Shifting Student and Employer Priorities Create Opportunities for Higher Education Interest and innovation in workforce-related programming and credentials continue to surge, emerging as one of the fastest growing markets in higher education. Two-thirds of colleges and universities are making significant investments in this area, with more than one-third also embedding professional certifications into their online…
Read MoreInstitutions must begin preparing now for 2026 implementation. On July 4, 2025, Congress passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), a sweeping legislative package that reshapes federal student aid and accountability policy. Among many consequential provisions for higher education is the creation of Workforce Pell, which will extend Pell Grant eligibility to some short-term,…
Read MoreThe world is in the advent of the fourth industrial revolution, which is what the World Economic Forum describes as a new era that extends the impact of digitization in new and unanticipated ways. The fourth industrial revolution has shown up first and most prominently in the high-tech fields. Unsurprisingly, they are the ones leading…
Read MoreOverpriced, outdated and no longer required by an increasing number of employers; is the baccalaureate in a death spiral? Enrollments at American colleges and universities have been on a decade-long skid. This past year, enrollments dropped by 600,000 or 3.5%. While some of those drops may have been prompted by the pandemic, the trend is clear; fewer…
Read MoreAI Tools Are Driving Prospective Student Decisions, UPCEA and Search Influence Research Shows
Half of prospective students use AI tools weekly, and early-adopting institutions stand to gain in enrollment visibility. NEW ORLEANS, La., October 13, 2025 – 50 percent of prospective students now use AI-powered search tools at least weekly, making artificial intelligence a critical first step in discovering and evaluating higher education programs. The 2025 AI Search…
UPCEA Virtual Forum Recap: Expanding Institutional Capacity for Employer Engagement in Credential Innovation
September 17, 2025 marked UPCEA’s first-ever Virtual Forum on Employer Engagement and Credential Innovation. The event, curated by Amy Heitzman, Ph.D., UPCEA’s Deputy CEO and Chief Learning Officer, brought together senior leaders in professional, continuing, and online education to examine how institutions can strengthen partnerships with employers and scale credentialing strategies that align with workforce…
UPCEA Publishes “The Future Is Now: Essential Conversations for Building Tomorrow’s University Today” to Guide Higher Education Leaders into a New Era
Advocacy piece serves as a guide for institutional leaders to navigate challenging times WASHINGTON, D.C., ISSUED OCTOBER 6, 2025…UPCEA, the online and professional education association, today announces the release of its latest advocacy piece, “The Future Is Now: Essential Conversations for Building Tomorrow’s University Today.” Designed to raise awareness of critical questions every campus leader…
UPCEA 2025 Fong Grant Recipient Announced
WASHINGTON, D.C., September 29, 2025 — UPCEA is pleased to announce that the 2025 Jim Fong Grant for Advancing Online and Professional Education has been awarded to Morgan State University’s Center for Continuing and Professional Studies. Morgan State’s submission contained broad ambitions, notable contributions to the field, and aligned with UPCEA’s suite of services. …
We are pleased to share the foreword by UPCEA CEO Bob Hansen from the newly released Chief Online Learning Officers’ Guidebook: A Framework for Strategy and Practice in Higher Education. The guidebook, now available from Routledge in paperback, hardback, and eBook formats, provides a comprehensive framework for today’s online learning leaders. Learn more and purchase…
Read MoreOver the last three years, UPCEA engaged in an innovative partnership with the University of Wisconsin–Madison to enable the latter’s Distance Teaching and Learning (DT&L) conference to continue under UPCEA’s leadership. The partnership’s goals included making this valuable event for the distance learning community more sustainable and accessible to online practitioners focused on teaching and…
Read MoreInnovation attracts attention, and not all of it good. Protecting data, students, and credibility now means securing every AI experiment before it secures you. The Bright Side, and the Blind Spots, of AI in Higher Ed AI is higher ed’s new favorite partner and, like any power couple, it comes with complications. It’s rewriting…
Read MoreIs your institution ready to deliver, comply, and compete? This update is intended to highlight key portions of the One Big Beautiful Bill (OBBB) that affect colleges and universities. The goal is not to offer opinion, but to bring clarity around the law’s implications—especially the arrival of Workforce Pell. The OBBB is a broad, multi-issue…
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