Lauren Edmonds and I have collaborated on several research projects around online program demand, competition and design for my institution. As a leader at EAB, Lauren is well placed to help us understand where the online learning market is going.
Q: Lauren, before we talk about your role at EAB and the future of online learning, I thought we’d start with EAB itself. Can you help us understand what EAB actually is and what it does? Is EAB a research firm? A marketing company? A consultancy? A technology company? How big is EAB, what does the company do, who are its competitors and who do you work with?
A: EAB solves problems for schools. Our roots are in research, which is still a big part of what we do. When we aren’t researching solutions to the challenges facing educational institutions and employers of all types, sometimes we’re helping colleges recruit, enroll and retain students. At other times, we’re building technology that helps them gather and make better use of their institutional data. What connects all of it is that we’re working with our partners to solve education’s toughest challenges and support students as they progress through the educational system and out into the workforce.
There are over 2,000 of us supporting 2,800-plus organizations from K–12 to college to career. We also work with employers (through our Seramount division), helping them build stronger, more inclusive workforces. Learning even more directly about employers’ needs has helped me sharpen my research and gain new insights into how educators can better prepare students to launch successful careers after graduation. Given the breadth of what we do, we compete with various companies across the different markets that we serve, but there is no single entity, at least that I’m aware of, that offers a solution set comparable to EAB spanning the full kindergarten-to-career trajectory.
Q: Thanks for that context. Let’s talk about your role. What are primary accountabilities? How do you mostly spend your days? And what was the career path that brought you to your current role?
A: Much of my role focuses on growth in professional, continuing and online education … and I got here by completing an on-campus, double major in two interdisciplinary subjects at a liberal arts college. This is not what I thought I’d be when I grew up! After a very brief stint at a pro-social marketing firm, I found my way to EAB, where, 13 years later, I’ve built our Market Insights service and guided its growth while fine-tuning my skills along the way. I feel fortunate to work with schools ranging from open-access community colleges to highly selective institutions like Dartmouth on these market research questions and beyond.
A typical day for me involves balancing three priorities:
- First, ensuring our research effectively answers partners’ questions about program development and portfolio growth, among other topics. That enables me to have rich and productive conversations with everyone from senior leaders to front-line staff who are focused on these topics.
- Second, I need to ensure our team of talented researchers has all the training, resources and support they need to thrive.
- Lastly, I’m researching answers to questions our partners may not be asking yet, but that should be on their radar. For example, I’ll get to share new research at our roundtables this fall into what Gen Z needs from your student support; meanwhile, I’m also thinking ahead to Gen Alpha, kids ages 15 and younger that online leaders may not be thinking about just yet, but [whom] we’ll need to guide partners on a decade from now.
Q: In your work across the higher education ecosystem, what are the big themes and challenges you are seeing related to online learning? What is keeping the online learning leaders you work with on research projects up at night? When it comes to the future of colleges and universities, what keeps you up at night?
A: I think most educators today have deep concerns that keep them up at night, and I share many of those same concerns. With respect to online education, the stakes and the expectations continue to grow. I worry about whether student support structures can keep pace. Online adult learners are often seen as a population that can make up the difference when institutions struggle to meet enrollment targets for undergrads or international students, for example. But we’re not a tap you turn on; serving online learners well takes significant investment and good leadership.
Presidents and provosts need a strategy for how they’ll recruit and retain these online adult learners and a commitment to support the online learning leaders charged with developing and executing that plan. Those sleepless nights do lead to hopeful mornings, though. This work is too important to the people I work with at EAB and at universities across the country. We all have to continue to adapt so we can meet the needs of online learners when and where they need it. That’s not going away.
