Higher Education in the New Decade 🎓
At this very moment we are going though times of uncertainty around the world. Unprecedented societal, political and economic shifts are underway. I believe higher education is central to managing these challenges ahead. However, with increased political uncertainty, digitized and fluid job markets and hard-pressed funding models, today’s higher education systems are incompatible with the current realities and unprepared to deal with the challenges of the new decade.
Here are my top three major developments that will challenge the sector.
1. Lifelong Learning
The concept of lifelong learning is not new. But as the world is now much more non-linear, the need for lifelong learning has become extremely important. A report released in 2017 by the Foundation for Young Australians (FYA) predicts that a 15-year old is more likely to have 17 jobs over five industries in their life lifetime. This means that increasingly employees are required to constantly learn, unlearn and relearn in order to update their skills and stay relevant. Therefore, individuals will need to have access to learning opportunities for different purposes and at various career stages throughout their lives. We need to build education and funding models that reflect this change and a culture that promotes it.
2. Skills over Degrees
Rapidly advancing technologies such as artificial intelligence, big data analytics, robotics and the advent of quantum computing have created an environment in which much of what is learned in college becomes outdated in a few short years. For example, a 2016 World Economic Forum report found that “in many industries and countries, the most in-demand occupations or specialties did not exist 10 or even five years ago, and the pace of change is set to accelerate.” This means that people will not only need to learn frequently but also quickly. Employers are increasing looking for people with soft skills such as creative thinking, critical thinking, leadership and the ability to learn new skills in an evolving environment. One-size-fits-all in education will soon be a thing of the past and individual learning paths will arguably be less defined by traditional educational structures. Therefore, higher education institutes must develop new routes to personalised skills development.
3. Business and Funding Models
Rapid social and technological change, combined with rising education costs, have made our traditional higher education systems an increasingly archaic and risky path. The cost of higher education is becoming extremely high and the debt incurred and time lost is not outweighing the future earning potential of students. Yet too often a University degree perpetuates the illusion that it is a lifelong stamp of professional competency. Recent research also shows more and more companies, including prominent ones such as Google, Apple, Penguin Random House, Ernst & Young UK and IBM, are actively shifting focus away from degrees to new ways of measuring employability as a consequence of the changing nature of work. As per my previous two points people will be required to study often throughout their lifetime and do it quickly in order to stay relevant. Therefore, we need to find new business and funding models in order to accommodate these changes.
So, what does all this mean for higher education institutions?
Traditional Universities must seriously re-evaluate their roles in this new paradigm. Higher education institutions must acknowledge the need to change and develop alternative and innovative models of programs which do not need three or four years to acquire and incur a massive debt. They must use technology, data and new models of public/ private partnerships in order to introduce new, alternative approaches that better deliver on the evolving expectations of learners.
I do not know exactly what the new model will look like but I am confident that the future higher education landscape will almost certainly consist of disruptive new entrants, competing and collaborating with the traditional actors — maybe with a redefined role for traditional institutions altogether.
