Season 7 Wrap Up

In this season 7 wrap-up episode of Future U., Jeff and Michael go to a rapid-fire format and break down six topics in higher education: recent enrollment trends, the state of online education and OPMs, the ongoing FAFSA issues, campus protests related to the Israel-Hamas conflict, the increasing focus on value in higher education, and recent developments in compensating college athletes. This episode is made possible with support from Ascendium Education Group and the Gates Foundation.

Relevant Links

The Great Misalignment

Key Moments

(00:00) Enrollment Challenges and the Future of Higher Education
(07:06) The Growth of Online Education and Challenges in the OPM Market
(09:23) The Long-Term Impact of FAFSA on Enrollment and Financial Aid
(10:48) Campus Protests: A Continuing Issue in Higher Education
(13:07) Blending High School and College: Creating Value in Education
(16:02) The NCAA Settlement and the Future of College Athletics

Transcript

Jeff Selingo:

So Michael, we've reached the end of another season, season seven of Future U. And whenever we do these end of the season wrap ups, it always seems that as I go back to listen to some of the episodes again from the past year that we've lived through the most consequential year in higher ed's history.

Michael Horn:

There's certainly a lot to think about from this past year and look forward to as we go into our short summer break, Jeff, from continuing enrollment challenges for higher ed to what's next for online education. And so today we're going to do a speed round of six topics in 30 minutes.

Jeff Selingo:

Hold us to that.

Michael Horn:

All right, we'll do our best. And that's today on the season seven wrap up of Future U.

Sponsor:

This episode is brought to you by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, working to eliminate race, ethnicity, and income as predictors of student success through innovation, data and information, policy and institutional transformation. This episode of Future U is sponsored by Ascendium Education Group, a nonprofit organization committed to helping learners from low income backgrounds reach their education and career goals. For more information visit ascendiumphilanthropy.org.

Jeff Selingo:

I'm Jeff Selingo.

Michael Horn:

And I'm Michael Horn.

Jeff Selingo:

Michael, we're in person together, so we probably should explain where we are.

Michael Horn:

Yeah. Omaha, Nebraska, which listeners may not know, is actually the origin of Future U back in 2017.

Jeff Selingo:

October, 2017, to be exact, we were both in Bellevue, Nebraska, which is about 10 miles from here for a discussion with a board at Bellevue University. Bellevue has a few locations in Nebraska and it has a huge online presence as well serving adult learners. And we were both asked independently, if you remember to talk with the board about future trends in higher ed. We knew each other a little bit from working with a consultancy and tangled, but we really had never done anything together.

Michael Horn:

Yeah, that's right. And we got up there, Jeff, we did I think, held court for about three hours, if I'm not mistaken. And then a few board members came up to us afterwards suggesting, hey, you guys should do a podcast together.

Jeff Selingo:

Yeah. And Michael, since I knew we were coming back here now to talk with the Bellevue board again, I looked up in my email archives and that night on the flight home from Omaha, I sent you a note suggesting that we do something together where quote, we could riff off of each other on a subject and then maybe have a guest. Sounds like Future U, right?

Michael Horn:

Yeah, it does, right. And I remember writing back just a few hours later and as they say Future U was born from that and we've had more than just a few guests. I remember recording our first episode just a few months later. It was a short first season, but here we are now seven seasons later.

Jeff Selingo:

Back in Omaha recording show number 164, our wrap up for this season as we go into our usual summer hiatus before we return in August for season eight.

Michael Horn:

And Jeff, we always do these episodes where it's just us a bit different each time. We know it's been a long year, especially for those listeners who are actually on the campuses themselves. So we are going to try to make this a quick 30 minute show, and we've already of course used our precious minutes talking about ourselves, but the idea is to go through a speed round of topics. Some looking back on the big stories of the past year, some looking forward and to be honest, frankly, almost all or some combination of a little bit backward looking and a little bit forward looking. So six topics in 30 minutes. Now, a little less than that. Let's go. First up for you is enrollment, latest National Student Clearinghouse Research Center data report shows that enrollment is up 2.5% this spring. So Jeff, are we out of the woods? Do I have to start backing off some of my predictions?

Jeff Selingo:

You've been trying to back off some of those predictions I know, but not to sound negative, Michael, but I don't think we're out of the woods at all. Nearly a third of the increase in the National Student Clearinghouse data was because of the number of dual enrolled high school students in college. And as we know from our John Fink interview earlier this season, and I really encourage folks who didn't hear that to go back to find it, colleges are really not making money and indeed might be even losing money on dual enrollment. So for them to have an increase in dual enrollment is not always a good thing necessarily. Again, if you look inside the numbers that came out from the National Student Clearinghouse, you'll also see private colleges saw their enrollment dip putting more pressure on that sector where of course we've seen most of the closures in recent months.

The other thing that was interesting in looking at the data is that enrollments in the top 20 academic fields are really driving most of the increase. So we're seeing more students in STEM and health related majors, and that's only creating an even greater divide between STEM and health related majors and everything else on campuses. And to be frankly honest, I think that it really makes it hard to run an institution on just 20 fields. It's not that it's impossible, but it really changes the nature of most colleges and universities. I really do think that this is more than just an early onset of the demographic cliff. I still want to repeat something that you said on a recent episode that we had with Terrell Dunn about the Gates funded research on enrollment. The share of high school graduates going straight onto college has dropped several percentage points equal to probably a couple hundred thousand students.

And adult enrollment is not making up for those losses, at least at the institutions that are losing traditional undergrads. My take on this, Michael, is it's purely economic, even with the big discounts, and we saw NACUBO just came out with its recent survey on tuition discounting. College is really unaffordable for too many students and families. They don't think the payoff is there for a degree, for a degree at least. And until we see a rise in different kinds of products, I'm thinking of other good pathways that combine work and learning and maybe stack up to a credential including a bachelor's degree. I just don't think we're going to see an increase in enrollment. And just one other last note about these other products, these other pathways, they need to be valuable too. You probably saw the recent report from the Georgetown Center on Education in the workforce that found a great misalignment between projected job demand in many local labor markets and the mix of credentials available to workers seeking jobs, requiring more than a high school diploma in those same labor markets.

So there's just this mismatch between what colleges are offering and what the local economy needs. And we'll definitely put that report in the show notes for this episode. So let's move on to topic two, Michael, which is somewhat related. Phil Hill mentioned in his newsletter on the National Student Clearinghouse data that one item under-reported in the news coverage was that online education growth continues to outperform more traditional options, but this has still been a tough year for the OPM market, those outside partners that help colleges get online. We saw some consolidation, we saw a lot of upheaval with new leadership at 2U of course. So could you help our listeners square this? The number of students online is going up, but the ed tech players that help colleges get online seem to be going through their own shifts. So what's happening?

Michael Horn:

Yeah, well, I think Phil Hill actually answered this in his newsletter as well, where he said the biggest growth in online enrollments, private nonprofit institutions, Southern New Hampshire University, Liberty, Western Governors, you know the list, they don't work with OPMs. So that's the first thing is the biggest growth is not from the players working with OPMs. Secondly, as we heard in the episode where we had Jeff Maggioncalda and Fernando Bleichmar, ultimately people are moving toward online programs that are lower price. This goes back to what you were just saying in your answer, where people are looking for value, they're looking for something that's affordable that has hit the online market now. This is no longer just about convenience and access, it's about the price itself. The programs that are struggling, like the USC masters programs, for example, they were high-priced, they were supported by OPMs.

Those aren't working. If you're an OPM though that's supporting a low cost program, you're having some more success right now, I think was my conclusion from that episode. And then here's the last part of this, to you is obviously the poster child for the OPM industry, they are really going through in some ways their own unique challenges, which is really around the debt that they have taken on, and it creates a liquidity challenge with servicing that debt. And so I think that's less about the performance of online programs per se, and more about a particular actor that is way over leveraged, Jeff. So let's hold that there and go to topic three and let's hit FAFSA, something that we've talked a lot about this year and here's the question I want to know from you is, does it have the long tail in higher ed like COVID did in terms of enrollment disruptions and learning loss? Is this going to be a hangover that continues to impact next year as well?

Jeff Selingo:

Yeah, Michael, I'm now starting to think it does. And when we last talked about the FAFSA on the show, I didn't think it would have a long tail beyond this year, but now I'm not so sure. I recently interviewed Kim Cook from the National College Attainment Network, and they closely track all things FAFSA, and she told me that by now the initial steps for next year's rollout should have already happened. And on top of that, there's this message out there about how tricky the FAFSA was this year, which is really not the message you want going into the fall. Now do I think it will be as bad as this year? No, but I think the Department of Education is going to have to just do something different to boost numbers beyond just getting the form out on time. For one thing, they know exactly where FAFSA completions were down this year.

So what I would do if I were them, I'd go into those states and those zip codes and do FAFSA completion days. Essentially the week the form gets out, ask all of their star power that they have in Hollywood and elsewhere with influencers to do public service announcements in social media. I think you really need to flood the zone, particularly in the fall when the form comes out to say how critically important this is. Okay, Michael, you're up next, topic number four. Speaking of the long tail of stories, campus protests weren't on our list I know when we started this season, but then October 7th happened and what might the fall bring in terms of campuses? And is this a story that you think continues to dominate at elite colleges? Because you might've seen the piece that Robert Kelchen co-wrote in the Washington Monthly recently where he found that nearly all the protest activity has been at elite schools.

Michael Horn:

Yeah. Well look, Jeff, I love that they did this research because I think many of us had this gut intuition that this was something that was happening at places with quote unquote, privilege, with wealth and so forth. Then they put the data behind it and with a few anomalies, they basically showed what Marvin Krislov, the President Pace University formerly at Oberlin said to you where he said, "My students, they don't have time for this stuff. They're actually focused on the issues actually impacting them. They want to get through their studies. They're often working jobs. They're trying to get the degree so that they can get a better job. They don't have the luxury of time or wealth to spend it frankly out on a camp overnight protesting." It's a luxury belief in other words, as Iris Stoll has written. I thought it's interesting that this issue has made Saturday at Night Live now, several times.

You may have seen the skit where they were talking to one individual, I'm blanking on the actor's name right now, and they basically said, "What do you think about the protest?" He said, "It's great." And they said, "It's your child protesting." She better not be, right. And so I think that's a lot of the attitude of people is like, well, as long as it's not my kid doing that. And so that said, I do think it's going to roll over into the fall. I think there's some new presidents at some of these universities. I think people are going to want to test them, see how they respond. It's going to be interesting. I don't think it's anything but over. And Israel has recently said that this invasion of Gaza to get Hamas out is going to last at least through the end of the year. So I don't think we're going to see this go away, Jeff.

Jeff Selingo:

And by the way, add a presidential election on top of that.

Michael Horn:

A lot of temperature, a lot of heat. And so that's a whole nother layer that obviously we're going to get into next year as well, but topic five meantime. Jeff, as I looked back on our season, if there was one common thread running through basically almost every single episode, it was value, value, value, value. This is a long running conversation of course that we've had, but I'm just curious, did you learn anything new that our listeners can take with them over the summer as perhaps they're planning and putting in some strategic thinking for future of their campuses?

Jeff Selingo:

Yeah, Michael, it seems as I was going back through our episodes from this past season, there is something that does boost demand in higher ed, and it's what I found to be a more integrated approach. And what do I mean by that? It's blending traditional higher ed with something else. And let me talk about two threads since we don't have a ton of time. The first is blending high school and college, and so dual enrollment. And although I must admit even after our episode with John Fink, I still remain kind of skeptical of how dual enrollment is done in many places. I think where high schools and colleges can work together so students can earn credits and can really start college early, it shows them the value of getting a degree while they're still in high school. So a true blending of high school and college and not just some of these courses, which again, even after listening to the John Fink episode, I just don't think are very good in some places.

The second blending is really blending work and learning. And I think back to our apprenticeship episode with Trident College in South Carolina where it was focused on work first and learning on the side. And this is something where students know why they're learning in the moment and it makes college more affordable. And whether that is other types of experiential learning and co-ops, internships, other types of work-based experiences, but the more that we blend work and learning in a more real way. So it's not something that's just bolted onto the side how I think it is for so many students now. That is what I think will not only show more value to the students, but also make the itself more affordable. And so Michael, that brings us to topic number six, the last one. And I know you're a basketball fan and I know the last couple of weeks have been probably appointment TV viewing for you with the NBA playoffs. So let's make this last one a jump ball and you get it. So what's the one topic you want to take us out with?

Michael Horn:

I love that transition, and as we're recording this, my Celtics are giving me a lot to cheer for at the moment. We'll see how well that stays as this episode is released and they take on the Mavs. But we've covered a lot of interesting topics this year. Apprenticeships, the future of the PhD, loan forgiveness, second chance, [inaudible 00:15:32] and more. But I want to stick with your analogy, Jeff, and go sports, namely the NCAA settlement and then the announcement that each college will be able to pay up to 20 million or so to athletes in salary. We started off this season with you actually observing that schools, colleges and universities haven't thought nearly enough about how their costs could continue to rise if they have to start paying student salaries for their athletes. And all of a sudden it feels like it's here. It's right in front of them.

And I think both you and I thought that paying athletes was frankly inevitable, but I'm not sure that I saw Charlie Baker and the NCAA moving this quickly ahead of the legislators and so forth to make this happen starting in the fall of 2025. But here we are, and I'll say I don't think it's resolved yet, though. There's more stickiness to come. I'll just throw out a couple of questions. I'm sure some schools are going to want to pay that money and salary to those sports that are actually quote unquote, revenue generating. That means football, basketball. Might that run afoul of Title IX regs? Perhaps. Maybe it doesn't apply to a place like University of Connecticut where their women's basketball team is maybe bringing in more revenue, but at other campuses, I'm not so sure. And so I think that's going to be a really interesting question to weed through.

And frankly, I think many universities, this is me speaking again, I don't see anything happening on this front per se, but particularly for those in the Power Five conferences, I think spin out your athletic teams into affiliated for-profits so that you can maybe get out of some of this tangle of regulation and have some separation between paying the athletes on your campus, but maybe not supporting those who are going to go into engineering and other fields that frankly our economy needs and those students need in their future earnings. So I just think this is a continuing issue, Jeff, that has taken a big step forward, but it's still not resolved and will be a big issue in the fall and spring and for a couple of years more to come at least.

Jeff Selingo:

Yeah, Michael, and I can't let this one go without commenting a little bit here, especially since we're in Omaha, home of the NCAA College World Series, also home to Nebraska football, but also volleyball, very popular, women's volleyball at Nebraska.

Michael Horn:

But that's volleyball, the biggest attendance.

Jeff Selingo:

Biggest attendance. So this is obviously, and I remember going back to an episode we did with Victoria Jackson at ASU a couple of years ago, her and Matt Brown on college athletics. I don't think any of us thought we would've gone to this point by now when we record that episode. But I remember Victoria telling us that college sports the way it is in the US is kind of an accident of history. And I'm starting to wonder, will this be the thing that finally breaks it where the big time athletics in the US is not as associated or closely associated with higher education? I think that's the big thing to be looking for over the next couple of years.

And with that, we are going to wrap up this episode, season seven of Future U here from Omaha, Nebraska, where Future U got its start seven seasons ago. We're going to be taking a short summer break, but if you follow Michael or me on social media, you'll be able to see some of our highlights of the year's episodes that you should listen to over the summer on your summer break. And we're going to be back in August where we're going to pick up right where we left off. So until then, have a great summer, get some time outside and relax, and we'll see you next season on Future U.