A Focus on Lifelong Learning: Shifts in Higher Ed Enrollment Patterns
Tara Goldman, VP of Canvas LMS Product Management describes how Canvas LMS can support students at any stage of the learning journey.
So one of the things I heard on the road, was a need for learners to demonstrate their product, right? I've heard it through the lens of portfolios. I've heard it through the lens of externally verifiable credentials or badges. I've been hearing a little bit of sort of blurring lines between traditional and nontraditional a traditional and new traditional. And both of these point to our last strategy. This idea of the whole learner on their learning to earn and journey. And so I'd like to introduce Tara Gomen.
She's a senior product leader who oversees our K-twelve higher ed and continuing professional ed journeys. And see someone who's gonna talk to us a little bit about what I've been hearing, right, which is a little bit of trepidation, in the shift in enrollment patterns. So can you tell us what you're hearing about that? Yeah. Absolutely. So that's certainly the first reaction in institutions have.
But many are also starting to embrace the shift we're seeing in learners' desires for flexibility when it comes to the traditional four year degree. So programs that were once relegated to distance, continuing, and even global learning teams are really part and parcel of the full learning experience. Learners are craving flexibility, whether it's your first generation student, helping out their family, new moms juggling, competing priorities, high school students seeking dual enrollment, or even your working professionals looking to upskill or reskill for the current job market. There's so many opportunities when it comes to lifelong learning. And the most leading institutions like the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania are not only embracing this shift by scaling Canvas to over ten thousand learners worldwide, but they're taking advantage of the Instructure learning platform by creating content once and then leveraging it for their degree, non degree, and even returning learners.
Oh, that's a really compelling story. What about the folks who start some sort of tertiary learning and then they just drop out at some point. Yeah. Absolutely. So there's a really surprising statistic.
There are over forty million learners. Who have some college education, but absolutely no credential to show for that learning. With the Instructure Learning platform, higher ed institutions can really help guide those learners. And the best part is they can save a lot of money by creating efficiencies through using a platform like ours. Well, I'm sure that's something the budget office really wants to hear.
Right? Save some money. Yeah. And not just saving the money, but sinking those savings back in into core teaching and learning. I'm sold. So how does an institution get started with this? Yeah.
So here's the really great news. Many have already gotten started just by having their course content set up in Canvas. The next step is really just about aligning that course content to skills. And by using Canvas credentials, institutions can set up and award badges, based on those earned skills. In fact, in twenty twenty two alone, there were over seventy four million badges, award awarded worldwide.
And with the one ed tech open badges standard, badgers are both interoperable and verifiable enhancing their credibility and portability. That's great. So it makes sense. Use your existing content, create a issue badges, but how do learners figure out, or what's working, when you hear talking to customers? Well, before we get into that, I really wanna shout out Florida Gulf Coast University. They have developed an incredible university ride badge initiative that is really in service of increasing the career readiness of their students.
They've brought together industry, employers, faculty, staff, all to help their students prepare for the future of work. That's great. But I wanna bring it back to these learners. Right? When they acquire these skills, they're automatically awarded a badge that shows up in their backpack. And I don't know about all of you, but I'm so envious of learners today who get to experience that incremental sense of accomplishment by building these stackable credentials.
I'm jealous too. I wish I could do it. So I got it. So now they use their content that they have. They award badges, but how do learners figure out what the programs what's available.
Yeah. So they got their content and badges set up in Canvas and credentials, and then they can use Canvas catalog as a localized storefront to simplify and scale the enrollment and registration of their non degree programs. What's great about this is that learners can find and self enroll in these programs in a matter of clicks, and institutions can understand which programs are driving the most revenue. We recently released enhanced analytics, which allows institutions to make better data informed decisions about their non degree programs using enrollment, engagement, and revenue data. And I'm super excited to talk about two new upgrades coming soon.
The first is allowing institutions to extend their brands into these programs using catalog customization, And the second is all about making it even easier for learners to find these programs. So we're going to be building weighted search with enhanced tagging abilities for admins. So essentially by using canvas, credentials, and catalog together, institutions can really create that cohesive user experience to to support the scale of their non degree programs all while seamlessly integrating it into their traditional ones. That sounds amazing. So how do folks think about bringing all of that together into something that turns into a portfolio or credential.
Yeah. So I'm really excited to talk about the few sure we believe that that really entails a portable and shareable record. One where individuals can amass all the skills and achievements over their time and share that with employers and institutions. The transcript of the future really is a stackable credential. Think of it like a learner passport.
Where individuals can basically share their bio, work experience, educational history, badges certificates, really any evidence of that demonstration of learning over their lifetime. We're super excited to build this solution in partnership with our great and structured community, our partners, and our students, And if you would love to learn more, we're gonna be talking about it in the lab tomorrow. That's so exciting. I, I wish I was starting my learning journey right now. It's such a great time to be you said people can learn more in other places.
They can learn a bit more about what's happening. Absolutely. So there is a session later today called reach more learners in more ways. So Feel free to attend that. We've got our in the lab session tomorrow talking about the future of our learner passport and, of course, visit us in the Canvas, credentials, and catalog boots.
That's great. Thanks so much for sharing it, Tara. Thanks for having me.
She's a senior product leader who oversees our K-twelve higher ed and continuing professional ed journeys. And see someone who's gonna talk to us a little bit about what I've been hearing, right, which is a little bit of trepidation, in the shift in enrollment patterns. So can you tell us what you're hearing about that? Yeah. Absolutely. So that's certainly the first reaction in institutions have.
But many are also starting to embrace the shift we're seeing in learners' desires for flexibility when it comes to the traditional four year degree. So programs that were once relegated to distance, continuing, and even global learning teams are really part and parcel of the full learning experience. Learners are craving flexibility, whether it's your first generation student, helping out their family, new moms juggling, competing priorities, high school students seeking dual enrollment, or even your working professionals looking to upskill or reskill for the current job market. There's so many opportunities when it comes to lifelong learning. And the most leading institutions like the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania are not only embracing this shift by scaling Canvas to over ten thousand learners worldwide, but they're taking advantage of the Instructure learning platform by creating content once and then leveraging it for their degree, non degree, and even returning learners.
Oh, that's a really compelling story. What about the folks who start some sort of tertiary learning and then they just drop out at some point. Yeah. Absolutely. So there's a really surprising statistic.
There are over forty million learners. Who have some college education, but absolutely no credential to show for that learning. With the Instructure Learning platform, higher ed institutions can really help guide those learners. And the best part is they can save a lot of money by creating efficiencies through using a platform like ours. Well, I'm sure that's something the budget office really wants to hear.
Right? Save some money. Yeah. And not just saving the money, but sinking those savings back in into core teaching and learning. I'm sold. So how does an institution get started with this? Yeah.
So here's the really great news. Many have already gotten started just by having their course content set up in Canvas. The next step is really just about aligning that course content to skills. And by using Canvas credentials, institutions can set up and award badges, based on those earned skills. In fact, in twenty twenty two alone, there were over seventy four million badges, award awarded worldwide.
And with the one ed tech open badges standard, badgers are both interoperable and verifiable enhancing their credibility and portability. That's great. So it makes sense. Use your existing content, create a issue badges, but how do learners figure out, or what's working, when you hear talking to customers? Well, before we get into that, I really wanna shout out Florida Gulf Coast University. They have developed an incredible university ride badge initiative that is really in service of increasing the career readiness of their students.
They've brought together industry, employers, faculty, staff, all to help their students prepare for the future of work. That's great. But I wanna bring it back to these learners. Right? When they acquire these skills, they're automatically awarded a badge that shows up in their backpack. And I don't know about all of you, but I'm so envious of learners today who get to experience that incremental sense of accomplishment by building these stackable credentials.
I'm jealous too. I wish I could do it. So I got it. So now they use their content that they have. They award badges, but how do learners figure out what the programs what's available.
Yeah. So they got their content and badges set up in Canvas and credentials, and then they can use Canvas catalog as a localized storefront to simplify and scale the enrollment and registration of their non degree programs. What's great about this is that learners can find and self enroll in these programs in a matter of clicks, and institutions can understand which programs are driving the most revenue. We recently released enhanced analytics, which allows institutions to make better data informed decisions about their non degree programs using enrollment, engagement, and revenue data. And I'm super excited to talk about two new upgrades coming soon.
The first is allowing institutions to extend their brands into these programs using catalog customization, And the second is all about making it even easier for learners to find these programs. So we're going to be building weighted search with enhanced tagging abilities for admins. So essentially by using canvas, credentials, and catalog together, institutions can really create that cohesive user experience to to support the scale of their non degree programs all while seamlessly integrating it into their traditional ones. That sounds amazing. So how do folks think about bringing all of that together into something that turns into a portfolio or credential.
Yeah. So I'm really excited to talk about the few sure we believe that that really entails a portable and shareable record. One where individuals can amass all the skills and achievements over their time and share that with employers and institutions. The transcript of the future really is a stackable credential. Think of it like a learner passport.
Where individuals can basically share their bio, work experience, educational history, badges certificates, really any evidence of that demonstration of learning over their lifetime. We're super excited to build this solution in partnership with our great and structured community, our partners, and our students, And if you would love to learn more, we're gonna be talking about it in the lab tomorrow. That's so exciting. I, I wish I was starting my learning journey right now. It's such a great time to be you said people can learn more in other places.
They can learn a bit more about what's happening. Absolutely. So there is a session later today called reach more learners in more ways. So Feel free to attend that. We've got our in the lab session tomorrow talking about the future of our learner passport and, of course, visit us in the Canvas, credentials, and catalog boots.
That's great. Thanks so much for sharing it, Tara. Thanks for having me.