The Pulse of Higher Ed

A common fact about hurricanes is that the greatest disruption and damage is caused when the storm enters an area and then departs it. A subtle calm is experienced as the eye of the hurricane often pauses over an area to sometimes gain strength. Higher education may be experiencing an eye of the hurricane scenario. In fact, some optimists were equivalently saying six months ago that “My institution is seeing the highest number of applicants ever…we’ll be fine” or “The pandemic, like other societal or economic tragedies has pushed people back to college,” only to be woken up to the harsh reality that many potential undergraduate students applied to “reach” schools or many more institutions than they might have otherwise applied to, given the lack of an SAT requirement.

 

With vaccination rates on the rise and booster shots entering society, higher education in the U.S. appears to be heading in the direction of “normal.” While there are still signs of the pandemic visible on campus, institutions are trying to portray some sense of normalcy with full stadiums during football games, a return to the dorms and the easing of restrictions on some campuses. However, we may be in the eye of the storm regarding the credentialing of education. As we ease out of the pandemic, there are clear signs of higher education erosion: a recent report by the National Student Clearinghouse[i] shows that undergraduate enrollment continues its downward spiral. While some of these declines may be the result of unfavorable and expected demographic changes, much of it could be a result of other factors, such as lowered household incomes as a result of pandemic unemployment, a rapidly changing economy, and a potential lack of confidence that higher education credentials in the form of a degree are guarantees of employment.

 

The National Student Clearinghouse report also shows an increase over the last two years in terms of graduate certificate enrollments (+9%), as well as graduate degrees (+5.6%) in general. Further analysis shows:

• Less selective institutions are seeing the greatest declines (-4.7%) over the past two years
• The greatest declines have been among associate degree enrollments (-6.6% over the past year and -14.1% over the past two years)
• Private four-year for-profit institutions also show a decline of 13.1% over the past two years for graduate enrollment
• During the past two years, undergraduate enrollment has declined at nearly a 2-to-1 ratio between men (-9.3%) and women (-5.3%), although much of this was a result of declines experienced in Fall 2020.

 

So, what does this mean for professional, continuing and online (PCO) education units? PCO units will become more essential and valuable to the central parts of their institution, as they are seen as the early entrants and innovators to online education, the extension of the institution to business and industry, and the bridge for returning adults seeking their degree. However, the challenges they face are more daunting as they are likely to experience the following in their efforts to respond to the educational storm:

 

• Filling Sand Bags to Avoid Floodwaters: During a hurricane, residents in low lying and waterfront areas build temporary walls to keep water from destroying their community. Higher education administrators will rush to fill their sand bags with more online degrees. After all, this helped save them with displaced campus-based undergraduate and graduate students during the early part of the pandemic. However, with so much supply in the market, institutions either need to race to the market to get market share or need to have a clear competitive difference in their program, whether that is quality, price, content uniqueness, brand, etc.

 

• Preparing for the Future: With climate change a proven reality, communities in low lying areas are likely to experience another environmental crisis. Smart communities do not just plug holes and hope and pray for a different outcome in the future. They make meaningful long-term changes, such as after the San Francisco earthquakes happened, engineers and architects made dramatic changes to compensate for future disasters. Higher education can diversify its portfolio to be less degree dependent or more stackable or modular. Having consulted with a number of institutions during the pandemic, what is apparent are two ways of thinking: 1) innovating and changing for the future, or 2) resisting because of legacy thinking. The declines that are apparent in the National Student Clearinghouse study are clear indicators of future problems. Educational products and programs need to be designed for the future and not the past. Stackable credentials leading to the degree that hold value even before the degree has been earned will become more essential in the future.

 

• Helping the Displaced: Storms and disasters displace people. People need to be rescued. The pandemic is a disaster where there are those that will need to be rescued economically and educationally. According to a recent New York Times article[ii], the pandemic shows that many young men have lost confidence in higher education or see it as having less value then entering the workforce. In addition, as K-12 pivoted, many young people entered college with less academic knowledge than previous classes. A recent study by McKinsey states that students are on average five months behind in mathematics and four months behind in reading[iii]. Will this have a trickle-down effect regarding student readiness in college? Will students have a lower likelihood for success in a traditional format and ultimately end up in a degree completion scenario later in life? PCO units should expect this. With male students leaving college and students in general being less prepared, along with the potential for mental health challenges, students may drop out of college at a higher rate than years past. PCO units need to be prepared to pick them up, but with greater value, such as the offering of certificates and badges.

 

• Helping the Forgotten: During disasters, many people are forgotten because they are not vocal about their suffering or ignored in favor of the masses. The pandemic has disproportionately impacted people of color and has thus created a wider digital divide. McKinsey also reported that during the pandemic, Black and Hispanic students were more likely to receive lower-quality remote instruction or were more likely to receive no instruction[iv]. In addition, McKinsey also reports that indigenous communities also suffered from a lower quality education K-12 experience. This is further compounded by students of color not having access to the Internet or suffering through dial-up access[v]. It is the mission of many PCO units and of their central institutions to provide access and equity to those that underserved or ignored. While many people of color are fighting for educational equity, the pandemic only pushed them back further in terms of access to resources.

 

• Leadership is Needed During a Time of Crisis: During any natural or man-made disaster, communities heal faster in the presence of strong and calming leadership. FEMA also encourages communities to be prepared in advance and to have strong leadership before, during and after a crisis. PCO units will need strong leaders, leaders that can help other parts of the institution see through the chaos and embrace innovation and risk taking. Faculty and administrators are likely to battle PCO units in their resistance to noncredit-to-credit pathways, stackable credentials and badges in favor of competing solely in fully online degrees. However, a strong leader will make the case for more customer-centric educational products and programs which (in many cases) may not be the degree. Faculty and administration have little experience in new credentials and a strong PCO leader will help them with their discomfort and anxiety through controlled experimentation, implementation and innovation of new credentials. 

 

• Communication is Critical: During a disaster or crisis, communications systems often fail. Power lines may be down and fiber-optics severed. To survive a disaster, one of the first things that is done is to restore and rebuild communications, which in turn connect response teams with volunteers and to individuals in need. The pandemic has caused communication to shift. Digital communication is more prevalent and the use of technology more dependent. The PCO unit can be the critical link to the future of higher education, as it may have more advanced communications with business and industry, and with the community (especially adult learners). 

 

The pandemic is a natural disaster and without meaningful change, many institutions of higher education may fall victim to it. PCO can be one lifeline among many that an institution needs to better leverage to weather future storms.

 

[i] https://nscresearchcenter.org/stay-informed/

[ii] Carey, K., New York Times, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/09/upshot/college-admissions-men.html

[iii] https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/public-and-social-sector/our-insights/covid-19-and-education-the-lingering-effects-of-unfinished-learning

[iv] https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/public-and-social-sector/our-insights/covid-19-and-learning-loss-disparities-grow-and-students-need-help

[v] https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator/cch