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It is hard to participate in our various learning innovation communities, from EDUCAUSE to OLC to UPCEA to WCET to NMC to edX, without feeling as if major jumps in postsecondary productivity are not only possible, but imminent.
If you read blogs like Higher Ed Gamma, or spend time on the EDUCAUSE Leading Academic Transformation community of practice site, you will find a wealth of amazing ideas and exciting examples of higher ed innovation.
So why is it that our edtech ideas to improve postsecondary productivity (along the dimensions of quality, costs, and access) feel so far away from widespread adoption?
How is it that we know so much, but that higher ed seems to be getting more expensive at a faster rather than it is getting better?
Why do we have all this amazing organizational, technological, and pedagogical knowledge - and yet have not been able to significantly move the needle on improving postsecondary access?
Don’t get me wrong. There are many areas of higher education that are hugely better than when I was a college freshman 30 years ago.
Online education has created opportunities for millions to receive degrees, while at the same time the techniques pioneered in online programs (backwards course design, formative assessments etc. etc.) have diffused into blended and residential course offerings.
The confluence of rapid advances in learning science, and improvements in our physical and digital instructional environments, has led to large (and mostly unrecognized) improvements in the quality of our foundational courses. (The average intro to statistics, calculus, and biology course is much better today than that same course was 3 decades ago).
It should be recognized that there is an amazing energy and excitement, across a wide range of institutions, about new initiatives and programs designed to improve active and experiential learning opportunities for students.
Despite these positives (and I could list many more), it is hard to argue against the conclusion that the rate of higher ed improvement from 1987 (the year I went to college) has not kept up with the growth in prices.
In 1986-1987, the average tuition, fees, and room and board (in 2016 dollars) was $21,650 for private non-profit four year schools, and $8,900 for public four-year institutions. By 2016-2017, the corresponding figures were $45,370 and $20,090.
The real price for private higher ed has increased 110 percent, and for public higher ed 126 percent, since I went to college.
We can definitely say that higher education has gotten much better in the past 30 years. What I don’t think we can is that higher education has gotten 100% (or 110% or 126%) better.
Should we be having more of a crisis in confidence within our postsecondary edtech and innovation communities?
If us folks in our various academic transformation communities truly know how to improve postsecondary productivity (maybe an open question), then how come we have not gained the influence or authority to enact our ideas at a level that shows up in the overall cost and quality data?
Is ours a failure of ideas, or a failure of execution?
Yes, I know that there is a large literature on our higher ed cost disease. We should acknowledge that much of the student price increase is driven by the decline in state level support for public education.
I get that this is not an original question, and that there is no shortage of research and opinions on the roots of rising costs and lagging postsecondary productivity gains.
What I’m asking for is that our learning innovation / academic transformation communities tackle these issues head on.
That we put prices and productivity at the center of our innovation and academic transformation conversations.
Is that too much to ask?
