business side of he

Two items re: enrollment data for higher education

On 11/01/2024, in business side of he, colleges, community colleges, funding / grants, higher education, legislatures / government / legal, parents/guardians, student-related, United States, universities, by Daniel Christian

Undergraduate enrollment rises 3% despite drop in first-year students, early data shows — from highereddive.com by Laura Spitalniak
Headcounts declined among students attending college directly after high school, the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center found.

Dive Brief:

Undergraduate enrollment rose this fall for the second year in a row, up 3% compared to similar early data from fall 2023, according to preliminary figures released Wednesday by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center.
Enrollment jumped 1.9% in bachelor’s degree programs and 4.3% in those for associate degrees. While all credential types saw gains, the number of undergraduate certificate seekers increased the most, at 7.3%.
However, enrollment among first-year students shrank 5%, the first dip since the decline seen at the start of the pandemic. Declining enrollment among 18-year-olds — a proxy for students who attend college directly after high school — accounted for most of that drop, the clearinghouse said.

What preliminary enrollment data from fall 2024 tells us — from highereddive.com by Laura Spitalniak
Higher education experts broke down some trends in the early data and what may have prompted the decline in first-year students.

Higher education news tends to be a mixed bag, and the most recent enrollment report from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center is no exception.

Last week, the clearinghouse released preliminary findings for fall 2024 and found that undergraduate enrollment rose 3% compared with early data from last year. On the other hand, it showed enrollment among first-year students dropped 5% compared with the year before, the first decline since the drop at the start of the pandemic.

The youngest adults, 18-year-olds, drove a majority of the decrease, according to the clearinghouse. Its researchers used this group as a proxy for students who enroll in postsecondary education directly after they graduate high school, it said.

2025 EDUCAUSE Top 10: Restoring Trust

On 10/29/2024, in adjunct faculty, business side of he, change, colleges, community colleges, higher education, IT in HE, leadership, strategy, United States, universities, by Daniel Christian

2025 EDUCAUSE Top 10: Restoring Trust — from educause.edu

Higher education has a trust problem. In the past ten years, the share of Americans who are confident in higher education has dropped from 57 percent to 36 percent.

Colleges and universities need to show that they understand and care about students, faculty, staff, and community members, AND they need to work efficiently and effectively.

Technology leaders can help. The 2025 EDUCAUSE Top 10 describes how higher education technology and data leaders and professionals can help to restore trust in the sector by building competent and caring institutions and, through radical collaboration, leverage the fulcrum of leadership to maintain balance between the two.

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The Uberfication of Higher Ed [Ubell]

On 10/29/2024, in adjunct faculty, business side of he, career development, colleges, community colleges, faculty, higher education, learning ecosystem, teaching & learning, United States, universities, by Daniel Christian

The Uberfication of Higher Ed — from evolllution.com by Robert Ubell | Vice Dean Emeritus of Online Learning in the School of Engineering, New York University
As the world of work increasingly relies on the gig economy, higher ed is no different. Many institutions seek to drive down labor costs by hiring contingent works, thereby leaving many faculty in a precarious position and driving down the quality of education.

While some of us are aware that higher ed has been steadily moving away from employing mostly full-time, tenured and tenure-track faculty, replacing them with a part-time, contingent academic workforce, the latest AAUP report issued this summer shows the trend is accelerating. Precarious college teachers have increased by nearly 300,000 over the last decade, as conventional faculty employment stays pretty much flat. It’s part of a national trend in the wider economy that replaces permanent workers with lower paid, contingent staff—members of what we now call the gig economy.

The wide disparity is among the most glaring dysfunctions—along with vast student debt, falling enrollment, rising tuition and other dangers afflicting higher education—but it’s the least acknowledged. Rarely, if ever, does it take its place among the most troubling ails of academic life. It’s a silent disease, its symptoms largely ignored for over half a century.

Do families who send their kids to college, paying increasingly stiff tuition, realize that most of the faculty at our universities are as precarious as Uber drivers?
…
Everyone at the table was taken aback, totally surprised, a sign—even if anecdotal—that this dirty secret is pretty safe. Mass participation of contingent faculty at our universities remains largely obscure, wrapped in a climate of silence, with adjunct faculty perpetuating the quiet by leaving their students mostly uninformed about their working conditions.

College sports are out of hand! [Christian]

On 10/29/2024, in business, business side of he, change, changing business models, colleges, Daniel S. Christian, higher education, parents/guardians, student-related, trends, United States, universities, vendors, by Daniel Christian

From DSC:
The following reflections were catalyzed by Jeff Selingo’s Next posting from 10/22, specifically the item:

Student fees for athletics, dark money in college sports, and why this all matters to every student, every college.

All of this has big risks for institutions. But whenever I talk to faculty and administrators on campuses about this, many will wave me away and say, “Well, I’m not a college sports fan” or “We’re a Division III school, so that all this doesn’t impact us.”

Nothing is further from the truth, as we explored on a recent episode of the Future U. podcast, where we welcomed in Matt Brown, editor of the Extra Points newsletter, which looks at academic and financial issues in college sports.

As we learned, despite the siloed nature of higher ed, everything is connected to athletics: research, academics, market position. Institutions can rise and fall on the backs of their athletics programs – and we’re not talking about wins and losses, but real budget dollars.

And if you want to know about the impact on students, look no further than the news out of Clemson this week. It is following several other universities in adopting an “athletics fee”: $300 a year. It won’t be the last.

Give a listen to this episode of Future U. if you want to catch up quick on this complicated subject, and while you’re at it, subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

Clemson approves new athletics fee for students. Here’s what we know — from sports.yahoo.com by Chapel Fowler
How much are student fees at other schools?

That’s true in the state of South Carolina, when comparing the annual fees of Clemson ($300) and USC ($172) to Coastal Carolina ($2,090). And it holds up nationally, too.

DC: Having played a sport at the NCAA Div I collegiate level, I can say sports are out of hand in our country. Increasingly, ALL students are being billed new athletic-related fees. One wonders…in the future, how much will future Ss/parents pay per yr? https://t.co/P64plKVdH2

— Daniel S. Christian (@dchristian5) October 22, 2024

From DSC:
The Bible talks a lot about idols….and I can’t help but wonder, have sports become an idol in our nation?

Don’t get me wrong. Sports can and should be fun for us to play. I played many an hour of sports in my youth and I occasionally play some sports these days. Plus, sports are excellent for helping us keep in shape and take care of our bodies. Sports can help us connect with others and make some fun/good memories with our friends.

So there’s much good to playing sports. But have we elevated sports to places they were never meant to be? To roles they were never meant to play?

Freshman enrollment dropped more than 5% from last year at American colleges & universities [Montague]

On 10/23/2024, in business side of he, colleges, community colleges, higher education, parents/guardians, reinvent, staying relevant, student-related, surviving, United States, universities, by Daniel Christian

Freshman Enrollment Appears to Decline for the First Time Since 2020 — from nytimes.com by Zach Montague (behind paywall)
A projected 5 percent drop in this year’s freshman class follows a number of disruptions last year, including persistent failures with the FAFSA form.

Freshman enrollment dropped more than 5 percent from last year at American colleges and universities, the largest decline since 2020 when Covid-19 and distance learning upended higher education, according to preliminary data released on Wednesday by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, a nonprofit education group.

The finding comes roughly a year after the federal student aid system was dragged down by problems with the Free Application for Federal Student Aid form, commonly known as FAFSA, which led to maddening delays this year in processing families’ financial data to send to school administrators. That in turn held up the rollout of financial aid offers well into the summer, leaving many families struggling to determine how much college would cost.

Re: the business of higher ed, also see:

Tracking college closures— from hechingerreport.org by Marina Villeneuve and Olivia Sanchez
More colleges are shutting down as enrollment drops

College enrollment has been declining for more than a decade, and that means that many institutions are struggling to pay their bills. A growing number of them are making the difficult decision to close.

In the first nine months of 2024, 28 degree-granting institutions closed, compared with 15 in all of 2023, according to an analysis of federal data provided to The Hechinger Report by the State Higher Education Executive Officers Association or SHEEO.

And when colleges close, it hurts the students who are enrolled. At the minimum, colleges that are shutting down should notify students at least three months in advance, retain their records and refund tuition, experts say. Ideally, it should form an agreement with a nearby school and make it easy for students to continue their education.

“College competition & operational pain are the ‘new normal,’ S&P says” [Unglesbee] + other items re: higher ed

On 10/14/2024, in adjunct faculty, business side of he, colleges, community colleges, cost of getting a degree, faculty, higher education, learning ecosystem, liberal arts, neurodivergent/special needs, parents/guardians, student-related, teaching & learning, United States, universities, by Daniel Christian

S&P: Community colleges lifted by improved enrollment and finances — from highereddive.com by Ben Unglesbee

Dive Brief:

With enrollment trends improving and state appropriations increasing, the community college sector has reason for “optimism,” according to a recent report from S&P Global Ratings.
For 2023, median full-time equivalent enrollment, at 5,439 students, was down just 0.3% from 2021 and up nearly 8.1% from the previous year, S&P found among the roughly 200 community colleges it rates. That comes after enrollment in the sector fell 7.7% year over year in 2022,.
Meanwhile, median state appropriations per FTE student for the sector increased 19.1% to $4,930 between 2021 and 2023, analysts found.

College competition and operational pain are the ‘new normal,’ S&P says — from highereddive.com by Ben Unglesbee-
Margins are down, costs are up and tuition revenue is constrained after the pandemic exacerbated existing challenges, according to a recent report.

Dive Brief:

U.S. colleges face a “new normal” and accelerated existing challenges in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, including constrained operations and heavy competition, a recent report from S&P Global Ratings found.
Between 2018 and 2023, operating margin rates fell from 0.8% to -0.1% amid rising costs to colleges, according to S&P. Meanwhile, median tuition discount rates at private colleges rose by more than 5 percentage points, to 44.4%, in that period, putting pressure on college revenues.
From 2019 through the second quarter of 2024, the ratings agency issued 126 credit downgrades for the higher ed sector, compared to 62 upgrades, per the report.

5 ways colleges can improve outreach to rural students — from highereddive.com by Laura Spitalniak
Students from small towns help strengthen campus communities, said panelists at the National Association for College Admission Counseling’s conference.

We cannot just swoop in and take the best and brightest and just say, ‘Oh, good job us.’ We want this to be a two-way highway, not a one-way brain drain.

Marjorie Betley
Deputy director of admissions at the University of Chicago

A Trauma-Informed Teaching Framework for Stewards — from scholarlyteacher.com by Jeannette Baca, New Mexico Highlands University; Debbie Gonzalez, California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt; Jamie Langlois, Grand Valley State University; and Mary Kirk, Winona State University

Using the Trauma-Informed Community of Inquiry (T-I CoI) framework as a pedagogical design helped us address students’ emotional stress and facilitated cognitive growth and connection to the learning process. It also provided an opportunity to create a sense of community within an online learning environment. When we returned to in-person instruction, the model continued to be beneficial.

Average Student Loan Debt — from educationdata.org by Melanie Hanson; last updated August 16, 2024

Report Highlights.

The total average student loan debt (including private loan debt) may be as high as $40,681.
The average federal student loan debt is $37,853 per borrower.
Outstanding private student loan debt totals $128.8 billion.
The average student borrows over $30,000 to pursue a bachelor’s degree.
A total of 42.8 million borrowers have federal student loan debt.
It may take borrowers close to 20 years to pay off their student loans.

From DSC:
In other words, we are approaching the end of the line in terms of following the status quo within higher education. Institutions of traditional higher education can no longer increase their cost of tuition by significantly more than the rate of inflation. Increasingly, K-12 students (and families) are looking for other pathways and alternatives. Higher ed better stop trying to change around the edges…they need new, more cost-effective business models as well as being able to be much more responsive in terms of their curricula.

Has the cost of college reached a tipping point for a significant number of middle-class students? [Young]

On 09/27/2024, in business side of he, colleges, community colleges, cost of getting a degree, future of higher education, higher education, parents/guardians, student-related, trends, United States, universities, by Daniel Christian

Has the cost of college reached a tipping point for a significant number of middle-class students? — from edsurge.com by Jeffrey R. Young

Has the cost of college reached a tipping point for a significant number of middle-class students?

I’m seeing more signs of just that, and it’s happening at the undergrad and graduate levels.

Just this week, for instance, a new survey of 1,500 high school counselors conducted by the education consulting firm EAB found 63 percent reported that fewer students at public schools plan to attend college than four years ago. And 53 percent of those counselors said cost was the primary reason.

Meanwhile, a new study released this week by Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce found that the cost of graduate education has risen to the point where a significant number of degrees will not pay off. The center says that 41 percent of master’s degree programs and 67 percent of professional degree programs for which data was available would not pass their “debt-to-earnings test,” meaning they would not bring enough earnings to cover the cost plus interest from typical student loans.

Also see:

How Rising Higher Ed Costs Change Student Attitudes About College — from edsurge.com by Jeffrey R. Young

Risepoint Releases Voice of the Online Learner Report

On 09/12/2024, in Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning / Deep Learning / Algorithms, business side of he, colleges, community colleges, cost of getting a degree, higher education, online learning, parents/guardians, skills, society, student-related, United States, universities, by Daniel Christian

Risepoint Releases Voice of the Online Learner Report — from academicpartnerships.com by Risepoint; via Jeff Selingo on LinkedIn

The Voice of the Online Learner report highlights the journey of online learners, and the vital role education plays in their personal and professional growth and development. This year’s report compiled responses from over 3,400 prospective, current, and recently graduated online learners.

Key findings from this year’s Voice of the Online Learner report include:

Decision Factors for Online Students: When evaluating online programs, the key decision for students is cost, with 86% saying it’s extremely or very important. After cost, 84% said accreditation is most important, 75% said program concentrations, followed by 68% of respondents who said it was the time it took to achieve a degree. 38% selected the lowest cost program they evaluated (up from 29% in 2023).
Perception of Online Programs: Students see online programs as equally valid or better at meeting their needs than on-campus degree programs. 83% of respondents prefer the flexibility of online programs over hybrid or on-campus options, while 90% feel online programs are comparable to or better than an on-campus degree. 83% (up from 71% last year) want no on campus requirement.
Degree ROI: 92% of students who graduated from online degree programs reported tangible benefits to their career, including 44% who received a salary increase.
Value of the Degree: Career outcomes continue to be very important for students pursuing their degree.86% felt their degrees were important in achieving their career goals, and 61% of online undergraduates are likely to enroll in additional online degree programs to stay competitive.
Importance of Local Programs: Attending a university or college in the state where the student lives and works is also an important decision factor, with 70% enrolled at a higher education institution in the state where they live and/or work. These students say that local proximity creates greater trust, and that they also want to ensure the programs meet local licensing or accreditation requirements, when relevant.
Demographics: The average age for online students enrolled in undergraduate programs is 36 years old, while the average age for students enrolled in graduate programs is 38 years old. Of the students enrolled in undergraduate programs, 40% are first-generation college students.
Upskilling is lifelong: 86% of graduated and currently enrolled students are likely to do another online program in the future to upskill.
Generative AI is a concern: Students want guidance on generative AI, but 75% reported they have received none. 40% of students think it will affect their career positively and 40% believe it will impact them negatively. Nearly half (48%) have used it to help them study.

Majoring in video games? A new wave of degrees underscores the pressures on colleges — from usatoday.com by Zachary Schermele
From degrees in AI to social media influencing, colleges are adapting to economic trends with new majors that emphasize the debate about getting students their money’s worth.

Majors like hers are part of a broader wave of less conventional, avant-garde majors, in specialties such as artificial intelligence, that are taking root in American higher education, as colleges grapple with changes in the economy and a shrinking pool of students.
…
The trend underscores the distinct ways schools are responding to growing concerns over which degrees provide the best return on investment. As college costs soared to new heights in recent years, saddling many students with crippling loan debt, that discourse has only become increasingly fraught, raising the stakes for schools to prove their degrees leave students better prepared and employable.

“I’m a big believer in the liberal arts, but universities don’t get to print money,” he said. “If enrollment interests are shifting, they have to be able to hire faculty to teach in those areas. Money has to come from someplace.”

From DSC:
Years ago, I remember having lunch with one of the finalists for the President position of a local university. He withdrew himself from the search because the institution’s culture would be like oil and water with him at the helm. He was very innovative, and this organization was not. I remember him saying, “The marketplace will determine what that organization ultimately does.” In other words, he was saying that higher education was market-driven. I agreed with him then, and I still agree with that perspective now.

School is back in session, and so are AI art classes [Farfan]

On 08/28/2024, in art, Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning / Deep Learning / Algorithms, business side of he, career development, change, changing business models, colleges, community colleges, creativity, curriculum, new business models, United States, universities, by Daniel Christian

School is back in session, and so are AI art classes — from hyperallergic.com by Isa Farfan
New university programs are incorporating generative tools into studio art courses while attempting to address the murky ethics of the technology.

There’s a new addition to the course catalog at Ringling College of Art and Design, a small private art school in southwest Florida: an Artificial Intelligence Undergraduate Certificate.

The college claimed its new program is the first-of-its-kind AI certificate at an undergraduate arts institution in a news release earlier this month. Other schools in the United States offer courses and certificates focused on the integration of artificial intelligence and creative work, and educators across the country have already brought the technology into the art studio. Critics, however, say pushing AI into arts education won’t level the playing field for professional artists competing against increasingly sophisticated generative tools.

From DSC:
Though this next item is not necessarily related to AI, the following is still art and it’s very fun to watch!

Wait for the magic pic.twitter.com/peHgBHCoti

— Learn Something (@cooltechtipz) August 27, 2024

Here’s why it’s so hard to change a culture [Satell] — Pay attention higher ed! [DSC]

On 08/25/2024, in business, business side of he, colleges, community colleges, corporate / business world, culture, higher education, organizational change, United States, universities, workplace, by Daniel Christian

Here’s why it’s so hard to change a culture — from digitaltonto.com by Greg Satell

Excerpt (emphasis DSC):

Lou Gerstner, writing about his legendary turnaround at IBM, said, “Culture isn’t just one aspect of the game, it is the game. In the end, an organization is nothing more than the collective capacity of its people to create value… What does the culture reward and punish – individual achievement or team play, risk taking or consensus building?”

Most business gurus would readily agree with that, but if you’d ask them what culture actually is they would be hard pressed to give a coherent answer. Anthropologists, on the other hand, are much more rigorous in their approach and most would agree that three essential elements of a culture are norms, rituals and behaviors.

In a positive organizational culture, norms and rituals support behaviors that honor the mission of the enterprise. Negative cultures undermine that mission. A common problem with many transformation initiatives is that they focus on designing incentives to alter behaviors. Unfortunately, unless you can shift norms and rituals, nothing is likely to change.

A New Problem With Four-Year Degrees: The Surge in College Closures — from wsj.com by Milla Surjadi; article behind a paywall
Universities have buckled under the strain of tuition losses as the number of college-bound students continues to decline

Over 500 private, nonprofit four-year institutions have closed in the last 10 years, according to the State Higher Education Executive Officers Association. That is three times what it was in the decade prior. Rachel Burns, a senior policy analyst at SHEEO, estimates at least 1.25 million students were affected by these closures. (Many more for-profit institutions have closed in this period as well.)

68% of seniors say college has significantly boosted their ability to land well-paying jobs, poll finds — from highereddive.com by Natalie Schwartz
Although the survey suggests students believe higher education has improved their career prospects, they’re still worried about job market competition.

Dive Brief:

Around two-thirds of incoming college seniors said college has significantly contributed to their ability to land a well–paying job, according to a new survey from job platform Handshake.
A slightly higher share, 72%, said higher education has appreciably improved their ability to secure a meaningful job. And 85% of surveyed seniors said college significantly helped them understand their own career goals.
College seniors also indicated that higher education has helped them beyond their career development. According to the survey, 88% said college significantly contributed to their personal growth.

Exploring the Landscape of College Instruction — from sr.ithaka.org by Sage Love and Melissa Blankstein
Highlights from the 2024 US Instructor Survey

We are excited to announce the publication of the 2024 US Instructor Survey. This survey, adapted from our longstanding US Faculty Survey, provides a detailed snapshot of over 5,200 faculty members from different disciplines, institution types, ages, and titles across the US at four-year institutions. This new report offers a comprehensive overview of how college instructors across the country are navigating and shaping the current educational landscape.

Overall, we heard that instructors are increasingly adopting innovative, technology-driven teaching methods, while recognizing the critical role libraries play in supporting student success. The growing use of open educational resources (OERs) reflects a commitment to affordable education, though fewer instructors create their own. Additionally, strong institutional support remains essential for effective teaching, particularly IT and with pedagogical practices. Below we share several key findings:

Will 25 Percent Of Colleges Consolidate? An Update On A Prediction — from forbes.com by Michael Horn

But starting with the 2013-14 academic year, a whopping 726 degree-granting institutions closed through the 2022-23 school year, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. That means in just nine years, 15 percent of the-then 4,724 degree-granting colleges or universities closed.
…
Ultimately, after all, the prediction is a result of business model failure, in which rising expenses outpace revenue, as the students cease to enroll or have the capacity to pay enough.

But non-profit institutions are in their own world of hurt as well. According to Higher Ed Dive, 18 have announced their closure this year so far. But 141 closed between 2013-14 and 2022-23—or roughly 8.4 percent.

Survey: Over Half of Rising Seniors Feel Pessimistic About Starting Their Careers — from insidehighered.com by Ahsley Mowreader
New data from Handshake finds 57 percent of the Class of 2025 have low expectations for their future after graduation, largely tied to a competitive job market, student loan debt and current political climate.

Entering senior year can be a stressful time for college students as they prepare for their next step after graduation. Inside Higher Ed’s 2024 Student Voice survey found 68 percent of fourth-year students (n=703) are at least somewhat stressed when they think about their life postgraduation, with 25 percent feeling “extremely stressed.”

This year’s graduating class is feeling less hopeful than their peers before them, with almost three in five students sharing that they feel pessimistic about their immediate future, according to new data from Handshake.

The results highlight a challenging job market for new graduates, the role of affordability in higher education and how institutions are supporting students as they launch into careers.

Reflections on “The Burden of Misunderstanding” [Hill]

On 08/15/2024, in adjunct faculty, business side of he, colleges, community colleges, Daniel S. Christian, faculty, higher education, legislatures / government / legal, online learning, policy, teaching & learning, teaching online, United States, universities, by Daniel Christian

The Burden of Misunderstanding — from onedtech.philhillaa.com by Phil Hill
How ED’s outdated consumer-protection view of online education could lead to bureaucratic burden on every online course in US higher ed

Time to Comment
There are plenty of other points to be made on this proposed rule:

the lack of evidence supporting the treatment of online ed differently than f2f or hybrid;
the redefinition of regular and substantive interaction;
the impact of this simplification rule actually complicating matters for compliance; and
the risk of auto-withdrawal for 14-day inactivity periods, etc.

For now, I wanted to be more precise on what I believe is a misunderstood compliance burden of ED’s proposed rule, and ED’s inability to listen to feedback from colleges and universities and associations representing them. And that while the details of this proposed rule might seem arcane, it will have a major impact across higher ed.

It is very important to note that we are in the middle of the public comment period for these proposed rules, and that ED should hear directly from colleges and universities about the impact of the proposed rules. You can comment here through next Friday (August 23rd).

From DSC:
Phil brings up numerous excellent points in the above posting. If the Department of Education’s (ED’s) proposed rules on online attendance taking get finalized, the impacts could be huge — and negative/costly in several areas. Faculty members, directors and staff of teaching and learning centers, directors of online programs, provosts and other members of administrations, plus other relevant staff should comment– NOW — before the comment period ends next Friday (August 23rd).

Augmented Course Design: Using AI to Boost Efficiency and Expand Capacity [Fang & Broussard] + other items re: AI’s impact on ID

On 08/15/2024, in accessibility / UDL, adjunct faculty, Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning / Deep Learning / Algorithms, assistive technologies, Bias | Diversity Equity & Inclusion (DE&I), business side of he, colleges, community colleges, content development, aggregation, repositories, design, digital audio, digital learning, digital video, faculty, graphics, higher education, ideas, innovation, instructional design, intelligent systems, IT in HE, leadership, learning, learning ecosystem, Learning Experience Design, liberal arts, lifelong learning, multimedia, online learning, online media, productivity / tips and tricks, skills, strategy, teaching & learning, tools, United States, universities, vision/possibilities, by Daniel Christian

Augmented Course Design: Using AI to Boost Efficiency and Expand Capacity — from er.educause.edu by Berlin Fang and Kim Broussard
The emerging class of generative AI tools has the potential to significantly alter the landscape of course development.

Using generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) tools such as ChatGPT, Gemini, or CoPilot as intelligent assistants in instructional design can significantly enhance the scalability of course development. GenAI can significantly improve the efficiency with which institutions develop content that is closely aligned with the curriculum and course objectives. As a result, institutions can more effectively meet the rising demand for flexible and high-quality education, preparing a new generation of future professionals equipped with the knowledge and skills to excel in their chosen fields.¹ In this article, we illustrate the uses of AI in instructional design in terms of content creation, media development, and faculty support. We also provide some suggestions on the effective and ethical uses of AI in course design and development. Our perspectives are rooted in medical education, but the principles can be applied to any learning context.
…
Table 1 summarizes a few low-hanging fruits in AI usage in course development.
.

**Table 1. Types of Use of GenAI in Course Development**
Practical Use of AI	Use Scenarios and Examples
Inspiration	Exploring ideas for instructional strategies Exploring ideas for assessment Course mapping Lesson or unit content planning
Supplementation	Text to audio Transcription for audio Alt text auto-generation Design optimization (e.g., using Microsoft PPT Design)
Improvement	Improving learning objectives Improving instructional materials Improving course content writing (grammar, spelling, etc.)
Generation	Creating a PowerPoint draft using learning objectives Creating peripheral content materials (introductions, conclusions) Creating decorative images for content
Expansion	Creating a scenario based on learning objectives Creating a draft of a case study Creating a draft of a rubric

.

Also see:

10 Ways Artificial Intelligence Is Transforming Instructional Design — from er.educause.edu by Rob Gibson
Artificial intelligence (AI) is providing instructors and course designers with an incredible array of new tools and techniques to improve the course design and development process. However, the intersection of AI and content creation is not new.

I have been telling my graduate instructional design students that AI technology is not likely to replace them any time soon because learning and instruction are still highly personalized and humanistic experiences. However, as these students embark on their careers, they will need to understand how to appropriately identify, select, and utilize AI when developing course content. Examples abound of how instructional designers are experimenting with AI to generate and align student learning outcomes with highly individualized course activities and assessments. Instructional designers are also using AI technology to create and continuously adapt the custom code and power scripts embedded into the learning management system to execute specific learning activities.Footnote1 Other useful examples include scripting and editing videos and podcasts.

Here are a few interesting examples of how AI is shaping and influencing instructional design. Some of the tools and resources can be used to satisfy a variety of course design activities, while others are very specific.

Taking the Lead: Why Instructional Designers Should Be at the Forefront of Learning in the Age of AI — from medium.com by Rob Gibson
Education is at a critical juncture and needs to draw leaders from a broader pool, including instructional designers

The world of a medieval stone cutter and a modern instructional designer (ID) may seem separated by a great distance, but I wager any ID who upon hearing the story I just shared would experience an uneasy sense of déjà vu. Take away the outward details, and the ID would recognize many elements of the situation: the days spent in projects that fail to realize the full potential of their craft, the painful awareness that greater things can be built, but are unlikely to occur due to a poverty of imagination and lack of vision among those empowered to make decisions.

Finally, there is the issue of resources. No stone cutter could ever hope to undertake a large-scale enterprise without a multitude of skilled collaborators and abundant materials. Similarly, instructional designers are often departments of one, working in scarcity environments, with limited ability to acquire resources for ambitious projects and — just as importantly — lacking the authority or political capital needed to launch significant initiatives. For these reasons, instructional design has long been a profession caught in an uncomfortable stasis, unable to grow, evolve and achieve its full potential.

That is until generative AI appeared on the scene. While the discourse around AI in education has been almost entirely about its impact on teaching and assessment, there has been a dearth of critical analysis regarding AI’s potential for impacting instructional design.

We are at a critical juncture for AI-augmented learning. We can either stagnate, missing opportunities to support learners while educators continue to debate whether the use of generative AI tools is a good thing, or we can move forward, building a transformative model for learning akin to the industrial revolution’s impact.

Too many professional educators remain bound by traditional methods. The past two years suggest that leaders of this new learning paradigm will not emerge from conventional educational circles. This vacuum of leadership can be filled, in part, by instructional designers, who are prepared by training and experience to begin building in this new learning space.

Learning Ecosystems

2025 EDUCAUSE Top 10: Restoring Trust

The Uberfication of Higher Ed [Ubell]

School is back in session, and so are AI art classes [Farfan]

Here’s why it’s so hard to change a culture [Satell] — Pay attention higher ed! [DSC]

Reflections on “The Burden of Misunderstanding” [Hill]

Augmented Course Design: Using AI to Boost Efficiency and Expand Capacity [Fang & Broussard] + other items re: AI’s impact on ID

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