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It’s not personal — it’s demographic. College enrollments are going to seriously ebb within the next few years due to a complex set of circumstances that have more to do with demographic shifts than economic ones. That’s not to say, however, that economics are not at the root.

It’s a well-known physiological fact that if you don’t continually use a muscle, it becomes weaker and will eventually atrophy. If you do your child’s homework (some parents actually do this), chances are they will have trouble making it on their own in college. If you are in Paris and everyone speaks English to you, you may forget what French you know.

As universities move toward unbundled degrees — most often referred to as “microcredentials” or “microdegrees” — we have to ask, “What’s going on here? Is this the next wave in online learning evolution? Is this some sort of shift to blended learning? Is this really about technology at all?”

The New York Times recently ran an editorial, “Online Courses are Harming the Students who Need the Most Help,” that paints a picture of online learning as a wedge further dividing those with strong academic skills from less proficient students.  

Recently I was on a panel at the LearnLaunch Across Boundaries conference. The panel — titled “Outsourcing Online Programs: The Shape of Things to Come or a Bad Moon Rising?” — was moderated by Howard Lurie, Principal Analyst at Eduventures and author of a soon-to-be-released research report on the state of the Online Program Management (OPM) market.