An Abrupt End to 2 Midwest Colleges Merging—Plus AI, Mastery Learning, and More Media Hits for Job Moves
I was originally planning to lead this update with a video of me talking about the impact of AI in education and the challenging landscape for many colleges. That’s still below. But breaking news changed the whole tenor of our latest Future U. podcast, released this past Tuesday, titled “A Midwest Merger: How Two Ohio Colleges Are Coming Together.”
In the podcast, Jeff Selingo and I talked to the presidents of two colleges in Ohio that had been seeking to merge for some time: Kathy Fell from the University of Findlay and Jane Wood from Bluffton University.
Ohio sits in the middle of the demographic crunch impacting higher education. Yet even in that climate, what had been so different about this story is how Bluffton University under the leadership of Jane Wood had been so proactive about reaching out to Findlay seeking a merger—even as the financial picture was still OK at Bluffton.
And now it’s all changed.
This week, the University of Findlay board voted not to proceed with the merger.
And Jane Wood resigned as the Bluffton University president.
In the conversation, which we had recorded just a few weeks earlier, we had dug into the emotional nature of the decision to merge; how you communicate with different stakeholders; and how the federal approval process for the merger had been a difficult and lengthy one to navigate.
According to sources, the long timeline of that federal approval process was a big factor in Findlay’s decision to pull out of the merger. As you’ll hear in the conversation, it had been a big source of irritation for the presidents.
At a time when college consolidation is likely to increase and the state of the Department of Education is uncertain, that’s something that needs attention.
The back half of our episode also has something different. Jeff and I have opined a lot on the topic of college mergers on Future U. So we invited Ricardo Azziz to join us for the back half and offer his thoughts. Ricardo is a leading expert in reproductive medicine; a former university president having led Georgia Regents University, now called Augusta University; and now a consultant to higher ed institutions. He's also the author of a new book, Leading Existential Change in Higher Education: Mergers, Closures, and Other Major Institutional Restructuring Now, as well as the book Strategic Mergers in Higher Education.
Listen to the whole episode here.
AI and the Future of Higher Education
In this wide-ranging conversation with the Harvard Business School’s Institute for Business in Global Society, I discussed how AI and changing market dynamics are reshaping education. We touched on the consolidation of higher education institutions, the rise of alternative learning pathways, and how experiential learning could bridge the gap between education and employment. I also talked about how emerging technologies and work-based programs are creating new opportunities while challenging traditional educational models.
Meet Every Learner’s Needs
Roughly two years ago, one of the co-founders of the Modern Classrooms Project, Kareem Farah, joined me on this show to talk about their model to help teachers personalize learning and move to mastery-based assessment.
Now, Modern Classrooms’ other co-founder, Robert Barnett is out with a new book titled Meet Every Learner’s Needs: Redesigning Instruction So ALL Students Can Succeed. I was curious about the book, and Robert agreed to answer some of my questions.
Q: What inspired you to write this book about the Modern Classroom model? And what's it about?
A: The book is 10% memoir, 10% manifesto, and 80% educator manual. I wanted to tell the story behind the Modern Classroom movement; explain why I think students and teachers both benefit from self-paced, mastery-based instruction; and most importantly explain how any teacher, anywhere, can take simple steps to better meet their learners' needs right away.
While MCP’s online courses have already empowered thousands of educators worldwide to adopt our approach, I think that teachers can often engage more deeply with printed books than they can with virtual courses. I want this book to be something that teachers carry around with them, and highlight and dog-ear and lend to their colleagues, and then display with pride in their classrooms because it has helped them succeed.
Q: Why is it critical that people read this book?
A: One thing that I don't think we acknowledge enough, especially in the education-innovation space, is that teaching is really hard. We have lots of ideas for making things better, which is great! But we can't just tell teachers what we think they should do better or differently. We need to start by recognizing the actual, day-to-day challenges that teachers face, and help provide solutions from there.
I think it's critical for anyone who wants to lead change in education to understand exactly why, on a lesson-by-lesson basis, it's so hard for teachers to meet their learners' inevitably diverse needs. And it's critical for the same people to understand that there are simple, concrete things that teachers can do today - without large-scale policy changes or new technologies - to keep every learner appropriately challenged, and appropriately supported, every day.
This is already a movement: there are thousands of educators, all over the world, who are using these practices every day. (You'll meet many of them in the book!) They use these practices because they address the common challenges that every teacher faces. And this book explains exactly what these practices are, where they came from, why they work, and how any teacher can use them to help every student succeed.
Q: Can you share a couple of the novel ideas in the book that readers won't have heard or read from others before?
A: This book doesn't contain a lot of big words. In fact, I only use the word "blended" once—and that's in a citation in the research section of the book! It does describe a comprehensive framework and it does propose universal principles about teaching and learning. But what it mainly contains is simple, concrete, and actionable practices. It's about things that any teacher, in any grade level or subject area or school, anywhere in the world, can do right away to deliver more effective instruction.
Don't get me wrong here. Educational theory and technological innovation are essential, too! But what's novel about this book is that it explains exactly HOW teachers can implement evidence-based best practices, supported by the technology they already have, to meet every learner's needs. If you're an educator, you can read this book and then do better tomorrow - no matter what or where you teach, or what technology you have.
That's what I did, and what thousands of other educators are doing every day: using simple, research-backed techniques to make instruction more effective and enjoyable. And when you read this book, you'll be able to do that too.
I’ll have more on the topic of the practicalities of implementing transformation on the ground in this newsletter soon, so stay tuned!
Job Moves
3 media hits around our book, Job Moves: 9 Steps for Making Progress, before you go:
Navigating Your Career: Michael B. Horn on Job Progress. In this episode of the Inside Learning Podcast, I talk about the book Job Moves: Nine Steps for Making Progress in Your Career—and offer advice for those feeling stuck in their careers. We talked about the importance of understanding personal progress in career choices and why thinking about experiences rather than features and perks is crucial when assessing job opportunities.
Why looking for the ‘perfect job’ could hold you back. An article in the Daily Maverick details why the pursuit of the “perfect” job can create more hesitation than progress. Growth and fulfillment come from exploration, adaptability, and the willingness to embrace new experiences along the way. It profiles the research that we did for Job Moves and the importance of making tradeoffs in your career.
4 reasons why employees quit their jobs. In HRM, the news site of the Australian HR Institute, Ethan Bernstein and I talk about the importance of understanding the different root causes driving someone to switch jobs. “It’s common to make assumptions about why employees quit their jobs. We often think it’s primarily in search of higher salaries or, for younger employees—the most likely cohort to job-hop—we might attribute it to unrealistic expectations or a lack of commitment. But the reality is more complex. In most instances, employees leave for reasons unrelated to money or entitlement.”
As always, thanks for reading, writing, and listening.
A wonderful article—I already read it on LinkedIn! Thank you for shedding light on this important topic. I truly hope education evolves in a way that positively impacts our world and creates a brighter future for all.