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Perspectives on Online and Professional Education
from UPCEA’s Research and Consulting Experts

Maximizing Audience Lifetime Value: The Role of Branding, Partnerships, and Alumni Networks in Credential Success

October 13, 2025

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…

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Preparing Four-Year Institutions for Workforce Pell

September 23, 2025

Institutions 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,…

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Unique biweekly insights and news review from Ray Schroeder, Senior Fellow at UPCEA

AI Hallucinations May Soon Be History

October 2, 2025

An artifact of the race to the top in Artificial Intelligence (AI) is that mistakes inevitably occur in refining the models that are under continuous development. One of those many mistakes apparently led to hallucinations in outputs. We all are witness to the incredibly frenetic race to develop AI tools that publicly kicked off on…

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AI Teaching Learners Today: Pick Your Pedagogy!

September 18, 2025

University budgets across the country are broken. Overall revenue and accumulated financial support appear to be declining at most universities for a wide variety of reasons. New funding policies, administrative reorganizations such as those at the Department of Education, lean fiscal times for states, diminished regard for higher learning, fewer requirements for degrees among employers…

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Your one-stop shop for the latest Association happenings, policy updates, plus thoughts from the desk of CEO Bob Hansen.

UPCEA Signs DACA Support Letter Joining HACU and Others

UPCEA today joined the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities and 26 other organizations to issue a letter to Secretary John Kelly of the Department of Homeland Security requesting clarification regarding protections offered under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. Our concern surrounds DACA holders being deported or detained and threatened with deportation…

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The Future of Jobs and Jobs Training (Pew Research Center)

The Future of Jobs and Jobs Training (Pew Research Center) May 3, 2017   Ray Schroeder, associate vice chancellor for online learning at the University of Illinois, Springfield, commented, “It is projected that those entering the workforce today will pursue four or five different careers (not just jobs) over their lifetime. These career changes will…

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Many Voices are More Impactful Than One: The National Adult Learner Coalition (The EvoLLLution)

Though non-traditional students have morphed into the new majority students on college and university campuses across the United States, public and institutional policy has largely remained focused on the “traditional” 18-22-year-old demographic. Unfortunately, this has created an environment that leaves the majority of students underserved on their own campuses, but a group of associations focused…

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New Study Delves Into Unexplored Professional Development Benchmarking for Instructional Design and Technology Teams

WASHINGTON, D.C. – April 7, 2017 – A study released today by the UPCEA eDesign Collaborative maps the expertise and roles in instructional design teams throughout North America. The study, Instructional Design and Technology Teams: Work Experiences and Professional Development, establishes benchmarks for experience and salaries among members of instructional design team members, and also…

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Musings on trends and updates from UPCEA CEO Bob Hansen.

Foreword by Bob Hansen Featured in The COLO Guidebook

July 10, 2025

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…

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A new direction for the Distance Teaching and Learning Conference

November 7, 2024

Over 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…

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Valuable insights from UPCEA's trusted corporate partners.

AI and Cybersecurity: The New Power Couple on Campus

October 10, 2025

Innovation 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…

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Workforce Pell Is Now Law Under the One Big Beautiful Bill (OBBB)

October 6, 2025

Is 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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