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Scaling online education: Five lessons for colleges

Scaling online education: Five lessons for colleges

As the COVID-19 pandemic surges across the United States, colleges have been forced to adjust their plans almost daily. As of late August 2020, just one-fifth of colleges in the United States were planning to return to campus fully or primarily in-person,


with the balance either undecided or planning for hybrid, online, or other remote teaching models. Already, several colleges have had to rapidly shift to 100 percent remote instruction following local COVID-19 outbreaks.

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Last spring, as colleges were forced to move to remote models from one day to the next, the focus was on ensuring engagement and access for students, and just-in-time training for faculty to finish the academic year. As restrictions on in-person learning extended through the fall, the imperative shifted to building the capability to provide a robust remote offering for the longer term. This need for remote learning has expanded interest in developing or scaling proper online education, leveraging the best practices learned from a set of institutions that have successfully implemented this educational model.

In this article, we briefly outline trends in online higher education over the past decade. Then, we review five critical lessons from leading online institutions that could help every university improve and scale their online offerings. The marketplace is moving quickly, so institutions of higher learning must act now.

The shift to online: At first a trickle, and now a flood

Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, online education was a driver of growth in higher education. As traditional enrollment in postsecondary institutions continues to decline, distance learning has increased by around 40 percent in five years, from 2.2 million students in 2012 to 3.1 million students in 2017. While some students studied online exclusively, more took a combination of online and in-person courses. Before the pandemic hit, roughly one-third of students had taken at least one online course.

However, this growth was unevenly distributed. Big institutions such as Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU), Western Governors University (WGU), and Arizona State University (ASU) accounted for around 10 percent of the growth, building national brands for online higher education that set them apart from their peers (Exhibit 1).

Exhibit 1




Online education growth is uneven among institutions, with the top ten players consolidating 20 percent of the market.





A trend that was playing out over a decade was then compressed into a semester. While many students will likely return to in-person learning when it is safe, others may stay remote for the long term, raising the
stakes on building sustainable offerings, not just stopgaps. Indeed, GSV Ventures, a venture-capital fund focusing on digital education, forecasts that “online-first pedagogy will become normalized for virtually every college student” and all growth in higher education until 2030 will happen online.


The imperative is clear: every university should build a robust online offering, and fast.

Taking the plunge: Standing up online programs

We interviewed leading online universities to understand what it takes to plan and implement quality online programs in higher education. We identified five key success factors.

Develop a student-centered approach

“The secret sauce to our success is our student-advising operation,” says Paul LeBlanc, president of SNHU. Leading institutions agree with this statement and have developed online strategies with one main objective in mind: support students to successfully complete their programs. Institutions have put in place three types of student support mechanisms to achieve this goal:

  • Personalized counseling and guidance. ASU and SNHU use personal success coaches and academic advisers to help students navigate admissions, enrollment, degree selection, and course requirements. Counselors also employ predictive analytics to identify students at risk of struggling academically and provide the required interventions.
  • Engagement with in-person and online communities. Part of student success relies on developing strong ties with faculty and peers. To ensure student engagement, Pennsylvania State University and SNHU have introduced personalized feedback sessions between faculty and students, enhanced peer-to-peer interactions through video calls, access to in-person networking events, and development of online
    communities (for example, an honors society).
  • 24/7 IT support to enhance learning experience. State University of New York and ASU installed a 24/7 IT concierge service that helps students with technical questions related to course access, course materials, and software.

Invest heavily in marketing

The biggest players spend heavily on marketing (Exhibit 2). Institutions with the largest online enrollment have marketing budgets similar to fast-growth tech and digital-retail companies. We found a positive correlation between share of voice and market share; in other words, the more an institution spent on marketing, the higher its market share. This highlights the role of marketing in spurring enrollment.

Exhibit 2




Institutions that spend more on marketing have a higher market share of online enrollment.





Two-thirds of students complete their first application within four weeks of starting a search for online programs. Leading institutions recognize that online students move faster in their decision-making process than their peers in the in-person applicant pool and have seamlessly integrated their marketing efforts with enrollment departments. Students not only move faster during their application process but also expect to receive timely information on financial aid and transferring credits when finalizing enrollment. The Online College Students report shows that within two weeks of having applied, 71 percent of online students expect to find out how to transfer previously earned credits, while 66 percent expect to receive an estimate of their financial aid award.

To enable a seamless application and enrollment process, SNHU established a team of 275 admissions representatives that follow up with interested students within two minutes of a query. It also uses a credit-transfer team that supports students tracking down the necessary transcripts for a small fee. The university recognizes that time-sensitive adult learners are the target of its programs and require a streamlined application and enrollment process.

Involve faculty early and enable academic staff to launch successful programs

Helping faculty develop successful online programs comprises two areas of support:

  • Provide faculty with the time required to develop online offerings. In our interviews, faculty members cited fear of time commitment and lack of recognition for remote teaching when asked to develop an online offering. Universities have added monetary and nonmonetary incentives to address those issues. University of Central Florida provides faculty with stipends and time for instructors to pursue the training required to develop and launch quality online courses. Similarly, Pennsylvania State University gives faculty the same credit for developing and teaching remote courses that they would receive for teaching in-person programs. The latter is aimed at addressing the perception that online classes are inferior to in-person courses.
  • Develop a standardized end-to-end process to support faculty. We identified a series of best practices that some universities have put in place to support faculty, from the assessment of the idea to quality assurance when launching an offering:
    • Create a standardized course proposal and approval process. To launch viable online courses, University of Florida created a central curriculum-development team with a dual mission: first, identify potential offerings that respond to both students’ needs and labor-market demand while taking advantage of the university’s strengths, and second, assess ideas proposed by faculty using the same framework.
    • Provide instructional design and course-production support to ensure offerings meet students’ needs. University of Florida’s Center for Online Innovation and Production supports faculty with training, instructional designers, and all production needs.
    • Develop a strict quality assurance process. ASU has a dedicated design and development team that manages quality assurance with a detailed rubric to measure course quality. It includes 22 instructional designers who each support 50 to 75 faculty members.

Establish an online organization with clear accountability

When defining the organizational structure required to carry out and grow an online program, institutions reported following three guiding principles (see sidebar, “Choosing an appropriate operationalization model”):





  • Have a clearly designated unit, with budget responsibility and decision-making power, that is responsible for executing the online program.
  • Enable faculty participation to ensure that implementation meets student needs and provides the support faculty requires to develop quality programs. Most of the public institutions interviewed reported having the online organization under the provost as a mechanism to enable faculty to take a leadership role in shaping the organization’s value proposition.
  • Define clear targets and ensure standardized practices are put in place to meet these targets. Examples of standardized practices include a vetting system to assess financial viability of new programs along with a clear resource-allocation framework for course development.

Adjust standard operating procedures to align with the needs of frequent online start options and shorter terms

Online programs that scale rapidly typically offer concentrated learning modules of six to eight weeks. They have multiple, staggered start options ranging from four to six in a given year (for example, January, March, May, June, August, and October) to provide several flexible entry points for target audiences. August and January are the most popular and have the highest enrollment of the start options. Most traditional university programs offer only fall, spring and, in some cases, summer admissions cycles.

The multiple-starts approach has important implications for several teams involved with the operations and student life cycle, including:

  • Admissions. Six application-processing cycles, with shorter turnaround times compared with schools that have three traditional cycles.
  • Marketing. Digital and print advertising must be rapidly readjusted and relaunched for each of the six starts.
  • Financial aid. Turnaround and application-processing times ramp up with significant spikes in activity in the five days before the admissions deadline versus traditional admissions cycles, in which financial aid processing is typically completed several months before the deposit deadline.
  • Student success. Advisers and counselors must get accustomed to digital responses, broader availability, and proactive outreach to address motivation and persistence.

Universities that operationalize online programs successfully also take into account these adjustments:

  • appointing people dedicated to directing online operations within their respective teams
  • instilling a strong customer-focused view in colleagues who support online operations
  • tweaking the school calendar to be flexible for the variations needed with multiple starts (for example, flexible work hours over the holiday break to ensure support for the January launch)
  • creating buffer capacity in their teams to address spikes in activity just before and after a new class start compared with traditional enrollment cycle activity

The transition to any form of online education is a major effort. In the past, universities could choose whether to invest in a first-rate online offering. Now, they have little choice, and they need to act fast. The good news is that there is plenty of experience from which to draw and build. Universities that take these lessons to heart can create or scale an online offering that will not only carry them through the pandemic but also set them up for success in a post-COVID-19 higher-education world.

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Homeschooling mothers are ‘extremists’ now

Homeschooling mothers are ‘extremists’ now

As lawmakers, technology companies, and media outlets try to come up with more restraints on “extremists,” it’s important to keep an eye on whom they include under that label, Pay Per Touch.

You might think, when a journalist, tech mogul, or politician says “extremist” speech needs to be reined in or we need more federal surveillance of extremists, that they are talking about neo-Nazis or coup-plotters. We know, though, that “extremist” has long been expanded to include anyone with fringe beliefs, such as polygamists or RFK-style anti-vaxxers. Also, “anti-vaxxer” has been expanded beyond its old meaning, which involved rejection of all vaccines, to now include anyone who doesn’t want the COVID vaccines.

The trend here is to gradually stretch the definition of “extremist.” This combines with the trend of demanding new government and corporate efforts against “extremism.” The ugly result is a massive push to crack down on a huge portion of the country that rejects the cultural demands of the elites.

It’s an ever-widening culture war purge.

The Sacramento Bee has just published
a great exhibit in this “Great Excommunication
.” It’s a 4,000-word, sprawling piece warning that “women in extremist circles often use their leadership to uphold white male culture.”

You see, typically, a reporter for a major newspaper uses a shortcut to show you that some group is bad — they point out that the person is a white male, or the group is dominated by white males. That shortcut isn’t available when the groups the newspaper wants to villainize are run by women. To build a greater permission structure for hating women with bad politics while still preserving the ability to use identity politics to protect one’s own belief from criticism, the Sacramento Bee ran this opus.

That’s the strategic purpose. Here’s the tactic, which is also tried and true: Blend together extremism, fringiness, or slightly odd beliefs with perfectly normal people you just happen to dislike because they are of another cultural tribe.

Mark Hemingway pointed out the core paragraph of this piece:

Got that? This piece profiles women who object to vaccine mandates, homeschool their children, or don’t want their 4-year-old to be forced to wear a mask while trying to learn speech alongside white nationalists and QAnon ladies. These people are causally called “conspiracy theorists” in a piece that attempts to link violent rioters to women who form homeschool pods and try to grow their own lettuce.

You may recall the recent effort by education bureaucrats, the news media, and the Biden administration to tar parents as domestic terrorists if they got upset about their schools’ failures. This is all part of the same effort: Politically active parents on the Right, or even those who opt for some sort of child rearing outside the governmental channels, are now extremists.

So, recall, the next time someone calls for action against “extremists,” they are including homeschooling mothers.

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How Does Online Learning Industry Reshape the World of Education?

How Does Online Learning Industry Reshape the World of Education?

Education is certainly the key civilizational component of paramount importance. Nevertheless, civilization has been affected by COVID-19 on a global scale and in so many ways. Similarly, education is yet another crucial aspect of our lives that has been significantly impacted and thus changed. E-education has certainly reached the apex at the current time due to closed schools and universities around the world. However, it seems there are many advantages to this way of education that were earlier less known or considered. 

 

To this end, check out these 6 points on how the online learning industry reshapes the world of education!

1. Cost-effective

One of the obvious and important ways how the online learning industry reshapes the world has to do with the economical aspect. Online learning is a much more cost-effective way of education than the traditional one. Therefore, with this type of education, many obstacles to schooling are simply removed. The students no longer have to travel from remote places to their schools, they also don’t have to pay for meals and other needs that go with leaving one’s house. Likewise, the same goes not only with students, but also with teachers and professors, and the rest of the school staff. All this makes e-learning incredibly less costly and thus has a great impact on the economy, but it also saves the environment!

 

2. Stimulating

Since students are offered quality education at home they are spared much inconvenience which, in effect, can be very stimulating for students in terms of progress. This is because they are spared much of the inconvenience the traditional approach to teaching brought to them. With this modern way of education, students are much more likely to concentrate better and study better. Moreover, since they are at home they can feel much more relaxed, comfortable, and at ease than they used to feel back in the old days.

 

3. Extra classes

Another big advantage of online learning is that students are offered countless opportunities to learn things that they have always wanted to learn about. For example, there are many languages, history, or IT courses that students would enjoy taking. Likewise, if you think you can share useful knowledge with others, you can organize courses that may attract students so you can spread knowledge and passion for it with many other people and even profit from it. This is especially suitable nowadays when people increasingly spend time at their homes and look for interesting and useful online courses.

 

4. Flexibility

The next important advantage of online learning that contributes to reshaping world education is the very flexibility of lessons they are delivered. Namely, students are able to replay the lessons in case they couldn’t manage to join the lesson on time. Similarly, if students feel they didn’t understand all the details from the lesson well, they are free to repeat the lesson as many times as they want and take notes more carefully! This can be a great way to significantly increase the success rate of students.

 

5. Knowledge retention 

Since students can enjoy numerous benefits such as better concentration and focus, learning flexibility, and cutting expenses, among all other things, their knowledge retention can be highly enhanced. For instance, feeling comfortable during the acquisition of knowledge is considered one of the major reasons that factor in strong knowledge retention. As already mentioned above, students can feel much more at ease since they are at home and can thus feel more relaxed during the lesson. Similarly, they can take a break when they feel they need it and replay the lesson after a good rest. These are only some of the aspects that greatly influence how they perceive the lesson delivered and how they acquire and retain the knowledge from it.

 

6. Effectiveness

All the ways online learning helps reshape and enhance world education have one purpose: to increase effectiveness and decrease education failure rate with students.

It seems there is a subsequent positive impact on the success rate of students in terms of exam scores. Given the fact students can grasp the teaching material much easier and better, they can likely improve the scores at any type of evaluation instrument. Higher scores and a lower rate of students dropping out of school is one of the most important indicators of enhanced effectiveness of online learning.

 

Although we live in seemingly difficult times, there is always a silver lining in it. Education becomes increasingly accessible and everyone is given a chance for personal growth and success.

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Career Paths You Can Take with a Physical Education Degree

Career Paths You Can Take with a Physical Education Degree

Do you feel called to educate others to live healthy lives through fitness? Do you feel called to coach others to enjoy athletic competition through sport participation? If so, pursuing a graduate physical education degree could be a great option for you.

Physical educators work on the front lines each day to help students stay healthy, not just physically but also mentally and emotionally. With about 13.7 million overweight or obese children in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), these educators can play a key role in reversing the trend. Many also serve as leaders and change agents in their communities, whether as coaches, counselors, or managers in a variety of settings.

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Physical education classes can help schoolkids in other areas, analysis finds

Physical education classes can help schoolkids in other areas, analysis finds
Physical education classes can help schoolkids in other areas, analysis finds


Physical education classes may boost intellectual and academic performance in schoolchildren, a new study has found. Photo by Michael Schwarzenberger/Pixabay

June 29 (UPI) — Enhanced physical education classes in school boost children’s brainpower and academic performance, particularly in math, according to an analysis published Tuesday by the British Journal of Sports Medicine.

Students at schools in which physical education classes were taught by dedicated teachers and included intellectually challenging activities had evidence of improved cognitive and academic performance based on standardized test scores and grades, among other measures, the data showed.

However, the analysis also revealed that students ages 5 to 18 gained little benefit from more frequent or longer-duration physical education classes, the researchers said.

“Physical education seems to promote improvements in several future health-related outcomes,” study co-author Dr. Antonio García-Hermoso told UPI in an email.

“Although physical education alone may not provide young people with all the exercise they need to fight childhood obesity, [it can] provide young people with tools to lead a healthy and physically active lifestyle,” said García-Hermoso, an investigator at the Public University of Navarra in Spain.

The findings are based on analysis of data from 19 studies that collectively enrolled nearly 8,700 children and teens in 11 countries, including the United States, the researchers said.

The included studies evaluated the effects of physical education on intellectual and academic performance using standardized test scores and students’ grades.

Amid increasingly limited budgets, many schools worldwide, and nationally, have made cuts to physical education programs — a trend that prompted García-Hermoso and his colleagues to conduct their analysis.

This is despite several studies that have linked physical activity with improved learning and academic performance, the researchers said.

The new analysis of the study data revealed that interventions focused on boosting the quality of physical education programs boosted students’ brainpower, particularly at the primary school level.

Adding “cognitively challenging” activities such as dance or martial arts, having lessons led by a physical education specialist and including high-intensity fitness activities, sports and team games had the most impact, the data showed.

But boosting the number or length of physical education classes had a “marginal and insignificant” effect on academic performance.

Still, increasing the length of physical education class time does not negatively affect academic performance, the researchers said.

“The beneficial effects of regular physical activity on young people’s cognition are more than well known,” García-Hermoso said.

“Overall, physical activity may enhance cognition by modifying white matter integrity and activating key regions of the brain responsible for cognitive processes,” he said.

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India to become a $313 billion online education market soon: Report

India to become a 3 billion online education market soon: Report

Summary

Report by non-profit Aspire Circle elaborates on 10 disruptive investment ideas that can transform the way Indians receive education

It shows the way forward in building human capital, keeping in mind the needs of the 21st century education and job market

India is poised to become a $313 billion online education market soon, thanks to the pandemic-induced shift to online classes as the chief mode of education, a new report has found.

The report, titled “Investing for Impact: Education, Skills and EdTech”, has been released by Gurugram-based Aspire Circle, a not-for-profit forum promoting enlightened social leadership in India through fellowships and research.

The report elaborates on 10 disruptive investment ideas that can transform the way Indians receive education, including skilling and training catalysed by new-age educational technologies. It shows the way forward in building human capital, keeping in mind the needs of the 21st century education and job market.

The 10 ideas that may steer the online education boom in India are:

  • Technology-enabled K-12 education
  • Online test preparation platforms-led inclusion and affordability
  • Supplemental and extra-curricular education
  • Teacher training and development
  • Affordable education loan platforms
  • Gig economy and unbundled microtasking
  • Affordable student housing
  • Innovative finance in education and skilling
  • Micro and alternative credentials for employability skills
  • Social and emotional learning

According to Amit Bhatia, founder of Aspire Circle, India’s education and skills market will grow almost double in this decade — from $180 billion in 2020 to $313 billion in 2030 — while creating five million incremental jobs and impacting 429 million learners.

Investors, entrepreneurs and policy makers will engage with Aspire Circle research based recommendations to help India truly realise its demographic dividend, Bhatia added.

The Covid-19 situation had led to mass school closures, affecting 150 million girls, 90 million among them being left without any learning opportunity whatsoever, informed Safeena Husain, founder of NGO Educate Girls which works to provide education to girls in rural and educationally backward belts in the country.

Husain added that if these girls are given the opportunity to access technology-driven quality education that is also affordable — including the supplementary social and emotional learning, and loan platforms envisioned in the report — that would go a long way in maximising the impact on education.

Aspire Circle’s three foundational initiatives include Aspire Young Achievers, a scholarship programme launched in 2008. The Rs 1 lakh scholarship is awarded annually to three young achievers from humble backgrounds under age 30 in the field of sports, art, culture, academics or civil society.

The Aspire Circle Fellowship is a one-year curriculum for CSR heads, foundation heads, impact investors, impact entrepreneurs and NGO heads to inspire enlightened leadership.

In 2020, Aspire Circle launched RISE Interns, which prepares youth as new cadre of impact professionals for an imminent impact revolution with the aim to enhance India’s chances of global leadership.

Last updated on 20 Nov 2021