Innovation in Online Education
Innovation in Online Education
Even outside of technology, there are countless ways to innovate on education with online schools
Based on my learning from UVA Darden's Business Growth Strategy course, I am writing a 4 part series on the growth of online schools. The course outlines 4 growth strategies: growth through scaling, entry, acquisition, and innovation.
The online schools I am discussing (often called cohort-based courses) are live, virtual schools for adults (typically post-undergrad) without accreditation.
"You would be hard pressed to point to any other industry sector so tied to historical practice, or structured in such a way as to inhibit real change, even when failure to do so represents an existential threat." - David Rosowsky, Ph.D via Forbes
Online schools will grow through constant innovation. When we think about innovation, we often think about new technology. I write about the potential of integrating technology into the education system in my post Doing More With Less in Higher Ed. In short, we should embrace technology in higher education to provide more (high-quality education experiences) for less (less money, resources, time). While technological innovation is very important (discussed again here: Entering The Higher Education Market), there are other ways of innovating in education beyond technology.
A key point that the UVA Darden course makes around innovation within an organization is the importance of creating a culture that embraces failure.
Online schools can grow through innovation by embracing failure and imperfection to innovate on every aspect of the education model. In this spirit, nothing about a school can be sacred when designing a digitally native education solution.
For example, timing, class size, content delivery, intensity, and price can and should be tweaked, iterated, and improved upon to find the best way to deliver transformational learning experiences.
The Darden course highlights the importance of failing fast to innovate. Digitally native schools should embrace this ethos. With the support of the flexibly of the online environment, we should embrace failure to innovate on how an education institution operates. Through many iterations and experiments, we can come closer to better ways to structure the education institutions of the future.
For example, there is an opportunity to innovate on time and intensity. David Rosowsky, the former Provost and Senior Vice President at the University of Vermont, gives some ideas of ways to innovate with timing: "12-month academic calendar, or the within-semester block scheduling options, or the embedded experiential learning component, or the flexible start-date, or the ability to start and stop enrollment." I explain further in a previous newsletter.
If you go a step further, one could ask: Are two year graduate degrees the optimal time required to learn? Can we experiment to provide similar value related to network and career transition in a shorter amount of time (and in tandem less money)? With experimentation and fast failure, we can innovate to see what time and intensity combinations provide the best outcomes.
Also, we can innovate on the financial relationship with students. For example, Lambda School innovated on the financial model of education with the ISA (income share agreement). Similarly, I often think about Y Combinator in the context of education. (I wrote a post called The Future of Higher Ed looks like YC not Harvard). While they don't formally call themselves an education institution, they provide many of the same benefits of an education institution: expert teachers, community, accountability, outcomes, brand/prestige, network, and access. On top of this, they fund the companies admitted into YC.
In summary, online schools can grow by innovating on every aspect of the education model from the technology they use to the structure of the programs to the financial relationships with the students.
Thanks for reading my series on the growth of online schools! Feedback is always welcome, so feel free to send me questions or comments: grant@makemymba.com.