Losing power and market.

YOU KNOW, I JUST MAY HAVE TO GIVE UP WRITING THESE DARN editorial columns, if you people keep writing them for me. Across my desk today came a confidential (read: do not reveal source) response to last month's editorial note, "A Question of Balance." In it, the author--a senior-level university administrator--confides that his university's president has had to fight a "long-standing faculty notion that 'they' are in charge." But he goes on to discuss an even more interesting angle to the question of who an institution of higher education is actually for (students or faculty).

"There is one major force that will likely bring the system into balance," he says, "and that is the marketplace. The traditional schools had better pay close attention to the big distance-education providers, because with a very tech-savvy generation moving through the pipeline, the distance ed mode may become very appealing, even to the most traditional of students."

This, of course, brings to light the whole issue of whether or not formidable, traditional IHEs truly have something to fear from the most capable of the for-profit distance ed providers--or even from their peer schools, jumping on the distance ed bandwagon. Is distance ed primarily for the older, skill-honing student, as we originally thought? Is it for job seekers looking for certification into various job markets? For the unemployed, sprucing up during downsizing? Is distance ed for the housebound young mother in rural environs? For the high school grad with limited funds and no means of transportation?

Or, is distance ed a sensible, effective, efficient, and (dare I say it?) quality alternative to traditional education as we now know it; a true and viable option for any high school graduate of any socioeconomic stratum, at any time? In other words, in the minds of traditional postsecondary educators, is distance ed Your Worst Nightmare--and a threat that is looming right around the corner, at that?

Education writer Rebecca Sausner, reporting in the July 2003 issue of University Business ("Carving your Slice of the Virtual Education Pie"), observed, "... there's the growing threat of losing traditional college and university students to the virtuals: After long focusing their efforts on adult Learners and degree completers, online education companies are now setting their sights on the traditionally campus-bound."

And according to Sean Robert Gallagher, an Eduventures higher education analyst, schools that are not responsive to changing market conditions may be at risk of losing even their most traditional local applicants: "Institutions in a particular geographic area that previously attracted local students ... now face direct competition for that student from an institution that may be 3,000 or more miles away."

In light of these revelations, then, does it not become ever more incumbent upon college and university presidents driving change in their institutions to keep their schools evolving and competitive--even if that means a "Wake Up and Smell the Roses" stance with reticent faculty who would prefer to keep the institution modeled to their own image of the academy? The new demands of the higher education marketplace would seem to make this tougher attitude a necessity. Indeed, Philip DiSalvio, assistant provost and director of Seton Worldwide (the online campus of Seton Hall University), has remarked, "A rapidly changing marketplace is a major threat to [IHE] brand equity." Speaking in the June 2003 issue of this publication ("Harvard Online: Paradigm Shift, or Business as Usual?"), he also noted, "While it's hard to imagine that Harvard has qualms about the University of Phoenix encroaching on its target market, peer institutions with comparable brand names have begun to lure top students with an "anywhere, anytime" degree delivery strategy."

In the ongoing struggle to wrest lost power (and thus a competitive attitude for the school) from his own faculty, one new college president "will be announcing to the faculty that they will now spend a combined time of 40 hours a week at the college, available for students. That means that if they are teaching 15 hours a week, they will be available to students 25 hours per week." Faculty at this school, says the anonymous source of this information, had been "allowed to take their required office hours down from 15 to five hours per week. My husband is faculty here and Laughed at how these instructors are on easy street. [Other] staff and faculty were constantly dealing with students who could not reach their faculty advisors [because] faculty wants were put before the student needs. My response [to the new hours] is, it is about time."

What will happen to schools that are not responsive to market changes and neglect a revitalization of their faculty availability and strengths (surely a traditional IHE's strongest selling points)? Our original unnamed letter writer pulled no punches when he predicted, "As the father of an eight-year-old, I am already wondering if [an online education] might be a better avenue for her, down the road. That way, she may actually get a real education instead of having to put up with all these arrogant, overrated, outdated, and self-interested professors who care only about their own political agendas and their arcane worlds of sub-specialty research."

Yipes. I expect to hear plenty about that one.

You can reach Kathy Grayson at [e-mail].