Inside the Pressure Cooker: Online Education, Policy, and the Push to Adapt with Stacy Snow

In this episode of UnchartED State, co-hosts Susan Seal and Maddie Ludt are joined by Stacy Snow, Principal at Kennedy & Company, to explore the evolving pressures shaping online education today. 

From shifting federal and state policies to increased scrutiny of the vendor marketplace, institutions are being pushed to rethink how they build and sustain online programs. Stacy shares insights from her work helping universities launch more than 140 online programs, emphasizing a critical shift: success is no longer about scale. It’s about relevance.

The conversation dives into how institutions can better align programs with regional workforce needs, why most online students still come from close to home, and the importance of asking the right questions before launching or expanding programs. They also tackle the harder realities facing leaders today—financial uncertainty, policy instability, and the growing impact of change fatigue across teams.

As higher ed navigates constant disruption, this episode highlights the importance of internal capacity building, stakeholder alignment, and staying focused on what matters most: creating meaningful, student-centered experiences.

In This Episode:

• Why relevance—not volume—is driving online program success
• The myth of “build it and they will come” in online education
• How geography and community still shape online enrollment
• Navigating federal policy shifts, funding uncertainty, and compliance pressures
• The real impact of change fatigue on higher ed teams
• Why transformative change often happens only in crisis
• Building internal capacity in a shifting vendor and OPM landscape

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

We have to stop chasing shiny objects. That's been something, and you know, that never ends. Those conversations are what keeps us on our toes, and those are good conversations to have. But if we're going to always chase something new, we might not be keeping an eye on well, it's the right thing for our institution's personality and our operating context right now. That also meets the student's needs. So I do think as long as we keep what student needs front and center, we have to have the hard conversations of, well, what can we do differently?

SPEAKER_05 0:36

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Uncharted State, where we are exploring the changing landscape of higher education. And as in most episodes, we're focusing on some of the most consequential things that have happened in higher ed. And today we're going to focus on online education and shifting federal policy, growing scrutiny of the vendor marketplace, and institutions scrambling to build sustainable models from the inside out. And we have with us Stacey Snow. Stacy, we're glad to have you here with us today.

SPEAKER_03 1:11

Hello, good afternoon.

SPEAKER_05 1:13

Stacy is a principal of Kennedy and Company acquired by Human Capital Education, one of the nation's leading higher education consulting firms. With roots in journalism and a career built across the University of Missouri system, Stacy has helped launch 140 online degree and certificate programs and specializes in enrollment marketing strategy, online program readiness, and helping institutions build in-house capacity in an increasingly complex marketplace. And you have worked with us in the past, and we're happy to have you today on uh Uncharted State.

SPEAKER_03 1:51

Well, it's a pleasure to be here. It's nice to see you both. And I have my Mississippi State earrings on. It's proudly representing Health State. Let's go.

SPEAKER_05 2:01

So tell us a little bit about your journey. You you started in journalism and then moved into higher education marketing at Missouri, which I mentioned, and then eventually into consulting. So how did all that shape where you are today?

SPEAKER_03 2:16

Well, it depends on how far you want to go back, right? Uh I have been.

SPEAKER_05 2:20

I was a small child.

SPEAKER_03 2:22

Exactly. Uh well, it actually does start pretty far back. Uh, in that one of my first jobs in high school was at the local extension uh office in our county, Missouri, Montgomery County, Missouri. And my job that summer was to test pressure cookers who people would bring in, and they weren't quite sure grandmama's pressure cooker was still working. And so they would bring it to the extension center, and for free, we would test them and make sure that they weren't going to explode in their kitchen. So, as you see, high school students clearly expendable human capital at the time. And we that was my job. Uh, and you know, you just kind of would turn it on, make sure everything, the seals were working properly, turn it on, and just sort of squint and hope for the best, which uh a quality that has served me well over many generations of jobs since then.

SPEAKER_00 3:14

Squint and hope for the best. That's my new motto.

SPEAKER_03 3:18

But uh after the job search began after college, I did go to school to be a journalist and worked just ever so for a little bit in journalism. I moved into the electric cooperative industry and was a communication specialist then. And so even at that point, the same touch point of working with the counties and the systems and the infrastructure for a county to bring electricity to the homes and then communicate throughout the rural part of the state that I was working in connected me back to extension and the traditional land grant mission of a public institution serving all the counties and its state. So I grew up in that space, worked in it as a first job in communications and writing and storytelling, and then moved into the University of Missouri when the extension system there was hiring its first marketing and communications team. So it had obviously been around a long time, but it had never had a group that was doing storytelling and promoting the continuing ed programs that it offered. So it started there, uh won't say what year, but it was many years ago. And uh, right as online education was also getting started. So I'll be honest, it was 99, 2000, somewhere in there when Missouri was moving into that space. And because it was a different type of education, the university didn't know what to do with it. It didn't have a home. And so, what do we do with types of education and different types of credentials that we don't exactly know what to do with? We give it to Extension, and that's how many of us grew up in that space. So for the first several years of online education at Mizzou, it was housed within the extension division. At some point, uh, the it it left the office of the provost, moved the four credit online programs out, and the non-credit stayed with extension, but my group of staff moved with the four credit online programs, and then we eventually turned an advertising campaign of Mizzou Online into an office name. So Mizzou Online was born somewhere in those years of trying to promote online and alternative credentials at the same time. So the core of what was true through all of those experiences, though, was the training I received both in high school and college of learning to tell stories and how to write about people and how to ask questions. And so I joke that questions are my love language. And for folks who know me, whether it's in my social circles or in family or people who have the benefit of working with me, I ask a lot of questions. The questions really never end. Ask the same question many, many different ways to try to really understand the core of what's happening in that situation and at that institution and whatever the challenges we're trying to solve. To me, the the answer lies in how can we ask the right next question in order to move the conversation along and uncover the best possible solution. And so, still to this day, we have to understand when are when am I asking the wrong question? I have to understand that too, because sometimes I can we can get off on a tangent and we are working on something that isn't really the right line of question or the line of query that we should be focusing on, and we have to redirect our conversations and get back to the next right question in order to solve problems. So it really is all connected back to helping folks in in all parts of the state.

SPEAKER_05 6:52

It started in a pressure cooker and it's now back in a pressure cooker, it feels like, right? It does. We have several people here that uh also had affiliations with Extension. I I worked in Extension for a long time, our associate dean did. We've got some others, and I think some of that understanding about taking the university out to the people, it's kind of embedded in in still what what we do. When I started working in um our online uh our Center for Distance Education, which was the academic side, I said it's it's kind of like the academic extension service because our role here is to take the university out to the people. It's just the academic side, as opposed to the non-credit and how to can tomatoes and agriculture and all the other things that that it did as well.

SPEAKER_03 7:44

It is, and that the connection to the community is so strong in the various channels that exist that have been built over generations of families living in these small rural communities and even in the urban areas, the types of services that you can get through those connection points. It's a built-in network for institutions. And really, sometimes the challenge is now how do we continue to tap into those networks in the best way? Even for institutions that didn't, quote, grow up as a land grant or didn't have that, you know, designation. There's still a connection point to the communities and the institutions that are finding those are having a lot of success versus the ones who aren't.

SPEAKER_05 8:24

Well, in online at the core um has been access. I mean, that's what we've we've tried to do with online education is create access for people. Um we talked about that you've helped, you know, launch hundreds of online degree programs, and we're coming up on our 40th year in distance ed. Not all not all online, obviously. Uh some of that we have people here telling stories about, you know, being in a back room making copies of VH VHS tapes and sending those VHS tapes out. Um, so we kind of came from some of that. Now we've got over 170 programs that are online. And sometimes it seems to be a race to who can get the most online. To your point about asking the right questions, I don't know that that's the right thing. So, in kind of your role and what you've seen, how do we make sure we're not just putting a lot of things online and it's not just about quality, but that we're putting the right programs out there and using our resources in the most effective and efficient way.

SPEAKER_03 9:34

Well, first of all, happy anniversary year. So that's a big deal. Uh, and just to connect those dots, the secret to getting your stakeholders to care about your anniversary or the number of degree programs you have is about making it feel really relevant to them. And I used to fall into that trap. You know, we have 30 online degree programs, we have 75 online, and then our whole advertising campaign would be based on how large we were. And what I have come to realize is it's not about the numbers, it's not about how long we've been around necessarily or how many things we offer. It's how can we make students feel like it's relevant for them? And I think that the connection points are really nuanced in how they're thinking about solving their own problems and how they connect to us, and can we solve their problems? So again, it kind of goes back to questions. What can you do for me if I'm the student? I'm not happy with the type of job I have, I'm not happy with my salary. Um, or more sort of intrinsic, I'm not, I'm I might be scared, I'll never be more than I am, or I don't even know what questions to ask because I've never been back to school, so I don't know what's even possible. I don't know what to ask, I don't know how to finance it, you know. And so we have to make sure that we're relevant to every type of student that we're trying to serve that's in our service set, right? Uh, and make them understand it is possible and how can we connect the dots for the challenges they're trying to serve. So some of our programs are for folks who, especially at the graduate level, right, they they understand education. They've been through it, they're career climbers. So we have to answer different types of questions at different points in their decision-making timeline. Whereas some of our other programs, or maybe even our non-credit credentials, the folks we're trying to serve there have a very different set of challenges they're facing. So they have also different questions. Or the folks who have, they know they need something, but they don't know how to ask it. So, how can we be everything to all people, but for the things we're trying to promote, for the priorities that we've set, the goal is we have to find a way to be relevant for them. So, how do we know if we have the right programs that are relevant? Uh, I think that the it's it's a recipe, I guess, is a the metaphor that I would use. Um, what does your region need? What isn't already being offered, and what fits your school's personality and your capabilities. So the recipe for those ingredients is going to be a little different everywhere. And some of your peers don't follow the recipe card, um, they're make it up as they go, right? Others are professional chefs at it, and they know exactly how much of each of those things to put into the mixing bowl when they're coming up with their next program ideas. But as long as you understand in your region what it needs, what the employers need, what the students are demanding and need, and then how does that fit into your structure and capabilities and what you as an institution or division can excel at? The answers are there. It's just a matter of rifling through all that data to find the right place.

SPEAKER_05 12:59

So, in working with departments and the way we're set up is as you know, um, we're kind of that centralized, decentralized. We have a centralized unit where we support all the colleges on campus with marketing and technology and advising and all of those kind of things. But the courses and the programs belong to that college. So we have had colleges or departments in the past that they've wanted to put their program online because it was not growing or it was struggling, and they're thinking, uh, this will be the answer, you know, and and that's not necessarily the reason to put it online. How do you tell a department no? I mean, how do you, and and that's not necessarily our role. We can say we don't think you should, and we've done the market research and you know, but how do you work with those departments so that you you it's not just the number and they're not just putting it online to save something else, that they're really looking at what are the the questions maybe that we get them to ask themselves?

SPEAKER_03 14:04

Sure, that's a great question. I think that as much data that we can find that's specific to that area, and sometimes the national data will help as well. But the majority of online students, and it's been true for a long time, and it's becoming even more true, majority of online students at nearly every institution come from quite a small radius from that institution. We used to say 250 miles or 200 miles, and now it's getting closer to 100 miles, 75 miles. Every group, your your geographic location, the type of state you're in, the type of region you're in, it all matters. But the the radius, if you drew a circle around the main draw area of your institution, it nationally anyway, those circles are getting smaller. So even though we're online, people are still going to an institution that they have a brand affinity for. They understand what the institution stands for, and they they've heard of it, they've heard know somebody who went there, et cetera. So even in an online space, what we try to help folks understand is that most of your students are still gonna come from a certain radius. Now, if you're a really rural institution with not a lot of competitors, your circle's larger physically, but the population demographics are gonna, you know, shift how that is it, is it really an uh an amoeba shape? Is it an ellipse? Is it what you know is what is the shape of your service area based on where you are in the state and the population? But that's one of the first places that I start and and will show peer institutions or peer programs um the demographics of where their student makeup comes from. And though those data will start to tell the story for disbelievers who don't think that, well, I'll just put it online and everyone will flock to me. Uh, it is true that some programs from really small uh institutions can have a national play. It's rare. Uh, and then sometimes our at a bigger state institution like yourself, you've got programs that play at a more national level than others, right? They've earned a reputation for a perfect set of reasons. Uh, you have a corner on that market, you have some really cool alumni in that program, um, it's been around a long time, it's ranked well, whatever the set of circumstances became true that that program made a name for itself. And so now it's got a bigger stage to play on. It's also true that not every program is going to follow that same trajectory. And so helping folks understand those data. Um, then we really get into the deep end of a market study. How is the pricing comparing? A lot of institutions don't have any control over the price of their programs unless it's at the graduate level. And even then, just charging the max that their board allows isn't always the right answer. So a comparison of tuition and understanding the price and the value that folks perceive that they're getting for those credentials, that's important. What it when's the last time the curriculum was looked at at a program? Uh, is it really matching to what the employers are demanding of their new employees? Have we studied that? Have we asked the employers? How do you feel about the people we're sending and and and producing for you? Does it match what you need? What do you think is on the horizon where a lot of folks worried about AI and how AI is changing workforce needs? There are millions more questions than there are answers right now to that. There are some specific places where people have been able to reduce workforce, but in many more cases, connected to a lot of our degree programs, it's actually that the work is shifting, not going away. So I am starting to hear more and more institutions talk about the pressures on the institution to make sure they're preparing students who understand how to be a good employee in the age of AI. And how does it impact this particular line of work and how does it impact my career so that they can hit the ground running when they start working for that employer and try to make things as efficient as possible? And yet there are areas where employers are not hiring as many people because of AI. So understanding those nuances in your region and in your program portfolio have to be part of the conversation as well.

SPEAKER_05 18:34

Are some of those questions naturally being asked now that maybe they weren't five years ago as far as looking at the curriculum? I mean, we're having to look at the curriculum because of a lot of things going on. You know, how do our assessments need to be changed? I mean, AI is dictating some of that, some federal policies. Well, you got to change it because of this. There seems to be so many things happening that maybe those questions are being asked anyway, as opposed to being forced to if we're gonna move it online or if we're gonna do something else with it.

SPEAKER_03 19:08

The the questions have changed in the last five years compared to when I was on the inside just talking about annual reports or talking about our own program reviews internally. And I think the for the reasons you just listed, there's different federal pressure, there are different groups looking at outcomes, uh, salary scale, employability in general, the sentiment of certain folks who think maybe higher ed's not worth it, and maybe it's higher ed of the past isn't worth it. So, side note, we have to tell that story in a different way than we've had to before to show the outcomes in different ways, right? Uh, but the the overall question of how can we prove these programs deserve to continue to exist? That's been asked more and more of us lately. So when we're asked to come in and help someone figure out what I should offer next that's new, almost always we're also being asked, well, let's look at what we're currently offering. Does it need to change the curriculum? Does a student learning outcome need to shift? And we haven't looked at that in a while. Do you have to have the hard conversation about sunsetting it? And I I would like to remove the the um how taboo that that conversation can be. I would like for that to be a more normalized conversation for institutions to have of should this be sunset, because we can't find the resources for innovation and new directions to move things in if we also are holding on to everything in the past, the same number of staff and the same number of resources.

SPEAKER_05 20:52

It's not failure. It's not saying it's a failure, it's just making room for the the next things.

SPEAKER_03 20:59

Right. And it's a hard, it's a hard combination of conversations. You're your the empathy that we have to approach those conversations with is is really important to me because these are faculty and staff members' livelihoods we're talking about when we're talking about closing a program. Um not just the alumni that you're gonna hear later from the say, I can't believe you're closing this program, right? But the number of staff and faculty who've poured their life work into running that program and that division, uh, those are those are really important uh lifelong works that we're impacting by saying maybe this program needs to morph. And the conversations are complicated because maybe the program actually could be reinvigorated. We have to find the right set of circumstances that it can be true to invest in it, right? And what is it the curriculum that has to change? Does it need to be redesigned from the ground up? Are we willing to do that change? And and we means everybody. Department leadership, the faculty, the team building the course design, the students you're getting the reviews from, your alumni who you're tapping into, the employers who want to employ. Everybody on that chain has to be willing to have something to do with the evolution of that program, and it can find another future. However, there are some that can't, and those are hard conversations.

SPEAKER_05 22:26

You were talking earlier about it's not necessarily how old a program is. And like I said, we're this is our 40th year. There's people who've been around a lot longer than we have and a lot newer. And I was talking to somebody from one of the uh institutions that has one of the early adopters, and is, you know, and certainly a national name. And they said, even with online, which you think is innovative and whatever, we've been around so long. We've kind of settled into that old, I mean, what we think of as universities, sometimes hard to change, hard to move, even though we're kind of separate from what they call the mothership, you know, with the on the online. But because we've been around for so long and we've kind of gotten in that pattern of this is how we do things, we're not as nimble as some of the the newer, younger ones, you know, coming coming along. So I think we have to continue to how do we um keep that culture of innovation fresh, whether it's with programs or marketing or you know, any of the things that we have to do, uh regardless of age of the unit or whatever.

SPEAKER_03 23:40

Yeah, absolutely. Uh one of um the quotes that I heard, I didn't didn't come up with this on my own. I wish I could actually give you the source of it, but it's students don't enroll in org charts, they enroll in experiences. And so one of the things that I have seen is that long-established online programs, like you just said, have the these isms about them, right? They've always done it this way, or this is how it's always worked. And so they're trying to innovate, uh, review what they're currently offering, look for the nuanced new programs that they could offer, special like you've got 170 programs, finding the next new golden goose isn't an easy task, right? There's so many nuances you could be in investigating. But sometimes our structures, how we've always done things, uh kind of hold us back sometimes and having those conversations. And so if we remember at the end of the day that we can't let those things be the enemy of innovation and good in the future. So if we if we have to keep innovating and examining how we're doing things.

SPEAKER_05 24:45

And Maddie, you you work with our students. So you're you're seeing that. You work with industry also. Um, so you you're on the working with those on the outside of the the institution. And sometimes you're the one that that brings us back that says, you know, that that terminology doesn't mean anything to our students or our uh industry that we're working with.

SPEAKER_00 25:08

Yeah, yeah. And I think that's like, I guess I've I will stop calling myself an outsider or a newbie at some point, but only like four years into this field. I think that is like one of my advantages because sometimes I still don't know what you guys are talking about. And so there's no way that our students are gonna know. Um, but that's brings up a really important idea. We're at this crossroads of innovation ourselves. Are we innovating for ourselves or are we innovating for our students?

SPEAKER_03 25:40

You know, I think that both can be true as long as student student outcomes is at the core of what higher ed should be focused on. But because you're innovating for what students need, there's kind of no help but to innovate for ourselves as well. Not however, we have to stop changing chasing shiny objects. That's been something, and and you know, that has never that never ends. There's always a new trustee or uh a new leader, whether it's at the very top of the institution or a new dean, uh, or a new shiny object that you learn about at a conference and you come back as the dean who's served for a while and you and you want to go after something. So that that those conversations are what keeps us on our toes, and those are good conversations to have. But if we're gonna always chase something new, we might not be keeping an eye on, well, what's the right thing for our institution's personality and our operating context right now? That also meets the student's needs. So I do think as long as we keep what student needs front and center, we have to have the hard conversations of, well, what can we do differently?

SPEAKER_05 26:59

Yeah, yeah. I think we can't innovate for the student if we aren't also willing to innovate our own processes and how how we do things. So they have to kind of meet somewhere. Um, let's talk a little bit about policy. Who doesn't love a good policy discussion, right? Uh because we're in this time that there's just uh we we keep saying this about everything. It's unprecedented. We're in an unprecedented time of of, you know, with AI and with marketing and and and with policy, with the the federal disruption in higher ed, um, the the funding cuts, the one big beautiful bill, and how it's reshaping graduate borrowing. We're looking at accreditation changes, DEI, uh, declining international enrollment, all the all the things. And institutions are are still expected to do that, you know, strategic decision making and even strategic planning, but we don't know what's going to happen next week, you know, much much less of you know uh a little bit longer range. And so from where you're sitting, uh working with uh institutions, uh a number of institutions, how are you seeing that leaders are actually processing all of this? Uh what is changing and how they make decisions based on all the changes that have come down from the federal level and also the state level. I uh, you know, being a southern state and and looking at some of the other southern states in particular, um, some of the higher restriction and the biggest changes are also coming from our state legislature.

SPEAKER_03 28:42

Well, I think the biggest thing that I've seen recently is that there's a lot of wait and see paired with an incredible amount of pressure to act now, act faster, make a decision faster, but also maybe we should wait and see. And that's an incredibly difficult position to be in as a leader because everyone is looking at you uh to have the next right answer in what direction we're gonna go. So it's I hate to say it, there's a little bit of consultant speak in here, but the whole concept of separating signal from the noise and having the ability to understand what are the components that we can break down in this situation and take an action on, or have an opinion on, or have a position ready for. When can we actually have an opinion and move forward? And when do we need to wait and see? And those are tough decisions. And we have to be ready to make some of those decisions without the full set of information. So, like you said, we have policy and stability. Will the federal policy actually change? Or when it changes, will they actually, or state, and and if it changes, will they enforce it? Or what's the timeline of when they're gonna enforce it? Uh, we had one of those recently where there was a a federal policy on accessibility that we schools were working toward for an April 2026 deadline, and that's been extended. And schools really needed that extension because the timeline they had originally been given and the amount of work it's gonna take to get into compliance is is huge. I'm sure your teams have been working on that for your online courses, and so we're working toward it. We still have to have resources devoted to being ready for that because there's an extension, but we still have to be ready when the uh the next deadline comes to pass. So, what were the workflows that had to be put into place to work toward that? What were the resources that had to be dedicated there? So, if you add all the various policies that are touching us, there's it's a little bit of instability of planning for your resources all the time. We also have incredible financial pressure facing us. Will the funding model come through or will it change? Uh am I changing based on something I believe to be true, but I wouldn't make that choice if the following situation wasn't going to become true and for my budget model. And but I have to have a budget, I have to have operating expenses, and I have to understand how we're going to move those things through our budget cycle. So understanding when to make decisions and move forward amidst all the chaos, it it really is taxing people. You can see it in um around their eyes and around like there's a lot of smiles that don't reach their eyes these days. And that's really telling about how uh how those constant pressure points are are impacting people. Um, I think that one of the pieces of advice that we kind of go back to is that we're so much change fatigue, we're actually becoming a little bit numb to the next crisis that might come at us. And so we have to watch and help help each other, not let that numbness turn into inaction, that we just don't do anything, that we stagnate because we're afraid of the next thing that's going to happen, or or or and sometimes you don't want to be part of adding to the change fatigue, so you don't want to change anything. But then that just keeps the status quo, whatever it's whether it's the tiniest of workflows between two divisions that you're thinking of, or it's a something school-wide or institution-wide. If you don't do anything, we can't get to the next right set of operating models that have to be true to do our business. And so it's easier said than done, but I think that I'm seeing people rely on each other a lot more than they used to. There's a lot of peer-to-peer networking happening, uh, a lot of a lot of after-dinner phone calls that I hear about, or or let's meet for coffee at six in the morning, because that's the only time I have to I have to meet during my busy day. I think there's there was there's a collective uh sigh of relief around May every year, around this time when we're recording this, uh, of we've hit graduation, we've made it through. Well, so now let's take a beat, let's be with family, let's center ourselves, but let's keep talking to one another. Because I still want to know what you're doing down the road and what the next school is doing down the road. I have to have a litmus test for how people are facing all these questions. Um, so that was a long way to say that the networking that people are doing has never been more important because we have to keep the decisions flowing, we have to keep our units running at the same time. Uh it's good to check in with our peers of way, I have this idea. Do you think this is going to work? How silly is this gonna be if we try this? And so that's one, it's not it's not a great answer really, but it's what I'm seeing. And I think it's making people feel more human and more humanly connected to each other as they're making million-dollar decisions about their units and their schools.

SPEAKER_05 34:10

Are you seeing real transformational change? I mean, are you seeing people making decisions that are that is truly transformational as opposed to incremental that sometimes we call transformational, but it's really just incremental change. But around some of those those bigger disruptors that we're talking about? Uh or is it uh let's wait and see, or there are people going, okay, we gotta, we gotta go.

SPEAKER_03 34:36

I wish I had a more positive answer. I'm seeing more transformative change uh happen when sort of our back is against the wall, right?

SPEAKER_05 34:47

Um we have to.

SPEAKER_03 34:49

We have to, the budget is in such a crisis mode, or and and it can be at an individual program level, a school, an institution level, our back is against the wall and we have to do something different. So major changes start to take effect. The challenge with those is that while there's been a team of people working on whatever that change needed to be for months, sometimes it happens in a vacuum. Then we start, it feels like it happens in a vacuum to the other stakeholders impacted, right? Then we have another set of change fatigue that's built in, a communications problem, perceptions out there among the people who maybe weren't consulted about that change. So it's transformative because it has to be, but it's not, it's it's not built on an infrastructure of understanding with all stakeholders around you. So I wish it wasn't what we saw. I wish that people were taking the time long before they're in crisis to make truly transformative change. I will say that there are individual programs, individual divisions that are really trying different things with their programs. They're really innovating the curriculum. They're using employers for better feedback. Um, there's a couple of UPSIA conferences ago, there was a several sessions on different ways to use advisory boards in new ways to really understand the local and regional and statewide connections that programs have with employers to really work on pipelines for their programs. So some of those things are happening. They're not necessarily transformational at an institutional level, but they can be for at the program and school level.

SPEAKER_05 36:32

The way they're implemented, they can be transformational.

SPEAKER_03 36:35

Right, right.

SPEAKER_05 36:36

Um let's shift a little bit and talk about um OPMs, consultants, and uh, and and how we how we serve students. There's been a scrutiny around third-party vendors in higher ed, and that's intensified. You're seeing some states that are are pushing back against um some of that. And a lot of it has to do with uh tuition share and and those kind of things. Organizations like you and the way that you worked with us was uh really to help us build some in-house capacity rather than the outsourcing. With these changes and the pressures on OPMs, is that creating more demand for kind of what you do? And and when and I mentioned that with Kennedy and company um being acquired, you know, how does that fit in there? That was a strategic decision as as well. Is that part of this this whole conversation?

SPEAKER_03 37:35

Sure. So in terms of what's happened to the OPM industry in general, I think the changes have absolutely been good for students. I will say that the reason OPMs existed in the first place still are exists for some institutions when there was fully no chance that they had the capital to advertise a new program to a new population or run online student services or online student lead generation or lead nurturing for students, and the board absolutely wanted to move in that direction. It was the only way that they could have gotten off the ground with those programs. And it's revenue that they're, even though it's a revenue share, it's revenue that they're realizing that they wouldn't have otherwise at all. Now, in many other cases, institutions matured beyond that. And that's where what I've been working on for so many years comes into play is how can we build your internal capacity to keep as much of that revenue in-house as possible? So, do we need outside many institutions need outside vendor support for various aspects? And that still continues today, and they might need help with additional instructional design, or they might need help with uh calling students back in the inquiry stream of, or they might need help with technology implement implementation or uh training their own staff to do a better job in some aspect, or the marketing team might need enhancement. All those things are still true, and so the key, I think, is to find vendors that fit your institution's personality and the type of help you want, and and your needs will morph over time. When you first start with an engagement, you might think, well, I just need help for a couple months, and then I'm gonna take this and run. And then you find, then you might have a change over in staff or in leadership, and then you find out you need help for a little bit longer and getting things up to up and running. Um, I think that because of the bad rap that OPMs have gotten recently, it was a good push in the right directions for schools to realize they needed to staff up in some of these capabilities. And some of the ways that our outside vendors can get results for us, you can replicate some of those methods on the inside. You can have better emails that go out to students when they ask for information. You can have a better text and phone call experience with someone when they're just shopping your programs and investigating you for the first time. You can, your staff can learn how to do things better. It's there, nobody likes the word sales in higher education, but that's absolutely what it is. Your team is selling higher ed at some level to the people who need it. And so having sales training in the right way, uh, having instructional designers and faculty and faculty development opportunities, there are good and bad ways to teach online, just like there are good and bad ways to teach in person. And so having those uh conversations to make sure that your products are as as good as they can be, your team is using the technology you have as best as it can, the courses are engaging, the students are satisfied, the outcomes are there, all of those things have to be true. So finding the right set of circumstances to make that true with your internal capabilities is is I uh maybe you can see the light in my eyes goes on a little bit more, but that's where I spend a lot of my time helping people understand those connection points and what has to be true to be better at this ourselves. So that's kind of my sweet spot these days. When we were acquired, I think one of the things that that is true is that higher ed problems and challenges are not sitting neatly in single lanes anymore. So when Human Capital Education and Kennedy and Company joined forces, it brings together really disparate types of services and people into a larger organization. And so now we can talk about enrollment growth from every perspective. Is it that you needed just a different program to market, or you needed to market the program in a different way? Did the program need to have a different name? Are we actually targeting the right students? Are we targeting the right geography? Did we need a different CRM system to take the inquiries? Did we need a different LMS system to deliver the courses? Did we need a different budget model to run the whole operation? Did we need a different website? So every angle of growing that enrollment, we can touch now because we joined forces. And I think that that is happening a lot in the higher ed serving vendor partner marketplace is that folks are combining forces because the challenges are not becoming fewer, right? That the institutions are facing.

SPEAKER_05 42:28

They are not, indeed.

SPEAKER_00 42:30

I'm curious, Stacey, like working with universities and colleges across such a broad section. What are some universal truths that you've uncovered? Are paths crossed in marketing mostly? And uh, is it like some common pitfall that people are falling into when they are trying to expand their internal marketing capacity? Is there some universal truth that we all share?

SPEAKER_03 42:52

Well, I think one of the my favorite things to say that connects all the dots between the different hats that I wear. Um, sometimes I'm talking about online growth or good storytelling or helping students or selling higher education in general. But this is another one of my favorite quotes. You can't communicate yourself out of a problem you behaved your way into. And so I'll say that again. You can't communicate yourself out of a problem that you behaved your way into. It was actually said by Jane Schaefer. She used to work at the University of Plymouth. So I'll give her credit for that quote. But when I'm working with an institution and their challenges are like really getting to me, uh, and I'm like, what can we do next? What is what's gonna, what's the right path forward here? What's the next right question to ask? Is if we focus back on what are the circumstances that they behaved them themselves into this situation. Is it a budget problem? Is it a staffing problem? Is it a technology problem? They got themselves here. And so no matter of pretty advertising or more advertising. Or more staff. None of that's going to get us out of maybe the hole that they've gotten into if we can't figure out what was the structure that that put us in this place in the first case. So I think that that's what I keep coming back to when I'm trying to connect all the dots.

SPEAKER_05 44:20

Okay, I'm going to use that.

SPEAKER_00 44:22

That's that's great.

SPEAKER_05 44:24

I love that quote. So as we wrap up, I I asked this question uh quite often to some of our guests. What is it that keeps you up at night? And what excites you when you get up in the morning?

SPEAKER_03 44:40

So I think that the quote that I just shared is part of that that keeps me up at night when I can't figure out what are ways to get out of this situation that's been created. So my my partner behaved themselves into this corner, right? They a certain set of things was true, and here's where we are. So when we were looking for a way out, you know, what's next? What's how can we grow, or how can we change, or how can we make the situation better, whatever it is we're working on, the thing that excites me is being able to ask it, ask the questions in a different way. What has to be true for the following thing to change? And then working on what has to be true that that week, that month, that quarter, right? What has to become true for us to change the trajectory that or reach the goal that we're trying to reach? So that part excites me, keeps me up at night when I can't figure out what that question is. And so uh I I spend a lot of time thinking about questions.

SPEAKER_05 45:44

So you're not up at night worrying about things, you're up at night. What keeps you awake is the finding the solutions to whatever the thing is.

SPEAKER_03 45:52

Absolutely. Because that's what that's why people want to work with us, right? We have to we have to help them solve their challenges or they could solve them on their own.

SPEAKER_05 46:03

That's right. That's right. Well, thank you for being with us today. This has been a great conversation. I appreciate your time.

SPEAKER_02 46:09

Thank you, Stacey. So great to see you both and uh have a great summer.

SPEAKER_05 46:15

Thank you for joining us on Uncharted State. We hope today's conversation sparks some new ideas about the future of higher education. Hit follow so you never miss an episode. You never know what uncharted territory we'll explore next.