Adult Enrollment Trap

There are quite a few private universities betting on adult learners to solve their enrollment problems. CAEL just released a report that can help revise their aspirational growth plans. Not surprising, the report notes that cost is the most frequently cited barrier to enrollment. Telling prospective adult learners that a fully online undergraduate degree costs $80,000-90,000 has never been  good marketing copy. The adults most motivated to enroll have long been those least able to meet the price point. Counting on yielding even a nominal number of the 65 million prospective adult learners while ignoring what they can actually afford will be a catastrophic fail for these universities.

Beyond cost, the CAEL report highlights the rapidly increasing demand among adult learners for shorter-term, workforce-aligned pathways. These are the learners telling us they want credentials tied to careers without the overhead of a traditional degree structure. Private universities offering conventional four-year online degrees at premium prices are solving the wrong problem for a growing share of this market. The worst online growth plans are also failing to adequately address credit for prior learning. Adult learners come to us with decades of work history, industry credentials, and military service that directly overlaps with degree requirements. Yet many private universities continue to impose cumbersome credit for prior learning policies and processes. For a population that's primarily motivated by career advancement and skill development, being forced to re-learn what they already know and pay for the privilege is a pretty compelling reason to walk down the street to the accessible, flexible and affordable public university.

Private universities have a genuine opportunity here, but only if they're willing to be honest about what the adult learner market requires. Affordability, time flexibility, and recognition of prior learning are the core of the value proposition for this market. Universities counting on adult enrollment to offset demographic decline, while maintaining traditional-age pricing and rigid credit policies, are going to find that intent doesn't convert to enrollment, and enrollment doesn't convert to completion. The data supports urgency and a serious rethinking of whether current program designs were built for the students these institutions claim to want to serve.