Sometimes it’s easy for us in Silicon Valley to get stuck in the echo chamber and assume our Bay Area lifestyle and attitudes are consistent with the rest of the world. We are early adopters of bleeding-edge technologies, we reject the status quo, and we constantly seek out better ways of doing things, whether that’s using a ride-share service or wearing a computer on our faces. It’s good to step back and remind ourselves that most people don’t live this way.
Online learning is another one of those things that feels pervasive in our world but is, in fact, still in its earliest infancy. For motivated lifelong learners, going online to take courses and pursue self-directed learning is just another way the internet is an integral part of our lives. Indeed, the variety of educational resources has never been greater. And yet, most people are unfamiliar with the options available to them or haven’t (yet) recognized their value.
In my mind, that one challenge overshadows the rest.
A lack of awareness is holding modern education back.
In fact, those people who could benefit most from online and digital education platforms are the most unfamiliar with them. Instead, it’s those who are already highly educated who are gravitating to new education platforms to bolster their existing skill sets. Moreover, the awareness problem affects the U.S. disproportionately compared to the rest of the world.
Consider India, where there will be 142 million students in the higher ed age range in 2030. They can’t build enough schools to accommodate the coming wave, and the internet is the most obvious solution for getting these people the skills training they need. At the same time, Indians are acutely aware of and concerned about the rise of automation and what it could mean for their employability, with 91% of Indian survey respondents believing their skills will become obsolete in the next five years. Udemy sees the strongest demand in areas with young populations and growing technical economies like India. Nearly one million students in India are enrolled in courses on our platform–a figure that’s more than doubled from last year.
But for most folks in the U.S., traditional institutions of higher ed still reign supreme, even as tuitions rise to historic highs and the return on investment becomes less certain. Colleges and universities are regarded as mandatory routes to career success, though many employers still find new grads to be underprepared for the professional world and many in-demand skills like graphic design and coding can be learned via online courses just as effectively. For-profit universities, in the news for sudden bankruptcies and high-profile lawsuits, have given Americans a negative perception of higher ed alternatives available to working adults. Online learning is often unfairly lumped in with that group.
Raising awareness of today’s digital learning tools will take much more than sharing information and signing people up for classes. The real issue is getting people to accept that all of us need to continue our education beyond high school and even college. I experienced my own dose of reality a few years ago when I did my first broadcast interview and realized afterwards how much better I would’ve done if I’d been media-trained.
Today’s workplace is evolving so quickly, you’ll get a wake-up call like that too, if you haven’t already, but you’re probably not about to drop your career and go back to school.
This is why there’s been so much talk urging individuals to embrace a growth mindset and develop into lifelong learners. Companies and organizations can help during the hiring process by looking at what job candidates know and can do—not where or how they learned it—and offering online skills training that’s more like choosing from Netflix’s online entertainment library and less like corporate drudgery. The goal is to create an environment that motivates employees and individuals to want to better themselves and then offer the resources to help them get there.
Online learning isn’t going away; it’s only getting bigger. But we in edtech can’t be the only ones touting its benefits. More voices—from college advisors to industry leaders to education policymakers—need to speak up about the larger issue of how today’s workers can stay marketable and grow their skills and the multitude of online resources available to them.
We’re drawing closer to a future in which every individual has equal access to grow skills and enrich their lives, but we still have a long way to go.
