxford Economics Papers.

Specifically, college graduates with “AI capital” or business-related AI studies listed on their resumes and cover letters were far more likely to receive an interview invitation and higher wage offers.

“In the UK, AI is causing dramatic shifts in the workforce, and firms need to respond to these demands by upgrading their workforces through enhancing their AI skills levels,” study author Nick Drydakis, a professor of economics at Anglia Ruskin University in Cambridge, said in a statement.

As part of an experiment, researchers submitted fake applications to job vacancies, which included CVs from 21-year-old British college graduates with a degree. Some of the applicants had studied an “AI in business” module, which was mentioned in their cover letter for the job.

Researchers submitted a matched pair of male applicants — one with AI capital and one without — to 680 companies, resulting in 1,360 applications from men. In addition, he sent 1,316 similar applications from women to 658 companies.

Overall, men with AI capital received an interview invitation 54% of the time, while men without AI capital were asked to an interview 28% of the time. 

Similarly, women with AI capital received an interview invitation in half of cases, and those without AI capital were invited to an interview in 32% of cases.

At large firms, applicants with AI capital were 36 percentage points more likely to be invited to an interview than in small-to-medium firms.

Beyond that, men with AI capital were shortlisted for job offers with wages that were 12% higher, on average, and women with AI capital were offered interviews for jobs with wages that were 13% higher.

“Larger firms particularly valued AI capital, possibly because they tend to undergo more AI-based structural technological transformations and have greater capacity for innovation,” Drydakis said.

Many companies have an unbalanced “buy versus build” approach to AI and plan to recruit new talent to handle their AI adoption rather than upskill their existing workers, according to a report from The Adecco Group. Instead, leaders should use both approaches and train their workers in order to avoid skills gaps, the report explained.

As more companies look for AI-related talent, employers are struggling to find the right candidates and paying premiums to fill in-demand roles, according to a General Assembly report. Companies are using alternative ways to find and hire talent, with more than half of leaders reducing traditional educational requirements for open positions and hiring additional HR staff to acquire talent.

Among AI-savvy companies, leaders are moving past AI infatuation and making serious changes to their talent strategy, according to a Deloitte report. Most leaders who are now piloting or implementing AI at their organizations said they’re looking to change their talent strategies during the next two years, particularly around work processes and upskilling or reskilling employees.

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By Blackboard

Continuing education and online learning leaders gathered at the University Professional and Continuing Education Association (UPCEA) 2019 SUPER Regional Conference in Denver, Colorado to discuss big-picture strategies and opportunities to lead the way in serving professional, continuing and online learners.

This post summarizes the ideas and best practices identified by institutional leaders at the workshop around a central theme, strategic planning, and the five key areas to address if your institution aspires to be positioned for growth.

1. Leadership and structure within the institution: independent is ideal

Where continuing education (CE) sits within an organization can be a key ingredient for success. Online and continuing education leaders agreed that it's optimal to set up continuing and online educational units independently as their own division, providing services and leading innovation institution-wide.

Less ideally, CE can be centralized within a system or siloed within individual schools. In the case of units that are system-wide, CE teams find it challenging to effectively provide support, advocate for additional resources, and gain system-wide traction. In decentralized environments, leaders noted the duplication of resources and the sharing of best practices as challenges.

2. Stay ahead of market demand

Online and continuing education leaders have paved the way to growth and new revenue streams for many institutions. Online learning has now matured into an established part of higher education and the student experience. Now, it is important for CE leaders to understand where the market is headed—where is the next opportunity for online, professional, and continuing education? CE leaders cited micro-credentials and certificates (stackable for-credit or non-credit) as the next frontier for higher education. The growth of this smaller, bite-sized form of education is outpacing traditional forms and aligns directly with what both students' and employers' value. It's important to understand the idiosyncratic needs and aspirations of each institution's nontraditional and online students.

3. A self-funded model has many advantages

The funding model for CE at the institution is an important factor in the ability to scale and be successful. Many leaders agreed that the self-funded model of many continuing education units gives leadership the flexibility to operate outside of the traditional models of education, develop new and innovative services to support this evolving modality with nontraditional learners, and flexibility with resourcing and reinvestment to fuel growth.

4. Use empirical data to build a case for resources

The ability to invest in resources to achieve growth requires CE leaders make a compelling case to institutional leadership. Successfully building a case for added resources (e.g., staff, technology, marketing, support services) typically requires CE leaders to:

• Demonstrate how added resources will lead to added revenue (and/or enrollments). Showing how revenue is generated from additional resources requires CE leaders to make an educated guess or rely on partners to help forecast the potential market size and demand and correlate investment with growth. At Blackboard Student Services, we have helped institutions like Johns Hopkins Executive Education, Texas Tech University School of Continuing Studies, and Wichita State University Online build similar models and successfully secure resources that helped fuel growth.
• Provide competitive insights into how other successful institutions are resourced (what is their marketing spend, how they are staffed, what technology do they use, which partners do they use to provide additional support?).
• Conduct secret shopping and document findings to highlight opportunities to improve the student experience.

5. Internal collaboration is essential

Internal collaboration, just as much as autonomy, is a key determining factor of success. Successful CE divisions are often the innovation hub for most institutions and help pave the way for the future of education. Bring key stakeholders from across the institution together for an annual or biannual summit to:

• Share mutual successes, resources, and learnings.
• Demonstrate progress and shine a light on innovation.
• Bring students or employers to the table to show other institutional leaders or constituents about their experiences and preferences.
• Develop internal-facing marketing materials such as videos to highlight their approach, reinforce the value CE provides, and continue to get buy-in institution-wide.
• Build relationships.

Innovative technology solutions

Many of today's students are far from traditional, meaning institutions cannot continue deploying traditional service models and expect to drive demand and increase or even maintain retention. Through open and innovative technology solutions and platform strategies, institutions are able to ensure their ecosystem is scalable and sustainable, helping to keep pace with the ever-evolving needs of their programs and users.

Global ed tech venture funding reached a low not seen since 2014, topping out at just $580 million during Q1 2024, according to an analysis from global market data platform HolonIQ.

The past decade has seen $80 billion in venture capital flow into the space, with the global market spiking to a whopping $16 billion in 2020 and $20.8 billion in 2021 during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Overall, ed tech venture funding in 2023 reached just $2.97 billion, down 86% from 2021’s all-time high.

The boom in demand during that period happened as school districts and colleges scrambled for digital platforms and solutions for remote learning. At the same time, the space is being impacted by the artificial intelligence hype cycle — or the level of comfort and risk associated with adoption during a technology’s life cycle stages, from initial development to commercial availability to its eventual decline.

Both of these factors are making it difficult to interpret long-term trends, the analysis said. As a result, it’s expected that there will be less startup funding to go around for the “next wave of ‘over-promise’ and ‘hard-to-deliver’ projects” than there was five to 10 years ago.

Another analysis earlier this year from venture capital firm Reach Capital predicted that ed tech “may not be far away” from seeing an investment influx similar to previous years amid the growing embrace of AI, as that space raised nearly $50 billion in funding in 2023 across all industries.

In the U.S. specifically, the HolonIQ analysis found Q1 2024 ed tech venture funding capped off at around $300 million, leaving significant ground to cover between the $1 billion total for 2014 and the peak of $8.3 billion in 2021.

Last year, a HolonIQ analysis predicted global venture funding in ed tech would return to pre-pandemic levels in 2023 after falling 49% to $10.6 billion in 2022 from a record $20.8 billion in 2021.

CHICAGO — While instructors and administrators weigh if and how to incorporate artificial intelligence into coursework, the emerging technologies pose broader existential questions about the role of higher education. 

Generative AI systems such as ChatGPT are poised to disrupt white collar and professional work, according to Daniel Susskind, an economics professor at King's College London, who has written a handful of books on tech’s impact on work. That, in turn, could have important ripple effects on colleges, which have long served as the training camps for those workers, he said.

Susskind spoke at a keynote event April 15 during the Higher Learning Commission’s annual conference in Chicago. He pointed to automation’s revolutionary impact on industries like agriculture and manufacturing — which has created huge gains in output with far fewer jobs — and to more recent advances in fields such as medical diagnostics. 

“We tend to think of the work that blue collar workers do as being relatively routine, relatively straightforward, relatively process-based, relatively easy,” Susskind said. “Conversely, we think of what white collar workers do as requiring subtler faculties — things like creativity, judgment, empathy.”

 AI has yet to replicate those functions of the human mind. But it doesn’t necessarily need to when trying to solve some of the problems in professions such as medicine, accounting, architecture and law.

Blindness to this state of things amounts to what Susskind called the AI “fallacy.” That, he said, is “the mistaken assumption that the only way to develop systems that perform tasks at the level of human beings is to somehow copy, replicate or imitate the way the human beings perform that task.” 

AI doctors, lawyers and accountants

With massive increases in computing power and data storage, AI can perform some of the same tasks through the blunt forces of processing and analysis that higher ed has traditionally helped to hone in humans.

“So a whole realm of activity that, until very recently, we thought was out of reach of these technologies turns out not to be,” Susskind said. “And it's often concentrated in the world of white collar work.”

The best response to this potential disruption is training and education, according to Susskind. 

This could mean focusing education on preparing students for tasks that can’t yet be automated or to outperform AI systems. 

“There are large areas of human activity that lie beyond the reach of even the most capable technologies,” Susskind said, pointing to interpersonal communication, judgment and empathy, among other areas. 

Colleges could also focus on training students to build the AI systems that might take over more human activity. 

Higher ed responds to AI advances

Many higher education officials are anticipating AI’s potential to change the sector. HLC devoted multiple panels to the topic at its conference, and the accreditor placed AI — and the “promises, opportunities, and threats” it poses — at the top of its annual higher ed trends list for 2024.

For institutions, AI could be incorporated into teaching, learning and personalized instruction and in all the areas of the enterprise that other organizations are looking at deploying it, HLC noted in its forecast.

At one of the conference panels, officials with Grand Canyon University described how they developed an institution-wide AI strategy tied to its mission. 

The Arizona for-profit started its process with a committee, as so many colleges do. Its early stages focused on brainstorming and surveying stakeholders to see what their needs were. 

That process churned out ideas such as using AI to develop curriculum content and monitor real-time student feedback. The committee went on to build a strategic model for how AI might be used at Grand Canyon, as well as to help develop resources for staff and faculty.

“No matter what decisions we make around AI — and those will change — and no matter if our perspective shifts around AI, the core of who we are as an institution is not going to shift,” Meredith Critchfield, dean of Grand Canyons's college of education, said at the panel April 15. 

The U.S. Department of Education is “concerned” about the impact a potential financial failure of 2U and other online program management companies would have on students, an agency spokesperson told Higher Ed Dive in a statement April 4.

The statement was in response to an open letter April 2 from advocacy groups — the Student Borrower Protection Center, Project on Predatory Lending, and Center for American Progress — calling on the department and Consumer Finance Protection Bureau to protect students from what they described as a “looming collapse” of 2U.

In a published statement on April 5, 2U said that the groups’ predictions about an imminent shutdown “are unequivocally false and represent a blatant attempt to confuse students and the public.”

The online program management sector has increasingly come under financial pressure, and 2U is no exception. After a meteoric rise over the last decade, the company now faces falling annual revenues, long-building losses and looming debt maturities. 

Documents filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in February and early March included “going concern” warnings, indicating there is “substantial doubt” about 2U's ability to keep operating if it can’t refinance its debt or raise capital. The March filing noted specifically that 2U might have to file for bankruptcy or liquidate — among other, less dramatic outcomes — if it can't cover its debt obligations.

As of Dec. 31, the company’s total debt stood at $904.7 million. With a long history of operating losses, 2U has racked up an accumulated deficit of almost $1.5 billion. The company shrank its losses in 2023, but its loss from operations remained steep, at nearly $226 million. Meanwhile revenue declined by about 1.8% for the year to $946 million. 

While it struggles financially and aims for a turnaround, 2U disclosed Thursday plans for cash retention bonuses for its top executives in lieu of their typical bonuses and stock awards, including more than $2.3 million for its CEO and $1.2 million for its CFO.

The student borrower advocacy groups pointed to financial stresses, as well as litigation and negative media stories about 2U’s practices, in its letter to regulators. 

On Tuesday, the advocacy groups warned of a “sizable impact” on students if 2U fails financially. 

“It is critical that your agencies work together to create a plan to support students financially impacted by 2U’s looming collapse,” they wrote in their letter to regulators.

In its Friday statement, 2U acknowledged the “need to improve our financial position” and noted that it is working to address its capital structure. It said it is confident it can “negotiate more favorable terms with our financial stakeholders between now and the end of the year, resolving the going concern disclosure.”

The company added — in bold —  that it is not “considering any options that would cause 2U to cease operations or end programs for students currently enrolled in a program” that it supports.

The advocacy groups recommended regulators gather student enrollment and loan data from online programs run with the help of 2U and begin preparations for student relief, such as loan discharges. They also recommended reaching out to students about their options and eligibility for loan relief, among other actions.

The Education Department spokesperson said the agency “is concerned about the impact that a potential failure of any OPM, including 2U, would have on institutions’ continued program delivery for students.” 

The spokesperson added: “The Department encourages all institutions contracting with an OPM they use for program delivery that is facing financial challenges to take steps to ensure minimal disruption for students in the event that OPM is unable to provide the services it promised.  The Department views institutions as responsible for ensuring students are not harmed by any potential failure of an OPM.”

Despite the financial travails, 2U executives have expressed optimism. For the most recent quarter, revenue increased 8.3% year over year to $255.7 million, a figure that included $54.6 million from “the mutually negotiated exit of certain degree programs.”

“We need to adopt a shrink-to-grow mindset and take the necessary measures to date, to set ourselves up for success long term,” CEO Paul Lalljie told analysts in February. Lalljie took over as 2U's top executive after co-founder Chip Paucek stepped down from the position in November.

2U CFO Matt Norden, who is also the company’s chief legal officer, addressed the going concern language in February, telling analysts that the company had a “relatively strong liquidity position.” He also said the company had efforts in the works to free up working capital that would give the company a “strong foundation to operate the business going forward” and help it meet the service and quality expectations of the company’s university clients.

When the AI-powered ChatGPT made its big debut, higher education leaders naturally questioned how their students would use high-tech tools like it to write essays and research papers for class.

Just a short time later, we know that’s only a microscopic way that AI is impacting higher education. There’s a bigger question that universities should answer: How can we help students succeed and lead in a complex, AI-powered world after graduation?

I believe the answer is life skills — the kind that outlast and extend beyond inevitable technological changes. We should stop fearing AI and instead teach students to be resilient, self-reliant, compassionate and capable of sound judgment.

We won’t shortchange students on technical skills, but this won’t be enough in the face of AI. AI will eliminate more traditional technical jobs and drive major disruption — some positive, some much less so — in the way we live and work.

Universities must ensure they’re teaching the following skills to students.

Judgment and problem solving

A fast-moving technology with a reputation for making significant errors requires oversight by people with strong critical thinking skills.

I recently had the pleasure of interviewing famed theoretical physicist Michio Kaku. I asked him if it is possible for us to someday have artificial wisdom since we already have artificial intelligence. His answer was telling.

“Intelligence is more than just being smart. It’s being able to put the data together and come up with some conclusions,” Kaku said, “and then from the conclusions calculate the consequence of these conclusions. That gets us into wisdom, and artificial intelligence does not go that far. It simply allows you to compute.”

Experience is the best way to help students hone their judgment and problem-solving abilities. 

We need to deliver more experiences sooner for every major and every type of student pursuing a degree. When a student has opportunities to solve a real-world problem, implement a solution to a community issue or create something that betters the lives of others, they flex and build these abilities.

Campuses usually have laboratories and real-world studios where students conduct research, produce creative works, master new technologies, invent new ways of doing things and encounter scenarios that will occur time and time again in the workforce.

We need to give all students access to these resources as well as the freedom they need to be intellectually curious. AI lacks the human element we look for in leaders. Our priority is to develop the entire student, making them well-rounded, global citizens.

Empathy and emotional intelligence

A society going through the type of disruption that AI will bring requires strong leaders who have the ability to put themselves in other people’s shoes and lend a hand to those in need. 

In 2022, our university’s Survey Research Center questioned 500 executives at organizations with 2,500 employees or more to examine what leaders are looking for when they hire candidates, as well as what qualities employees need to get promoted and continue to grow in their careers. 

The survey confirmed what I have always believed: People skills are in high demand and harder to develop than technical skills. If you consider what Kaku said, that’s even more true in an AI-driven world. AI can guide the technical aspects of something, but only humans can frame it with empathy and emotional wisdom.

A majority of executive leaders, 64%, said they would be more hesitant to hire a new college graduate who lacked emotional intelligence than a person who lacked technical skills. That isn’t surprising when you consider that an even larger majority of executives said it is much easier to develop an employee’s technical skills than their personal initiative and coachability.

Another way to look at the importance of having life skills, such as emotional intelligence, is to consider how you feel in your doctor’s office. 

Even though doctors are highly trained, they know that bedside manners are still an important tool. When you visit a doctor, their ability to listen and communicate with you matters as much as their technical skills, if not more. You might not return to a doctor who ignores your concerns and fails to answer your questions when you seek clarity about a medical issue. 

We are failing our students if we teach them that life skills are no longer valued in the AI age.

Resilience and openness to change

We need to equip students with confidence to trust their own ability to embrace positive change and adapt to negative implications. Technology isn’t going to stand still, and neither can our students. 

Disruptive innovation expert Daniel Burrus recently gave a presentation to our faculty about the future. He gave the example of two physicians — one who uses a medical AI platform to help serve patients and another who does not. He noted that most of us would have a lot more confidence in a doctor who is willing to learn and adopt new healthcare tools and technologies in pursuit of better care, as opposed to one stuck in their ways and scoffing about change.

New technologies might mean new routines, new economic realities, the rise of new opportunities and the sunset of others. College graduates need the ability to embrace the positive and ride out the difficulties that come with disruption.

We’ve entered difficult times, and our institutions must be able to strategically adapt in a way that benefits our students for the rest of their lives. Prioritizing their critical life skills is actually our most important mission. 

A majority of college students, around 70%, are now enrolled in at least one online course, signaling a promising shift that could benefit learners who have historically been let down by traditional education models.

Most students are readily embracing this tech-enabled future, according to new research from WGU Labs, the research and innovation arm of Western Governors University. 

The organization surveyed more than 3,000 students across nine diverse institutions including community colleges, private and public four-year institutions, and primarily online, not-for-profit colleges. At least 80% of respondents agreed that online and hybrid are effective formats of learning. More than 70% agreed that ed tech not only makes their courses more engaging, but also helps them more effectively learn course material. 

First-generation learners were especially positive about the shift online. More than three-quarters of these students, 76%, indicated they would be interested in taking online courses in the future, nearly ten percentage points higher than their peers with college-educated parents.

But there’s a disconnect. Despite growing interest and potential for the medium to revolutionize learning and break down barriers, too many online courses offer a lackluster learning experience, resulting in poor outcomes that can leave vulnerable students worse off.

Not all online learning is created equally

Relative to their peers, first-generation students are less likely to reach graduation. This signals that institutions are failing to meet the needs of a more diverse student body. While far from a silver bullet, the ability to learn anytime, anywhere — and often for a fraction of the cost — can be particularly impactful for these individuals who are more likely to juggle full-time jobs, come from low-income families, and provide for dependents while pursuing their degrees. 

Their unique experiences may also render them more open to innovative, tech-enabled models. Whereas college-educated parents often project their own aspirations and preconceived notions of what college means onto their children, first-generation students are immune.

Despite the potential for online learning to enhance the student experience and drive equitable outcomes, many institutions have historically deployed tech primarily to mitigate revenue shortfalls and meet enrollment targets, often replicating face-to-face instruction via antiquated web-conferencing tools and demanding full price tags that leave students saddled in debt. 

Programs like these are a reminder that online learning is a tool — not a means to an end. And that end should ultimately be to deliver value to students.

The future of learning is online, but higher ed leaders won’t meet this moment without a deliberate online strategy. To that end, leaders should ensure online courses and programs include the following key components:

• Intentional design: Online learning should be purposefully designed for the virtual environment, removing artificial constraints that exist in traditional models of learning — for instance synchronous virtual lectures, and fixed-pace schedules — and leveraging digital tools that have been strategically selected for their ability to enhance learning.
• Excellent teaching: Whereas in-person learning requires that faculty live near campus, programs that deploy online learning have the benefit of sourcing the best teachers in the world. But it’s not enough to identify instructors with expertise in teaching; faculty must also be given sufficient time, resources, input, and training to effectively use ed tech. 
• Engaging experience: Innovations in ed tech can enable faculty to pull from diverse sources of media and content, leverage motivational techniques, and engage their students in ways that are difficult to replicate in-person at scale via virtual labs, peer-to-peer interaction and practice environments.
• Personalized learning: Thanks to advances in artificial intelligence, readily available data on how students are doing can empower faculty to adapt and personalize learning materials and experiences through timely interventions. At WGU, for instance, we use machine intelligence to better understand our students’ momentum at a given moment, drawing on indicators such as how they’re interacting with learning resources, the extent to which they’re engaging with faculty, and how they’re progressing. By identifying when students have less momentum and are in greater need of support, faculty can design personalized interventions at the moments when students need them most.
• Valuable credentials: Technology should be used to deliver an affordable learning experience. But affordability is only part of the equation. For students to derive real value, learning experiences must ultimately lead to economic mobility.

Every learner deserves the opportunity to earn a credential that can transform their lives, families and communities, and online learning can indeed be a powerful tool for expanding access to underserved student populations, including first-generation students. 

But access without attainment is an empty promise. Leaders from long-respected, brick-and-mortar colleges and innovative online universities need to think differently about educating and supporting a diverse student body, whether through investing in new supports and wraparound services, or by embracing technology.

Done right, online learning can be a powerful vehicle for connecting individuals to opportunity. But if leaders aren’t careful, tech-enabled instruction — just like its in-person counterpart — has the potential to leave underserved students behind.

In fall 2023, CEOs of major education companies  briefed analysts on their most recent financial quarters. And some of them dropped major news during earnings calls. 

That includes education company 2U, which announced it was parting ways with the University of Southern California — one of its oldest and largest clients — on most degree programs they worked on together. 

Meanwhile, the CEO of Grand Canyon Education accused the U.S. Department of Education of retaliating against the company by slapping a $37.7 million fine on its largest client, Grand Canyon University. Brian Mueller, who also serves as the university’s president, said the institution has endured government retaliation due to an ongoing lawsuit against the department. 

Company leaders also gave insight into how the ed tech and for-profit college sectors are faring. Below, we break down three trends playing out across some major public companies. 

Education companies double down on degree programs

Officials at Coursera, a high-profile MOOC platform, touted gains they made in 2023’s third quarter. That includes adding 6.5 million registered users to its platform, bringing the total to around 136 million. 

Coursera’s lesser-known business — which hosts online degree programs — also saw growth. Its degree segment rose to $11.7 million, up 13% from the year before due to rising enrollment. 

In total, more than 20,000 students are enrolled in degrees on Coursera’s platform. 

During an October call, Coursera CEO Jeff Maggioncalda said the company planned to focus on offerings called “pathway degrees.” 

These programs allow Coursera users to count open courses they complete on the platform toward credit for degree programs. Students can also be admitted to degree programs based on their performance in these courses, Maggioncalda said. 

Coursera recently announced it had built several of these pathways to master’s degrees offered by Illinois Tech. Coursera users can now complete professional certificates offered on the website — including from Google, IBM and Meta — as credit toward these programs. 

2U is also continuing to focus on its degree business, although revenue was flat for this segment in the third quarter, at $137.6 million. 

Company officials remain optimistic about the degree business. 2U announced this month that it struck deals with six colleges to help them launch and run 50 new degree programs, most of which will debut next year. 

Alternative credential offerings were a mixed bag

During the third quarter, Coursera’s overall revenue skyrocketed 21% year over year to $165.5 million. Officials attributed part of the increase to strong demand for professional certificates on its platform, including new offerings from Microsoft and Amazon. 

Coursera also expanded its work with the University of Texas System by giving its 240,000-plus students and affiliates access to the company’s Career Academy, a skills training platform for colleges and companies. The academy provides access to over 40 professional certificates. 

“These certificates are being integrated into the curriculum and often offered as career electives for credit for students pursuing traditional degrees,” Maggioncalda said last month. 

Udemy, another MOOC platform, also saw increases during the third quarter. Its total revenue increased to $184.7 million, up 17% compared to the year before. 

Most of the company’s gains were driven by its Udemy Business segment, which gives employers access to online courses to help train their workers. Revenue for this segment jumped 30% compared to the year before, rising to $109.1 million. 

However, 2U’s alternative credentials didn’t fare as well.

The company’s alternative credential revenue fell to $92.1 million in the third quarter, down 3% from a year prior. 

The company attributed the decline to lower enrollment in its coding boot camps, though 2U CEO Chip Paucek said other programs — such as those in data — saw growth. 

“Coding itself is where the problem was,” Paucek said. “We think that that is related to coding jobs in the market, and I'm sure influenced some by AI.”

Enrollment ticks up at for-profit colleges

Several public companies operate for-profit colleges, offering a glimpse of how these types of institutions are performing. During the most recent financial quarter, many of those colleges reported big enrollment gains.

That includes American Public Education, which runs the American Public University System, Rasmussen University, the Hondros College of Nursing and Graduate School USA. All but one of those institutions saw gains, helping boost the company’s revenue to $150.8 million for the quarter. 

American Public University System, which encompasses two for-profit colleges, accounts for most of the company’s enrollment, with roughly 90,000 students. Its net course registrations increased 8% compared to the year before, according to the company’s estimates. 

However, Rasmussen University — which has 13,500 students — saw a 10% decline. 

Adtalem Global Education also experienced enrollment growth. The company, which owns Walden and Chamberlain universities, saw a 1.9% year-over-year enrollment increase, bringing headcounts to over 80,000 students. 

Strategic Education, the owner of Strayer and Capella universities, is another for-profit college giant. Enrollment at those two institutions rose above 82,000 students during the third quarter, up 9.9% compared to the same period last year. 

Grand Canyon Education doesn’t own any for-profit colleges. 

However, the educational services company’s biggest client is Grand Canyon University, which the U.S. Department of Education treats as a for-profit college for Title IV financial aid purposes. The company takes 60% of the university’s tuition and fee revenue. 

The university’s enrollment rose to around 118,000 students by the end of September, up 6.6% compared to the year before. 

Perdoceo Education Corp. was an exception. 

Both of its institutions, American InterContinental University System and Colorado Technical University, had third-quarter enrollment declines. The drop was especially dramatic at the university system, whose enrollment plummeted 34.2% year over year to 10,000 students.

As technology has grown more sophisticated, algorithms have slowly crept into more and more operations on college campuses. 

Take admissions, where some colleges are using artificial intelligence to help them decide whether to admit a student. While that practice is still somewhat rare, four-year institutions are more commonly using algorithms to help with another admissions decision — how much aid to offer already admitted students. 

If an institution has limited resources, education experts say, an algorithm can help optimize how aid is distributed. Others say the practice could cause issues for students and even open institutions up to potential legal risk. 

But both skeptics and proponents agree that using an algorithm successfully — and fairly —  depends on institutions and vendors being thoughtful. 

What is an enrollment algorithm?

Enrollment management and aid algorithms are essentially tools that predict the likelihood that a student will enroll in an institution after being offered admission. But admissions teams can also move the needle on that likelihood — by doing things like offering scholarships and other aid packages. 

“The concept is to award financial aid in a way that results in the maximum total amount of net tuition revenue for the institution,” said Nathan Mueller, principal at EAB, an education consulting firm, and architect of the company’s financial aid optimization work. 

Enrollment goes up as institutions offer more scholarship aid, but revenue per student decreases. 

“What we’re helping them find is the place in between, where they’re giving the best mix of institutional financial aid to raise enrollment to the point where if they gave one more dollar, even though they would increase enrollment, they would start losing that institutional revenue,” Mueller said.  

At the individual college level, that process means determining an admitted student’s likelihood of attending and how sensitive they will be to changes in price. 

The inputs for each algorithm can differ, depending on an institution's goals. 

Algorithms can, for example, take into account applicant information, such as grades, test scores, location and financial data. Or they may also look at an applicant’s demonstrated interest in a college — whether they have visited campus, interacted with an admissions officer or answered optional essay prompts. 

EAB counsels its own clients to not use those interest markers in aid determinations.

"We do look at some of those things, as ways of understanding how engaged a student is and understanding their price sensitivity,” Mueller said. “It absolutely has predictive value, but from our vantage point it crosses into the area of something that's really not an appropriate mechanism to determine how much aid a student receives.”

In the past, Mueller said, many colleges committed to cover 100% of a student’s demonstrated need. But in the early ‘90s, Congress changed how need analyses were conducted — making many families appear needier — and reduced funding for Pell Grants. As a result, fewer colleges believed they could afford to make that pledge, he said.

While some institutions do not use algorithms to help determine aid, their goals are often similar to those that do, Mueller said. Today EAB works with about 200 clients — most of them private colleges — on financial aid optimization.

Careful consideration

Vendors emphasize that the algorithms they offer aren’t just mathematical models that run and spit out a result to be followed exactly. They allow an admissions team to try out different aid strategies and see how those might change things like the diversity, gender balance and academic profile of their incoming class. 

“The criticisms about algorithms or about artificial intelligence specifically have been around this idea that they are sort of running loose on their own and don’t have overriding guardrails that reference institutional philosophies or strategic goals,” Mueller said. “We would never want anyone to just follow a mathematical exercise without any consideration of the other key strategic aspects.”

But Alex Engler, a senior fellow at The Brookings Institution said he’s skeptical about whether institutions are appropriately contemplating how they're using these tools. 

Because algorithms are frequently trained on data resulting from human decision-making, they often show evidence of human bias and lead to different outcomes for different subgroups. 

In financial aid, that could be consequential. Engler said he’s unsure that the college officials working with algorithms day to day have the technology and data expertise to feel confident challenging the algorithms. 

“Sometimes universities aren’t or can’t sufficiently evaluate and adjust the algorithms and really be self-critical in their impacts,” he said. 

For instance, some students may choose to enroll in a college if given certain aid packages — even if it’s not the best financial choice for them. And students who are burdened with high costs are unlikely to persist and graduate, leading to poor outcomes for both them and their colleges. 

Wes Butterfield is senior vice president of enrollment at Ruffalo Noel Levitz, an educational consultancy firm that also offers aid products to colleges. He said algorithms and aid strategies can take persistence and graduation into account. 

“What the campus is trying to figure out is, how do I provide a fair amount of aid that will allow a student not only to enroll, but I think more and more campuses are also thinking about that retention piece, what is the proper amount of aid to allow a student to walk across a stage,” Butterfield said.

Ideally, he said, he would like to see similar aid packages offered across institutions. 

“Students should be enrolling because of mission fit, because of the major, because they like the extracurricular activities,” Butterfield said. “I’m trying to neutralize aid as a factor.”

Human touch

Legally speaking, these algorithms don’t require human touch. In the European Union, citizens have the right to have a human being review decisions of major consequence, like the terms of a loan. 

But that right doesn’t exist in the U.S., said Salil Mehra, a law professor at Temple University. Mehra said that misuse of aid algorithms could potentially open institutions up to antitrust liability. 

In August, the University of Chicago settled an antitrust suit alleging 17 universities of price-fixing by illegally colluding on their financial aid policies. 

But Mehra said it's also theoretically possible for institutions to collude without express intent, such as by using the same consultants who are then using very similar formulas with each client. 

“It might, as a result, have a similar effect as an explicit agreement in reducing the amount of financial aid that students with need would receive,” Mehra said. “That’s actually potentially scary or concerning because it would be difficult to discover if that was happening.” 

In general, higher education is facing legal scrutiny that didn’t exist before the 2019 Varsity Blues scandal, in which wealthy parents paid to have their children gain entry to top-ranked colleges. Colleges would be wise to stay abreast of ways they might be exposing themselves to antitrust liability, Mehra said. 

Mueller, from EAB, said the company’s algorithms are unique to every institution. 

“Ultimately there are substantial differences in the model used for each college, and where the factors are similar, they’re driven by the competitive environment, not an inherent sameness in the models,” he said via email.

A complex tool

In practical use, colleges and admissions offices may not see aid algorithms as a standalone piece of technology but rather as a more comprehensive tool for understanding their probable yield. 

The company Othot, which offers analytics and AI products to colleges, published the results New Jersey Institute of Technology realized from its algorithmic tools. In fall 2018, when NJIT began using the technology, the college enrolled 173 more first-year students and saw net revenue increase. 

But officials at NJIT say they don’t think of the technology as specifically an aid tool but as one that predicts yield, helping them ration limited resources. That includes aid, but also time and effort from admissions staff. The technology doesn't make decisions on its own, they note.

“It’s not telling us what to do,” said Susan Gross, vice provost for enrollment management. 

Engler, at Brookings, recommends that colleges and admissions offices hire people with data expertise to work with any algorithms, while also paying close attention to how their admissions strategy is performing over time and how students are faring after they are admitted. 

“There’s a lot that can be done to improve practices,” he said, “and make sure that you’re going to have such an algorithm system where there are at least some checks for, ‘Well hey, are we systematically disadvantaging or undermining our own students?’”