Today’s universities face a continuing problem with declining enrollment. As inflation raises the cost of living and drives people to prioritize essentials, fewer are willing to take on the expense of a two- or four-year degree program.
Many students also want or need flexible options for education. They prefer to learn on their own schedules and at their own pace, choosing where and when to engage with higher education as it fits their lifestyle.
Offering flexible noncredit courses and credentials through a continuing education program meets these nontraditional learners’ needs, counteracting declining enrollment and setting your university apart from institutions that haven’t adapted to the changing student preferences.
Continuing Education: The Solution for Nontraditional Learners
Continuing education credentials from accredited universities give students of all ages and stages of life access to programs that improve their personal and professional skills. On resumes, these credentials show a willingness to learn and grow. On the job, they support job advancement and enable career changes as new opportunities arise.
Through continuing education, students may gain access to:
- micro-credentials
- certificate programs
- upskilling or reskilling courses
- competency-based learning paths
Each option enables students to access university-level courses and develop critical skill sets without enrolling in a full course load.
Implementing Continuing Education with D2L
One of the biggest challenges higher education institutes face when it comes to solving the problem of boosting enrollment is finding an end-to-end technology solution. An ideal platform not only integrates with existing technology; it should also make it easy to develop and market continuing education programs.
When Michael Crowe, VP of Academic at Bow Valley College in Calgary, Alberta, faced this challenge, he turned to D2L for help.
“We struggled to find a holistic solution with other vendors,” he told D2L in a recent interview. “We really needed a platform that brought industry learners and our college programming together. And D2L Brightspace was the tech solution we needed.”
D2L equips institutes with the necessary tools to deliver top tier continuing education experiences, including straightforward course creation, seamless storefront integration, competency tracking and robust analytics with an accessible and engaging learning environment. With D2L as a partner, universities and colleges can provide interactive program offerings that attract new learners and help them succeed in a rapidly changing professional landscape. In turn, this boosts enrollments and revenue.
D2L: The Core of Continuing Education
D2L allows you to create customized continuing education programs and deliver them directly through your university or college’s existing digital system. With D2L you can:
1. Create Engaging Content: Streamline the course creation process by incorporating automation tools and AI features to develop engaging interactive courses with personalized learning paths, available on any device.
2. Make Data-Informed Decisions: Effortlessly monitor learner’s progress, completion rates and overall course performance to enhance the online learning experience and attract new learners.
3. Make Outcome-Based Learning Simple: Offer courses that allow learners to master specific skills or competencies at their own pace. Learners also benefit from automatic badging and can easily showcase their achievements on their career profiles.
4. Simplify Enrollment and Manage Course Marketing and Sales: Use Course Merchant to create a customized virtual course catalog that allows students to self-enroll. Course Merchant also allows you to reach and market to students on the social media platforms they already use.
For Crowe, Course Merchant was a game changer. “Between Course Merchant and Brightspace, D2L met all of the technology needs that we had end-to-end for our continuing education program.”
D2L Learning Services: Course Development for Continuing Education Success
To truly meet students’ needs, continuing education must provide the desired outcomes. According to Higher Ed Dive, many educators would like to implement continuing education but struggle to find time to develop and run flexible programs. D2L’s Learning Services offers the necessary guidance for universities to create and implement student-focused programs, leading to quicker enrollments.
A Partner in Continuing Education
D2L’s products and services enable your higher education institution to provide up-to-date continuing education opportunities that meet the needs of changing markets. With the flexibility to provide a variety of individual and stackable credentials, you can create a valuable resource for learners that supports enrollment and provides your institution with a previously untapped revenue stream.
Universities and colleges who don’t adapt to the changing needs of their full-time students and who fail to offer nontraditional learners what they’re looking for will continue to face declining enrollment and lose out on potential revenue streams. Developing engaging, supportive continuing education programs is one way that institutions can remain competitive and gain a reputation as a valuable community resource that students return to again and again to improve their skills and advance their careers.
Crowe and the team at Bow Valley College saw firsthand how helpful it is having a partner like D2L to address the unique needs of nontraditional learners: “A three-year exercise in frustration became a three-month pathway to success once we started to work with D2L.”
Ready to boost enrollments with continuing ed? Learn how D2L’s products and services can help you successfully set up and scale your lifelong learning programs.
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