Emerging Technology

Ed tech specialist Chegg is slashing 388 jobs, or about 45% of its workforce, in a massive restructuring effort expected to save up to $110 million next fiscal year, the public company said in late October. 

The news comes as Chegg announced it will remain a standalone company following an exploration of strategic options that could have involved selling the company to new ownership or going private. 

The company also reshuffled its leadership. Executive Chairman Dan Rosensweig resumed the CEO role on Oct. 27. He replaced Nathan Schultz, who had taken on the chief role from Rosensweig in June 2024 and is remaining as an executive adviser.

Chegg pegged its mass layoffs to a change in how it operates its academic learning products, which include online homework and study help, textbook rental and proofreading services, among others. The company also highlighted its investment in artificial intelligence, which it has integrated into products such as its language-learning tools.

As it restructures, Chegg plans to refocus around its business-to-business skills courses in professional language-learning, workplace readiness and AI, which executives expect to collectively generate $70 million in revenue for fiscal 2025 and to grow in double digits next year. This new focus will set up Chegg for sustainable revenue and earnings growth, the company said.

For now, the company is racing to cut costs as it bleeds subscribers and money. In the second quarter, Chegg’s revenue plummeted by more than a third, to $105.1 million, which came on top of similar declines in Q1.

Chegg has named Google as the source of many of its woes — specifically the search giant’s artificial intelligence summaries, which led to a sharp decrease in Chegg's traffic.

In February, Schultz announced that Chegg filed an antitrust lawsuit against Google and that it was exploring its strategic alternatives to remaining a standalone publicly traded company.

“These two actions are connected, as we would not need to review strategic alternatives if Google hadn’t launched AI Overviews,” Schultz said then. “Unfortunately, traffic is being blocked from ever coming to Chegg because of Google’s AIO and their use of Chegg’s content to keep visitors on their own platform.”

In its complaint against Google, Chegg said it gains most of its subscribers through students searching for answers to their study questions on Google. “Chegg thus depends on referrals from Google’s monopoly search engine for a large portion of the revenue that it devotes to producing original online content,” it said. 

Chegg alleged that Google has leveraged its massive market share in internet searches to “coerce online publishers like Chegg to supply content that Google republishes without permission in AI-generated answers that unfairly compete for the attention of users.”

Google has moved to dismiss the case. The tech giant argued that it has tailored its AI Overview to best serve consumers and learners, and that Chegg’s revenue struggles are its own. 

“Instead of competing more effectively, it seeks to blame Google for its business decline,” Google responded in a May court filing. “Chegg’s grab bag of obscure legal theories in support of this effort not only are not cognizable under the antitrust laws, but run directly afoul of those laws.”

While Chegg looked at possible financial alternatives to going it alone, it ended the process as it began: as a standalone company, for now. 

“After thoughtful consideration of multiple proposals, the Board unanimously determined that remaining an independent public company offers the best opportunity to maximize long-term shareholder value,” the company said on Oct. 27.

Carnegie Mellon University has laid off 75 employees in its Software Engineering Institute as it wrestles with disruptions to federal funding, according to an Oct. 8 community message from Vice President for Research Theresa Mayer.

Mayer tied the cuts — which amount to 10% of SEI’s workforce — to the engineering institute’s “unique financial structure as a federally funded research and development center as well as the shifting federal funding priorities that are shaping the research landscape.”

Carnegie Mellon as a whole is in a “strong financial position” for fiscal 2026, university President Farnam Jahanian said in August, noting that the Pittsburgh institution cut its expenses by $33 million.

Jahanian said in an August community message that Carnegie Mellon is poised to get through the current fiscal year without a deficit, which is more than some of its peer institutions can say. 

But the university faces stiff financial headwinds — and what its president described as “existential challenges” — from the Trump administration’s disinvestment in scientific and academic research. 

To tighten its budget, Carnegie Mellon has paused merit raises, reduced nonessential expenditures, limited new staff and faculty hiring, and has reduced staff in certain units through voluntary retirements and employee reductions.  

In the August message, Jahanian described “signs of a marked decline in the pipeline of new federal research awards nationally and at Carnegie Mellon.” He added that university officials expect more cutbacks in federal agencies’ research budgets under a Republican-led Congress. 

The university’s Software Engineering Institute, which Mayer described as integral to Carnegie Mellon’s overall research enterprise, is one of the institution’s biggest recipients of federal research funding. Sponsored by the U.S. Department of Defense, SEI develops new technologies and studies complex software engineering, cybersecurity and AI engineering problems, in large part to advance the strategic goals of federal agencies. 

The institute took in $148.8 million in grants and contracts revenue in fiscal 2024. 

Prior to this month's job cuts, officials at the institute took “extensive steps to avoid this outcome, including implementing cost-saving measures in recent months,” Mayer said Oct. 8. “Despite these efforts, SEI was unable to reallocate or absorb costs, so staff reductions were unavoidable.”

Along with a slackening grant pipeline, Jahanian’s August message pointed to the possibility of reduced funding for research overhead costs. 

The Trump administration has sought to unilaterally cap reimbursement rates for indirect research costs at 15% across multiple agencies, though these policies have been blocked by courts. 

Carnegie Mellon is a plaintiff in one of the lawsuits that led to the 15% cap being permanently blocked at the National Institutes of Health, though the Trump administration has appealed the ruling. The university is also represented in lawsuits against other agencies through its membership in the Association of American Universities. 

If a 15% cap were implemented on research overhead, that would create an additional $40 million annual shortfall for Carnegie Mellon, according to Jahanian. Indirect research costs include overhead expenses such as laboratories and support staff. 

Beyond federal funding woes, Jahanian also noted in August that Carnegie Mellon’s projected $365 million in graduate tuition revenue for the current fiscal year is about $20 million short of initial estimates due to “lower-than-expected enrollment.”

While Jahanian didn’t offer reasons for the shortfall, he did note that going forward Carnegie Mellon was examining its balance of undergraduate to graduate and international to domestic students to “ensure long-term stability.”

Other universities have experienced major declines in their international enrollment amid the Trump administration’s disruptions to the visa approval process and aggressive immigration policies. 

Officials at DePaul University, in Chicago, said recently that new international graduate student enrollment fell by 62% year over year this fall, contributing heavily to a budget crunch at the institution. 

One group has predicted that international enrollment could drop by as much as 150,000 students this fall. 

In recent years, Carnegie Mellon’s enrollment has grown, as has its graduate student ranks. Between 2018 and 2023, overall enrollment increased 11.2% to 15,596 students and graduate enrollment grew 11.7% to 8,307 students.

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Today’s higher education leaders must increase enrollment, retention, and fundraising - all with growing student and staff expectations and limited resources. Despite these demands, leaders remain committed to driving student and institutional success. But their tools often fall short of delivering on expectations. This Connected Education Report offers a timely snapshot of the higher education landscape in 2025. Drawing on insights from students and senior staff across institutions globally, it highlights the expanding role of unified data, AI, and autonomous agents in shaping the educational experience. Students—already immersed in AI-enabled tools in their daily lives—are not only receptive to its use in education but now expect seamless and personalised service and experiences. There is everything to gain for institutions willing to embrace AI: streamlined operations, more meaningful student engagement, and - crucially - giving staff the time and space to focus on the relationships and human connections that really matter. Let’s seize the opportunity together!

What You’ll Find in This Report: A total of 2,091 responses were collected from April 1, 2025, to May 2, 2025, via an online quantitative survey run by Reputation Leaders in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Spain, Australia, and Ireland. Reputation Leaders also conducted 12 in-depth qualitative interviews with highly experienced higher education senior leaders in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Spain, Australia, and Ireland from April 4, to May 16, 2025.

1. Higher Education Seeing The Transformative Potential Of AI

Amid uncertain times, rising student expectations and increasing pressure to improve efficiencies on multiple levels, staff are optimistic about an AI-supported future which offers gains in productivity; freeing up time for higher-value efforts and a more responsive, personalized, and student-centered experience.

2. Student Perspectives in 2025

Most students are having a good university experience (and this has been increasing since 2021) but less than half would say their experience was really great. Room to improve on overall service - but it will require support which extends beyond the classroom.

3. Streamlining The Path To Enrollment: AI-Driven Recruitment & Admissions

The path from exploration to enrollment is no longer easy as student priorities have shifted. They expect a process which is simple and responsive and not an admin overload. Cue AI and autonomous agents to bring speed, personalization and agility; filling the gaps for streamlined interactions with students at the top of the funnel.

4. Better Student Experiences: AI Enhances Services, Support & Connections

Students are satisfied with core services, but onboarding and wellbeing support need work. Staff are already seeing the huge potential for AI to step in and bridge support gaps with personalized and proactive support for smarter and more student-centred services. Students are full open to - and using - AI across the journey and it is already boosting experience despite some wariness of AI use in the wellbeing space. Careers teams face growing pressure to better prepare students for the workforce

5. Lifelong Connections: AI Supports Advancement & Alumni Relations

Strong emotional ties drive better student experiences, and those students go on to become university promoters and engaged alumni and donors. Advancement teams are using AI to harness the data, information and knowledge they hold to drive better alumni relationships and build future donor relationships on genuine connection and engagement.

6. Staff Perspectives in 2025

Staff are generally supported and satisfied in their roles, but feeling the pressure to perform - especially in a new AI-enabled environment. Steps must be taken to improve clarity in communications between institutions and staff and to empower them through upskilling around AI - a critical enabler of digital transformation

7. Future Focus: Shifting AI From Tactical To Transformative

Many institutions still operate in data silos, despite knowing a unified strategy is essential. The vision for staff is real-time insights, connected data, and advanced AI use—and it’s now a top priority for institutions over the next 3–5 years. Early adopters of autonomous agents are seeing impact, but wider staff training is needed to unlock full potential. Leading institutions share three things: committed leadership, empowered teams, and a “test and learn” mindset. Without this alignment, AI risks staying in pilot mode—falling short of the transformation today’s students and staff expect.

Get the full report. 

COLUMBUS, OHIO — Artificial intelligence-based products and software for college admissions and operations are proliferating in the higher education world. 

How to choose from among them? Well, leaders can start by identifying a problem that is actually in need of an AI solution. 

That is one of the core pieces of advice from a panel on deploying AI technology responsibly in college administration at the National Association for College Admission Counseling’s conference in September.

Jasmine Solomon, senior associate director of systems operations at New York University, described a “flooded marketplace” of AI products advertised for a range of higher ed functions, from tutoring systems to retention analytics to admissions chatbots. 

“Define what your AI use case is, and then find the purpose-built tool for that,” Solomon said. “If you're using a general AI model or AI tool for an unintended purpose, your result is going to be poor.” 

Asking why before you buy

It’s also worth considering whether AI is the right tool. 

“How does AI solve this problem better? Because maybe your team or the tools that you already have can solve this problem,” Solomon said. “Maybe you don't need an AI tool for this.”

Experts on the panel pointed out that administrators also need to think about who will use the tool, the potential privacy pitfalls of it, and its actual quality. 

As Solomon put it, “Those built-in AI features — are they real? Are they on a future-release schedule, or is it here now? And if it’s here now, is it ready for prime time or is it ‘here now, and we’re beta testing.’” 

Other considerations in deploying AI include those related to ethics, compliance and employee contracts.

Institutions need to be mindful of workflows, staff roles, data storage, privacy and AI stipulations in collective bargaining contracts, said Becky Mulholland, director of first-year admission and operations at the University of Rhode Island. 

“For those who are considering this, please, please, please make sure you're familiar with those aspects,” Mulholland said. “We've seen this not go well in some other spaces.”

On top of all that is the environmental impact of AI. One estimate found that AI-based search engines can use as much as 30 times more energy than traditional search. The technology also uses vast amounts of water to cool data centers.

Panelists had few definitive answers for resolving AI’s environmental problems at the institutional level. 

“There's going to be a space for science to find some better solutions,” Mulholland said. “We're not there right now.” 

Solomon pointed to the pervasiveness of AI tools already embedded in much of our digital technology and argued untrained use could worsen the environmental impact. 

“If they're prompting [AI] 10, 20 times just to get the answer they want, they've used far more energy than if they understood prompt engineering,” Solomon said. 

Transparency is also important. At NYU, Solomon said the university was careful to ensure prospective students knew they were talking with AI when interacting with its chatbot — so much so that they named the tool “NYUAdmissionsBot” to make its virtual nature as explicit as possible. 

“We wanted to inform them every step of the way that you were talking to AI when you were using this chatbot,” Solomon said. 

‘You need time to test it’

After all the big questions are asked and answered, and an AI solution chosen, institutions still have the not-so-small task of rolling the technology out in a way that is effective in both the short and long term. 

The rollout of NYU’s chatbot in spring 2024 took “many, many months,” according to Solomon. “If a vendor tells you, ‘We will be up in a week,’ multiply that by like a factor of 10. You need time to test it.” The extra time can ensure a feature is actually ready when it’s unveiled for use. 

The upside to all that time and effort for something like an admissions chatbot, Solomon noted, is that the AI feature can be available around-the-clock to answer inquiries, and it can quickly address the most commonly asked questions that would normally be flooding the inboxes of admissions staff. 

But even after a successful initial rollout of an AI tool or feature, operations staff aren’t done. 

Solomon described a continuous cycle of developing key metrics of success, running controlled experiments with an AI product and carefully examining data from AI use, including by having a human looking over the shoulder of the robots. In NYU’s case, this included looking at responses the chatbot gave to inquiries from prospective students.

“AI is evolving rapidly. So every six months, you really do want to test again, because it will be different,” Solomon said. “We did find that as we moved forward, we could decrease the number of hard-coded responses and rely more on the generative. And that was because the AI got better, but also because our knowledge got better.”

Solomon recommended regular error checks and performance audits and warned against overreliance on AI. 

“AI is not a rotisserie. You don't set it and forget it. It will burn it down,” she said. “It's changing too fast.”

In June, Ohio became the second state to regulate how colleges can use third-party vendors to help launch and operate their online degree programs. 

Under a new law, both public and private colleges in Ohio must disclose on their websites for their online programs when they are using vendors to help run those offerings. Staff who work for these vendors, known as online program managers, must also identify themselves when talking to students. And it requires colleges to report OPM contracts annually to the state’s higher education chancellor. 

The law, part of a larger state budget bill, additionally prohibits OPMs from making decisions about or disbursing student financial aid. 

“Ohio's law is a step in the right direction,” said Amber Villalobos, a fellow at The Century Foundation, a left-leaning think tank. “It's great to see transparency laws because students will know who's running their program, who's teaching their programs.”

The new law is the latest sign that states may take on a greater role in regulating OPM contracts, heeding calls by consumer advocates for stronger government oversight. 

However, Villalobos said Ohio lawmakers could have improved the legislation by barring colleges from entering agreements that give OPMs a cut of tuition revenue for each student they recruit into an online program. Minnesota, the first state to pass a law regulating OPMs in 2024, prohibited its public colleges from striking tuition-share deals with these companies if they provide marketing or recruiting services. 

U.S. law bars colleges that receive federal funding from giving incentive-based compensation to companies that recruit students into their programs. However, in 2011, federal guidance created an exception for colleges that enter tuition-share agreements with OPMs for recruiting services — but only if they are part of a larger bundle of services, such as curricular design and help with clinical placements. 

But these deals have led to OPMs using misleading recruitment and marketing practices to enroll students and fill seats, Villalobos said. 

“When tuition-sharing is used for marketing or recruiting purposes we've seen issues like predatory recruitment,” she said. 

OPMs under scrutiny

OPMs help colleges quickly set up and market online programs, said Phil Hill, an ed tech consultant. That’s important since launching a successful online program catering to nontraditional working adults can be challenging for colleges that typically enroll 18- to 24-year-olds, Hill said. 

“It gives them a way to operate in the online space based on what students expect, but do it right away,” Hill said.

However, OPM contracts have been subject to lawsuits and federal scrutiny in recent years. 

In Ohio, for instance, legislators passed the new state law following Eastern Gateway Community College’s closure in 2024 after it offered tuition-free online college programs with an OPM. 

After the college began working with the for-profit company Student Resource Center, its enrollment soared from just 3,182 students in fall 2014 to 45,173 enrollees by the fall 2021, according to federal data. Former employees of the college accused the relationship of turning the college into an education mill, Inside Higher Ed reported at the time. 

By early 2022, the rapid enrollment growth and the college’s relationship with the Student Resource Center had attracted the attention of the U.S. Department of Education. 

The federal agency alleged that year that the college’s free college initiative illegally charged students with Pell Grants more than those without. In response, the Education Department placed the college on Heightened Cash Monitoring 2 status, which forced the institution to pay its students’ federal financial aid out of pocket before seeking reimbursement from the agency. 

In 2023, Eastern Gateway reached a deal with the Education Department to end its free college program. Its board of trustees voted to shutter the institution the following year.

Ohio likely had “the worst example of an OPM contract harming students, harming an institution of any state in the country,” said Hill. Legislators were “reacting to that situation and the collapse of that school.”

Colleges nationwide have also faced scrutiny over their OPM relationships. 

In July, the California Institute of Technology settled a 2023 class-action lawsuit that alleged the institution misled students about its role in a cybersecurity boot camp program that was instead largely taught and administered by an OPM. 

In 2023, the University of Southern California also winded down its partnership with an OPM on most online degrees they ran together. The move came after a 2023 class-action lawsuit accused USC of misrepresenting an online social work master’s degree program developed with the OPM as the same as its campus-based one. 

In January, the Biden administration’s Education Department issued guidance informing colleges that they could lose access to federal financial aid or face penalties if OPMs misrepresent themselves to students. That includes OPM employees implying they work for colleges or representing a virtual program as equivalent to an institution’s campus-based version when they have material differences.
 

Pros and cons of Ohio’s law

Adam Kissel, a visiting fellow at The Heritage Foundation, a right-wing think tank, criticized Ohio’s new law on the conservative Minding the Campus website in June. Despite being watered-down after it was first introduced in the Ohio House, the bill essentially “required a warning label when a college had an OPM partnership,” Kissel wrote.

However, higher education experts said students will benefit from the disclosures and reporting standards in Ohio’s law. 

A 2022 U.S. Government Accountability Office report found that at least 550 colleges worked with OPMs to support at least 2,900 education programs. However, the office couldn’t determine the exact number of OPM arrangements due to a lack of comprehensive data. 

“Without any real tracking, any real reporting or accountability systems in place, I think that some states just don't know how large of a scale the OPMs may be operating at in their state,” said Villalobos. “In some cases, that may be a reason we don't see states taking action.”

Yet Stephanie Hall, a higher education policy expert, said the Ohio law could have been improved if it had banned institutions from paying companies that provide recruiting services on a commission basis, referring to tuition-share agreements. 

“This practice has long been banned in the context of typical, on-campus admissions, but for some reason online students are not afforded the same consideration and protection,” Hall, a former senior director of higher ed policy at the liberal think tank Center for American Progress, said in an email.

Additionally, how Ohio enforces the law’s prohibitions on OPMs controlling or influencing financial aid decisions will be key, said Hall. 

OPMs in some arrangements provide input on whether the program’s tuition price is competitive, which Hall argues influences pricing, she said. 

Some colleges, through such contracts, also agree to offer promotions such as special scholarships or discounts, which the OPM markets or uses to persuade prospective students to enroll, Hall said. 

The availability of financial aid including those scholarships and discounts, for example, is often discussed as OPMs field questions from prospective students about the program and its price on behalf of its college client, she said. 

“These activities bring the OPM close enough to financial aid decisions to warrant oversight,” Hall said.

Many contracts between OPMs and colleges include a clause stating that the OPM is not a financial aid servicer — but those clauses are meaningless if regulators don’t verify them, Hall said. 

The state’s higher education chancellor’s office should thoroughly review how OPMs are involved in pricing, discounts, scholarships and enrollment strategies, instead of just ensuring that such clauses are in their contracts, she said. 

The reforms Hall and others are calling for have merit, said Hill. Transparency about contracts, particularly in public education, is a good thing, he said.

But Hill cautioned against characterizing all OPMs as predators. 

“I would argue that without this model, a lot of nonprofit colleges and universities just wouldn’t be able to make an online offering that grows at all,” he said.

It took the education sector 4.8 months on average to report data breaches following ransomware attacks between 2018 and 2025, according to a report released last week by Comparitech.

Colleges and schools had the highest average reporting time for ransomware data breaches when compared to the business, government and healthcare sectors, Comparitech found in its analysis of over 2,600 U.S. ransomware attacks. 

At the same time, education companies — counted separately from colleges and schools — saw even higher reporting times at 6.3 months. Waiting months to disclose a data breach is dangerous, given that stolen data can be on the dark web before victims even know a breach happened, wrote the researchers for Comparitech, a cybersecurity and online privacy product review website.

Delayed reporting of data breaches comes at a time when schools and ed tech companies alike are grappling with the ongoing threat of ransomware attacks.

Illustrating the prolonged response times for ransomware breaches, the latest Comparitech report pointed to Texas’ Alvin Independent School District confirming just this month that a June 2024 data breach impacted nearly 48,000 people. The data involved names, Social Security numbers, credit and debit card numbers, financial account information, medical and health insurance information, and state-issued IDs. 

Organizations often wait to disclose a data breach because they are unsure if data was stolen following a ransomware attack until the hacker posts the stolen information on the dark web, Comparitech said. 

“Data theft is a common component of ransomware attacks, so it’s not unreasonable for companies to assume hackers stole data, even if there isn’t any evidence to suggest data theft at first,” researchers wrote. “The worst thing to do is to jump to the conclusion that data hasn’t been stolen.”

The FBI also advises against paying threat actors following a ransomware attack. If organizations pay a ransom, it still doesn’t guarantee any data will be recovered, the agency’s website states, adding that ransom payments can actually encourage more attacks.

K-12 school districts have been especially concerned about a widespread breach of student and staff data across North America following a December 2024 ransomware attack on ed tech provider PowerSchool. 

Though PowerSchool disclosed the cybersecurity incident about a week later, the company allegedly told districts not to worry about sensitive student and staff information being exposed. Five months later, however, PowerSchool publicly confirmed that, despite paying a ransom to threat actors, multiple school districts were being extorted with the same information stolen in the December incident.

Since then, over 100 school districts — including Tennessee’s largest school system, Memphis-Shelby County Schools — have sued PowerSchool for negligence, breach of contract and false advertising.

Younger job seekers are more concerned than their older counterparts about AI’s effect on their skill sets and education, according to an Indeed report published April 28. The job site commissioned a Harris Poll survey of 772 U.S. adult workers and job seekers with an associate’s degree or higher for the report.

Businesses show no signs of slowing AI adoption, and already almost half of Gen Z job seekers say the technology's adoption has made their college education irrelevant, compared with about one-third of Millennials. About 1 in 5 Gen Z and baby boomer survey takers say the same of their college education.

The ongoing push to deemphasize college degree requirements in job postings has led half of Gen Z job seekers to view their degrees as a waste of time and money, according to the report.  

The deluge of AI adoption in the workplace has influenced in-demand roles, salary trends and even the C-suite’s purview. The effect is far from over, with younger generations grappling with the potential for additional disruptions ahead.

Every job currently posted on Indeed's job board will likely experience some level of exposure to generative AI and the changes it represents, according to Indeed Senior Talent Strategy Advisor Linsey Fagan.

"For any organization to succeed with AI, every single employee needs to have a basic understanding of AI and how their company uses it," Fagan said in an email to CIO Dive. "Leaders play a crucial role in this shift by assessing their teams, listening to individual needs, and supporting their development."

One way chief information officers have responded to the wave of change is by creating upskilling programs. Technology vendors, eager to remove the obstacles toward enterprise adoption, have also deployed training programs open to the general public.

Online learning and training platform O'Reilly found skyrocketing demand for AI-specific training last year, according to a January report. The number of professionals seeking training on AI principles more than quadrupled last year, the firm said.

"To truly unlock the potential of AI, organizations must invest in their people, offering training, hands-on experiences and opportunities to explore new tools in a supportive environment," Fagan said. "Organizations need employees to be motivated to try these tools and want to apply them in their day to day."

Microcredentials are often touted as a way for students and working adults to learn skills and move into new industries without the same time and money commitment required to pursue a college degree. But some college officials are working to pair microcredentials with a traditional four-year education. 

The University of Texas System expanded its partnership with Coursera late last year to provide some 15,000 students across its five health campuses with free access to the online learning platform’s microcredentials. Through the partnership, students, faculty, staff, and alumni have access to Coursera’s Career Academy, which offers some 50 professional certificate programs with companies like Google and Microsoft. 

System officials say they hope the microcredentials help students build upon their college classwork to succeed in the workforce. The results of pairing microcredentials with degree programs have not been fully studied, but higher education experts say they may offer benefits for students. 

The partnership has been active on the UT System’s nine academic campuses since August 2023 following a pilot launched the year before. Together, the campuses collectively enroll some 245,000 students. The partnership has so far cost the UT System about $1.7 million dollars. 

When microcredentials are tied to specific companies, like Google or Microsoft, it could signal information about their skills to employers beyond what they learn from classwork, said Kelvin Bentley, an official at the UT system. That might be especially influential for students at smaller campuses, said Bentley, who is the program manager for the Texas Credentials for the Future, an initiative that focuses on expanding short-term credentials across the system and includes the Coursera partnership. 

“We've just been really excited to be able to provide these microcredential courses to our students with the hope being that the combination of microcredentials from industry partners and the durable skills that they're learning from existing course work will help set them apart in the world of work,” Bentley said. 

What’s next for the program?

UT campuses are exploring how they might award credit to students for professional certificates earned through the Coursera partnership. If campuses award credit, the online courses may be able to stack within degree programs. 

The system is also hoping to find new ways to boost credential completion among participating students. Since the partnership launched at the original nine campuses, more than 14,000 students and alumni have begun a microcredential. However, only about 1,600 have completed one. In total, about 1,960 microcredentials have been completed. 

“Many students, because it's no cost, have signed up,” Bentley said. “What we're doing is just trying to work with our campuses is to find ways for them to connect with their learners to help them actually finish the microcredentials that they've enrolled in.”

Giving credit for microcredentials and integrating them formally into programs could make them more valuable to students, said Naomi Boyer, senior vice president of digital transformation at Education Design Lab. It could also encourage completion. College students may not see the immediate value in completing a credential when they’re already working towards a degree. 

“As long as it’s an extra add-on, it’s those people who have initiative, who already have gumption to find their pathway, who are going to take advantage of the opportunities,” she said.

Will the partnership boost student outcomes? 

It’s an open question whether microcredentials can improve the labor market outcomes of college students. Four-fifths of hiring managers said that alternative credentials could show skills or knowledge areas, according to a 2021 survey of over 1,000 respondents by InsideTrack and UPCEA. More than 70% said employees would be more likely to be promoted if they earned an industry-relevant short-term credential. 

It’s great to offer free courses for the personal enrichment of students, said Shalin Jyotishi, managing director of the Future of Work and Innovation Economy Initiative at think tank New America. But if college leaders want microcredentials to provide more value, they need to understand which courses may carry currency with the employers who are likely to hire their graduates, he said.

“We need to know if these certificates are going to add anything to a student's experience before we recommend them or embed them in programs,” Jyotishi said. “We have to be a little bit intentional about implementation. Otherwise, it might just be a waste of time and money.”

Colleges could use labor market data to see which credentials or skills are mentioned in job advertisements. Institutions could also work with regional employers to learn about which courses or skills they might find useful, Jyotishi said. 

The UT system is hoping to use a longitudinal study to help uncover whether microcredentials help students in the labor market. Using unemployment data, UT can track alumni and their labor market outcomes, which may provide insight into the role of credentials in their job success. 

Though college leaders should be thoughtful about whether they want to recommend microcredentials to their students, Texas is one of the states moving in the right direction on workforce training, Jyotishi said. 

“Higher education institutions are doing a lot of great things to evolve and be more responsive to the labor market,” he said. “Texas is on the forefront of this, without a doubt.” 

Colleges could lose access to federal financial aid or face penalties if their external service providers mislead their students, the U.S. Department of Education said Jan.14. 

That includes companies that help colleges launch and run online programs. Employees of online program managers, or OPMs, cannot represent themselves as working directly for colleges, including by having email addresses or signatures implying they’re employed by those institutions, according to the guidance. 

OPM employees are also not allowed to represent a virtual program as equivalent to a college’s campus-based version if they have dissimilar admissions criteria, completion rates, faculty qualifications or other substantive differences. And workers in recruiting or sales roles can’t call themselves an “academic counselor” or use a similar title if it doesn’t accurately describe their position. 

The guidance — issued in the waning days of the Biden administration — aims to add more oversight to colleges’ relationships with OPMs. Student advocacy groups have long called for stricter rules for these companies, which often help colleges launch online programs in exchange for a significant cut of their tuition revenue.

Carolyn Fast, director of higher education policy at The Century Foundation, a left-leaning think tank, praised the letter on Jan. 15. 

“Today’s move by the Department of Education is a step in the right direction, affirming what we already know: OPMs commonly mislead students about the quality of their online programs and that is illegal,” Fast said in a statement. “This action will deter misconduct by OPMs and their college partners and will help protect online college students from the risks posed by predatory OPMs.”

What led to the guidance?

The guidance comes after the Biden administration’s other plans to add oversight to the OPM industry faltered. 

In early 2023, the administration said it would review guidance that allows colleges to enter tuition-sharing deals with OPMs that provide recruiting help — so long as it is part of a larger bundle of services. Despite asking for public comment on the matter, the Education Department has not updated or rescinded the 2011 guidance.

At the same time it announced the review, the administration issued separate guidance that would designate OPMs and other organizations as third-party servicers. The change would have subjected them to regulations that would give the department insight into their contracts with colleges. 

However, the Education Department quickly delayed the guidance — and eventually rescinded it altogether — amid widespread criticism that it would create burdensome requirements for the higher education sector. 

“We finally have clarity, in the last days of the administration, what they're actually going to do with the guidance around [third-party servicers]” and OPMs, said Phil Hill, an ed tech consultant. “It's just been this soap opera for 2 1/2 years now.”

However, Hill described the new guidance as “petulant rulemaking” from the Biden administration. 

“This Dear Colleague letter is attempting to go down to the level of telling colleges and universities and vendors what words are allowable and what aren't,” Hill said. “And this went through zero process, zero attempt to get input from schools.”

That includes whether the guidance will hamstring colleges from running online programs or whether the policies address the issues they’re trying to solve, Hill said. 

Stephanie Hall, senior director for higher education policy at the Center for American Progress, a left-leaning think tank, took a different stance. 

The Education Department received a “treasure trove of comments” when it sought public input in 2023 on policies that would have impacted the OPM sector, Hall argued. 

“A lot was given over the past couple of years, and I see this guidance letter as just an extension or a conclusion of that process and not something new that didn't take any input,” Hall said. 

Whether the Trump administration will enforce the new guidance is another matter. But Hall said the guidance is likely to create changes either way. 

“Schools are put on notice,” Hall said. “It’s something they take very seriously.” 

The incoming Trump administration could also rescind the guidance altogether, though it’s unclear if OPM oversight is a priority issue to incoming officials. 

“Are they aware of the impact this could have on online education, and is this going to be on their radars to take action and just immediately get rid of it?” Hill said. 

The guidance could also draw legal challenges. The Biden administration’s now-rescinded 2023 guidance sparked a lawsuit from 2U, a prominent OPM. 

“This is just waiting for a rescission or a lawsuit,” he said. 

What’s in the guidance?

In the January guidance, the Education Department listed several examples of statements that OPM employees could make that would likely qualify as misrepresentations. That includes OPM employees using email addresses or signatures that suggest they are directly employed by their college clients. 

At least one prominent OPM has caught flak for using college email addresses — 2U. In 2022, The Wall Street Journal reported that the company used the “.edu” email addresses of its college clients in order to recruit prospective students into their online programs. 

Hall noted that this is a widespread practice in the OPM industry. 

“It's wonderful that they're addressing that and making it clear that that could be a substantial misrepresentation, and that schools would be held responsible for that,” she said. 

A 2U spokesperson said that the company’s marketing and recruitment teams use university email addresses to reach out to prospective students and include transparent disclosures about their affiliation with the company. 

2U is reviewing the Education Department’s letter to ensure the company remains aligned “with evolving regulatory guidance and best practices,” it said in a Thursday statement.

“Transparency has always been at the heart of our mission, and we remain steadfast in upholding this principle as we partner with universities to deliver transformative outcomes through high-quality online education,” 2U said. 

Under the department's new guidance, it could also be misleading for OPM recruiters or sales representatives to present themselves to students as academic counselors or other similar positions. 

“Such practices create a high risk of misrepresentation since rewarding an individual based on sales indicates that individual’s role is not focused on impartially counseling prospective or enrolled students, but rather on securing a financial transaction,” the Education Department said.

The overall guidance focuses on disclosures to students, Hall said. 

“The biggest change is really just disclosures, disclosures that are going to be coming from the contractor and overseen by the institution,” she said. “I don't see this mocking the core of the actual online program itself, or its operations or its business model.”

The agency also warned against OPMs casting online programs as equivalent to their campus-based counterparts if they provide “distinct and substantively different” resources to students, including instructors, curricula and advisers. 

In a footnote, the guidance cites a class-action lawsuit against the University of Southern California, which alleged that the institution presented its online master’s degree in social work as the same as a campus-based one, even though it outsourced “substantial aspects” of the virtual version to 2U. 

2U was not named as a defendant in the case. 

The company’s college partners retain full control over core functions of their degree programs, including tuition rates, faculty hiring, and admissions standards and decisions, a 2U spokesperson said. 2U’s clients also review and approve marketing materials for their programs, the spokesperson said. 

The lawsuit is ongoing. 

However, USC and 2U announced in late 2023 plans to wind down their partnership on most of their online programs, including the social work master’s degree. 2U continues to support a USC physical therapy program. 

Project on Predatory Student Lending is helping represent the students in the lawsuit against the University of Southern California. In a statement Thursday, PPSL President and Executive Director Eileen Connor said she hoped the Trump administration would take the letter’s concerns seriously. 

“This letter calls out just how dangerous the OPM industry is to our higher education system,” Connor said.

Ever since the public release of ChatGPT in November 2022, artificial intelligence has dominated conversations related to higher education and the future of work in the U.S. Now, some colleges are investing significantly in AI-related programs, from specific degrees to integrating AI literacy into other disciplines.   

They are doing so for several reasons. 

Those include responding to predictions that the American workforce will rely on AI much more in the future. For students who would like to work with the development and science of AI, that can mean jobs — some of which are fairly high-paying. For students in other disciplines, that could mean they need to demonstrate AI-related knowledge or competency to land jobs. 

“I don't know how higher ed could not embrace AI literacy as a learning outcome,” said C. Edward Watson, vice president for digital innovation at the American Association of Colleges and Universities. “We can't not lean in to provide students with the skills that we know they're now expected to have when they graduate.”

But institutions may also be responding to student interest in AI. As many institutions deal with enrollment declines, that can be a powerful motivator. 

“There are only a finite number of students and they're going to decide where they're going to go based upon which institutions will best prepare them for life beyond college,” Watson said. 

How are colleges approaching AI?

So far, around 100 universities have launched some sort of credential in AI, said Luke Koslosky, a research analyst with the Center for Security and Emerging Technology. 

And interest appears to be growing around the topic. Conferrals of AI-related undergraduate and master’s degrees — which include computer science and cybersecurity — have increased about 120% since 2011, according to a 2023 report from CSET. In 2021, colleges conferred over 140,000 bachelor’s degrees and roughly 70,000 master’s degrees releated to AI. 

AI credentials typically live within computer science or engineering disciplines. The University of Pennsylvania, for example, offers both bachelor’s and master’s engineering degrees in AI. And some institutions offer AI-related minors. 

Other colleges are taking a different approach — integrating some AI science or AI literacy into other disciplines. 

That’s how the University of Florida is approaching its AI initiative, which aims to integrate AI into every undergraduate major and graduate program. So far, the university has incorporated AI education into a handful of undergraduate programs, including majors in information systems and data science and a minor in bioinformatics. It’s also added AI education to several graduate programs. 

Additionally, University of Florida offers a general AI certificate and discipline-specific AI certificates in hospitality, geography and public health. 

The AAC&U is also embarking on a project to help departments integrate AI into their programs. The higher education association is working with 124 institutions through its Institute on AI, Pedagogy and the Curriculum, launched in September. 

Departments submitted proposals about what they would like to achieve as far as integrating AI literacy into their curricula to receive assistance through virtual events and mentorship. Teams had to involve at least five people on a campus, preferably with one senior leader. 

“It was becoming arguable that maybe in addition to being able to write well and speak well and to be a critical thinker that additional, essential learning that should occur in college may have to do with developing AI literacies,” said Watson, the director of the institute.

The process can be difficult because faculty need to be competent in AI. Then, teams need to decide in which classes they’re going to teach AI literacy, what assignments they are going to give, and whether to focus on AI generally or in a more discipline-specific way. 

Choosing to invest

Despite the growing interest in the emerging technology, investing in AI-related programming is often difficult. For one, depending on the level and focus, it can be expensive. AI curricula can require colleges to hire qualified faculty and staff and pay for significant computing power. 

That’s why many of the institutions that are investing in AI, such as Carnegie Mellon University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology, are well-resourced with large endowments, Koslosky said. 

Other institutions are pursuing partnerships with industry to make their goals possible. University of Florida, for instance, has a partnership with chipmaker Nvidia, which includes a $50 million gift from the company and one of its cofounders. Arizona State University is partnering with OpenAI, to provide enterprise subscriptions to ChatGPT for approved faculty and staff.

Stony Brook University, part of the State University of New York system, recently expanded an AI institute into a universitywide initiative, which will focus on research and applications in healthcare, infrastructure, education and finance. The university is investing about $15 million, which includes support from Empire AI, a college research consortium focused on AI and heavily funded by the state.

Stony Brook Provost Carl Lejuez said that “$15 million is nothing and a lot of money all at the same time.”

“We’re seeing companies struggle with this immensely because they’re having to make decisions about — are they going to fall behind so far that they’re not going to be able to compete?” Lejuez added. “But in the meantime they’re spending millions and in some cases billions in cases where they’re not generating real revenue yet.”

Whether an investment in AI programming is right for an institution will likely depend on its circumstances, including its resources, faculty, mission and connections to industry.

“If you're a major research university, you're going to be really far behind if you are not investing in this,” Lejuez said. “For research universities, it's an absolute necessity.”

For other institutions though, a big AI investment might be riskier.

“If your school doesn't have a huge computer science department and doesn't have a lot of industry connections to companies using AI or building AI, then you shouldn't drop everything to stand up a brand new AI program right now,” Koslosky said.

Additionally, investments in AI are so far untested. Although many business leaders believe AI is going to change the American workforce, that transformation hasn’t fully come to pass. Although current research predicts the number of AI jobs trending upwards, what those jobs look like might change. That means that trying to integrate AI into other disciplines is the financially safer approach, Koslosky said.

“Schools are struggling with lots of things and balancing competing priorities,” he said. “AI is important and will continue to be, but it's not the only important thing.”