1. The Graduate School of the Future
Grant Sabatier
Martin Van Der Werf
http://collegeof2020.com

2. Introductions
Authors of The College of 2020 report published by The
Chronicle of Higher Education. Former Chronicle staff. Now blog
at Collegeof2020.com on the future of higher education.
Grant Sabatier – Vice President, Digital Strategy at Eduvantis
LLC, a higher education Competitive Strategy firm
Marty Van Der Werf – Manager, Marketing at Huron Consulting
Group, a higher education consulting company

3. What We Are Going To Cover
• What’s Happening Today:
– Higher Education Issues and Trends
– Graduate Education
• What Will 2020 Be Like:
– Higher Education Issues and Trends
– Graduate Education
• Opportunities: The 5 Things You Need To Know To Survive and
Thrive

4. 2012 – The Facts

5. Higher Education Today
• 41 states cut higher education spending last year
– Florida spending on higher education now at 2003 level
• Public universities compensating by raising tuition
– Florida Universities raised tuition 15 percent each of last 4 years
• Student debt higher than ever
– Surpassed credit card debt for the first time ever in 2011

6. Higher Education Today
• College increasingly seen as unaffordable – resistance at all
income levels to paying it
• Hollowing out of middle: Flight to quality and affordability.
• Tuition discount rate over 40 percent
• Larger market share for for-profits and community colleges

7. Graduate Education Today
• Attrition rate in PhD programs is in the 40% - 50% range
• Graduate enrollment overall dropped 1.1% in 2010, first drop
since 2003
• Master’s Degree graduates carry on average $51,950 in debt
• PhD students carry on average $77,580 in debt
Source: “The Path Forward: The Future of Graduate Education in the United States”
Commission on the Future of Graduate Education in the United States 2010

8. Graduate Education Today
• No more federally subsidized loans for graduate students
• State legislatures generally do not allocate money for faculty
research or graduate education
Source: “The Path Forward: The Future of Graduate Education in the United States”
Commission on the Future of Graduate Education in the United States 2010

9. 5% increase - total 13% increase– total
elementary and secondary enrollment in postsecondary
school enrollment from 2008 degree granting institutions
to 2020 from 2008 to 2020
2020
3% decrease – total 23 million– number of
students in postsecondary
number of high school
degree granting institutions in
graduates from 2008 to 2020
2020
Source: “Projections of Education Statistics to 2020”
National Center for Education Statistics. September 2011

10. Higher Education in 2020: Students
• Increasingly irregular attendance patterns – combination of
PT and online, dropping in and out of college, taking a class
when they can afford it
• Looking for more experiential education
• More minority students – minority students will outnumber
whites in about 2021
• More adult learners – through 2018, students age 18-24 will
increase by 9%, students age 25-34 will increase by 25%

11. Higher Education in 2020: Facilities and Technology
• In 1974, college campuses had about 160 square feet per student
• Today, campuses have about 450 square feet per student
• About 14 percent of college buildings have gone up in the last decade
Going forward, more emphasis on:
• Sustainable, environmentally responsible buildings
• Interdisciplinary spaces -- As colleges see a need to reuse and
reimaging spaces, particularly libraries, they are putting more
emphasis on spaces that not only encourage the mingling of
disciplines, but can also be easily and quickly reconfigured for new
technology

12. Higher Education in 2020: Facilities and Technology
“Thirty years from now the big university
campuses will be relics... Already we are
beginning to deliver more lectures and classes
off campus via satellite or two-way video at a
fraction of the cost. The college won’t survive as
a residential institution.”
Peter Drucker, 1997

13. Higher Education in 2020: Facilities and Technology
• We are entering an era when people will live in the real
world and the virtual world, and the boundaries between
them will become increasingly difficult to identify.
• Visualization tools are making information more
meaningful and insights more intuitive. As tools of this
nature continue to be developed and used, visual literacy
will become an increasingly important skill in
decoding, encoding, and determining credibility and
authenticity of data. Visual literacy must be formally
taught, but it is an evolving field even now.

14. Higher Education in 2020: Facilities and Technology
“I think it’s inevitable that we will eventually have
one huge virtual college where there are
partnerships and buy-ins from all the major
universities of the world, and that they will share
and partner in the entire concept.”
Jay Box, vice president for technology solutions, Kentucky Community
and Technical College System

15. Higher Education in 2020: Facilities and Technology
The best professors will rise to the top – you no
longer need 5 intro level biology professors. You
use the best one, record them via video and
then use the rest of faculty as support. In
fact, institutions will share the best content and
share professors – or perhaps you can even buy
their content.

16. Higher Education in 2020: Faculty
• Tenure under threat
• Standards for tenure are higher every year
• Benefits costs on campuses are most difficult to control
• With research funding in doubt, will more emphasis be placed
on “teaching” skills?
• Preference for faculty comfortable in many
formats, particularly online

17. Graduate Education in 2020: Rosy Projections
Between 2009 – 2020 Enrollment Is Projected To:
• Increase 18% for postgraduate students
• The number of master’s degrees will increase 32%
• The number of doctoral degrees will increase 57%
• The number of professional degrees will increase
30%
Source: “Projections of Education Statistics to 2020”
National Center for Education Statistics. September 2011

18. So What?
The 5 Things You Need
To Know To Survive and
Thrive

19. #1
There will be incredible opportunities
for institutions and programs that can
adapt and respond to new market
opportunities.

20. What Students are Looking for
• Still strong demand for higher education
• Still seen as worthwhile long-term investment
• Emphasis by Obama administration on increasing
number of college grads
• But future students will want different things:
– Cost
– Convenience
– Time
– Value

21. #2
You need a “competitive strategy” –
this is how you plan to increase your
market relevance and compete for
resources –
students, faculty, funding. You no
longer compete regionally or even
nationally – it’s truly a global
competition.

22. Higher Education Marketing Today
• Marketing in higher education is in crisis – too many colleges
doing the same thing
• What is your competitive strategy?
• Need to drill down and define what makes an institution
distinct.
– Product
– Experience
– Outcomes
– Impact
– Perceptions
Source: Eduvantis Dimensions of Competition Model – eduvantis.com

23. #3
Foreign Students and foreign
demand will continue to increase.
Develop programs and products that
resonate and provide measureable
value/outcomes.

24. Foreign Students
More emphasis on foreign students and training for foreign
universities
– By 2025, 8 million students will have to travel to a foreign country to
study, 3x more than today.
– The universities of India and China are being held back by poor quality
of teaching. Someone must train professors of the future.

25. #4
Strategically develop and manage
the “user experience” of your
programs – both online and in
person. The experience is a key
differentiator – delight and educate.

26. #5
Focus on outcomes and assessment –
always ask what is the value you
provide and how can you measure it.
Students will continue to focus more
on outcomes in their decision making.

27. Thank You
Grant Sabatier
glsabatier@gmail.com
Martin Van Der Werf
martyvdw@gmail.com