Challenger Universities pt. 4b: How to Build a Differentiated Challenger University — Delivering Better Student Outcomes

This Emerge article series, researched in collaboration with our extensive network of education leaders, offers insights and practical advice for founders and university leaders bold enough to create new universities.

This is part 4b of our Challenger University series, where I write about the challenges with existing universities and the potential for new challenger universities to arise (first piece here: pt 1). In previous pieces I laid out the Market landscape of challenger universities (pt. 3) and The strategic framework for building a differentiated university (pt. 4), starting with how to create a unique student experience (pt. 4a).

There are 4 pillars of innovation that challenger universities can innovate against to create attractive student propositions. In this piece we focus on Outcomes, which in light of rising costs, have become one of the most debated topics in Higher Education: “What is the purpose of HE and what outcomes should it help students with?”

Outcomes: What specific outcomes am I going to support my students in achieving?

The status quo: This is today’s norm in how well students are supported and prepared for making the best decisions, and achieving strong outcomes throughout and after university:

You choose whether to go university and what to study with very limited thinking and guidance given the importance of the decision. You are offered loans, scholarships and promises of a better future without the guidance on what that better future means and how to evaluate it (given ROI and opportunity costs — neither of which are terms you understand).

You go to university and get drawn into the experience and flow, realising it has very little connection to the real world and employers. Your main connection to the real world are academics, books and classroom-based assignments and projects. Someone tells you that you should start thinking about internships, but you quickly realise that there are not enough internships for the vast majority of students.

If you do not manage to complete your degree and drop out, you realise that a few semesters or years of education without a diploma do not mean much to most employers. If you do get your degree, you are often faced with the harsh employment reality in which you are scrambling to determine how your translate your skills into what employers want and you often don’t get the job you were hoping for.

The potential: How can challenger universities offer significantly more value to students in defining and fulfilling objectives and finding meaningful jobs? There are 6 key dimensions of innovation that we define, a combination of which those challenger universities that are optimising for Outcomes should embrace. It is key that the chosen dimensions are embedded within the core vision, ethos, strategy and tech stack of the organisation. The embodiment of these dimensions could be supported through various existing third party technologies which we have covered in part through our extensive research on Employer University Collaboration here.

Objectives-focused: Help students define and redefine their goals and think about outcomes, development and careers from day one

The status quo: Students have very limited understanding of careers and industries in secondary school to make informed decisions about their field of study. Once they enrol their focus is on how to finish the next exam, rather than how to ensure they are closer to understanding and achieving their objectives, including employment. Students realise there is a department for this called Career Services, which is often under-resourced, providing off-the-shelf generic advice and support.

The potential: Be closer to and more transparent with students, while playing a more active role in:

• Working with secondary schools / high schools to help raise student awareness and improve decision making against various academic field options, given the nature of the study and careers that those fields are complementary too (e.g. with the support of companies like UniFrog and Unibuddy)
• Being transparent with students around finances, returns on investment of various degrees and graduation prospects, to inform better decisions (e.g. Blackbullion)
• Working with students from day one to help them think about and act upon changing interests and objectives, while keeping the big picture and post-university prospects in mind (eg Mentor Collective)

Better assessment & progression: Acknowledge that students learn in different ways, and different paces and adjust testing and progression accordingly

The status quo: Assessing student performance is largely a one-size fits all environment. Everyone is expected to move at the same pace and in doing so reach certain basic pass thresholds on the same assignments and exams. Failing exams can set you back years, while excelling in them rarely ever helps you graduate faster at a lower cost.

The potential: Realise that you will always be dealing with individuals with different abilities, preferred paces and life circumstances and adjust your offer by:

• Optimising and tailoring student assessment, reducing stressful situations and increasing breadth of assessment methods, to consider student’s unique circumstances (e.g. with the help of companies like UNIwise, Ecree and Examity)
• Using mastery-based learning to support every student with reaching a strong level of subject understanding through multiple means and opportunities, especially in foundational courses that have implications on the acquisition of further knowledge
• Removing ancient agriculture-necessitated time degree constraints, buy giving students more study and class enrolment dates, exam dates, as well as graduation dates, moving away from rigid 2 or 3 or 4 year progression calendars

Case studies: University of People has a unique admissions process through which students that meet basic criteria are guaranteed acceptance if they complete a set of foundational courses at their own pace. Foundry College actively embeds mastery-based learning in its courses, giving student multiple opportunities to master concepts before moving on. EDU Medical College admits up to 9 cohorts of students per year with learning and practical modules broken down into 8 and 4 week chunks, giving students enrolment and study flexibilities.

Employer informed: Ensure employers and industry professionals play an active role in shaping the course design and experience

The status quo: Courses are designed by academics and run by academics and young research staff, often with limited and/or outdated connections with employers and industry. The only exposure employers often have with the university curriculum is through looking at student transcripts and what they can gather and assess from student interviews.

The potential: Make employers a key part of the curriculum and student learning by:

• Ensuring that each course is informed by and ideally (co-)lead by industry professionals who can translate and connect the theory with the modern industry context
• Creating opportunities for students to experience and gain skills and credentials through simulated or real industry tasks and assignments that give students tangible employment preparation (e.g. with the support of companies like Riipen and FourthRev)

Employment as the norm: Instead of career services being one of many departments, think about how it can become the core ethos of your institution

The status quo: Universities (pre-Covid) guarantee a classroom, a professor and 2–4 years’ worth of educational content. University’s career services departments offer some advice, CV / cover letter tips, particularly as you reach graduation, and an employment fair once or twice a year. They in no way offer guarantees around meaningful employment with many graduates today becoming underemployed or moving to industries outside of their study focus and interests.

The potential: Shift the job responsibility and failures from students to universities by:

• Creating meaningful pathways for your students that are employment, not academia driven. If students put in the hard work and achieve strong results, if on the right pathway, they should have the relevant skills and attributes to have strong employment prospects. Look at examples of some of the more successful rising bootcamps (e.g. Lambda, Flatiron School)
• Creating strong bridges between employers and students. Employer relationships should be seen as an absolute priority, where universities understand employer needs and have large enough pools of employer relationships, while employers are intimately aware of and comfortable with skills students are building with multiple touchpoints along the way (e.g. with the support of companies like Handshake)

Case study: Ecole 42 and Epitech in France have in a very short amount of time become synonymous in the software and coding space with guaranteed employment, supplying 5% of France’s software engineers.

Modular career off-ramps: Create multiple opportunities for students to achieve career goals, be it after the first semester or after the full 1–4 years upon graduation

The status quo: Unless you graduate and get a shiny diploma, your student experience is often considered a failure as there are is almost no recognition for partial degrees and often no bridges to meaningful college-level employment. Similarly, moving from one HE institution to another is difficult and, even if possible, often nullifies many semesters worth of hard work.

The potential: Create the foundations of an environment where there are multiple positive outcomes, over and above receiving a graduation diploma, by:

• Creating bridges with other HE institutions that fully recognise your coursework and might be better next steps or alternatives to your institution (e.g. with the help of companies like Acadeum)
• Creating an employment-as-a-success culture, where students have multiple opportunities during their studies to gain PT or FT employment, without having to just wait for graduation. If students have the pre-requisites that employers are looking for and their circumstances make early employment preferable, this should be considered as a success for both the students and university, not something that is seen as negatively skewing graduation data

Case studies: The irony of US MBA programmes is that many students get internships 3–6 months into their studies that eventually lead to full time employment upon graduation 2 years later with the same employer. 3 months into your MBA you might already have secured your desired outcome, but you still have to study for 2 years and pile on $200k in debt + opportunity cost. School 42 has a different philosophy to student success. Students that accept a full-time offer after internships or during studies are still considered successes. For a 4 year learning experience, students who complete the initial foundation coursework and accept jobs at any stage after are still considered alumni.

Education as an employment extension: Think about how university can complement employment and fit around specific employer needs

The status quo: Universities are often seen as places where students and adults learn, while employers are seen as places where this learning is applied. When employers need to upskill or reskill their staff, going back to university is often considered the only way.

The potential: Instead of creating education and fitting it against employers, start with employers needs and employment first by:

• Creating employer-specific study pathways where employers give their seal of approval and sponsor employee courses and degrees that closely run part-time alongside employment and are directly relevant to the student’s work (e.g. with the support of companies like Guild Education)
• Creating employer-specific courses and degrees, where universities run and manage programmes for groups of employers with their specific requirements and outcomes in mind

Case studies: Pearson College runs highly practical degree apprenticeships. From day one students are placed to work with one of Pearson’s partner employers for part of the week, while for the other part they get their practical education with Pearson College from mostly industry teaching staff with strong, current industry connections.

In this piece we have covered our views on how challenger universities could support specific tangible student outcomes by focusing on a combination of 6 key pillars. Next week we will focus on the topic of audience and the 6 pillars challenger universities could embrace to create a more targeted offer keeping in mind different and changing student demands.

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While starting a new university is probably one of the most difficult and likely to fail ideas that you can have, it is such crazy ideas that excite us at Emerge. If you are a daring founder in this space or a university leader on the path to improving or reinventing the core student experience, we would love to talk and see how we can help. Send me an e-mail on mario.barosevcic@emerge.education, or feel free to follow me on LinkedIn or Medium and sign up to our newsletter here.