The Forced Migration

The Competitive Reality of 90 Credits

A lot of the debate around 90-credit bachelor’s degrees assumes institutions will get to choose whether they embrace them.

I’m not convinced that’s how this plays out.

And I think a lot of institutions may be asking the wrong question.

Today, many institutions are evaluating the model through an academic lens.

Is it rigorous?

Is it appropriate?

Does it fit our philosophy?

And those are certainly fair questions.

After all, the bachelor’s degree has remained remarkably stable for decades. Changes to its structure deserve scrutiny. Faculty should ask hard questions. Academic leaders should challenge assumptions. Institutions should carefully evaluate both intended and unintended consequences.

But markets don’t always wait for consensus from the Academy.

And that’s where I think the conversation gets interesting.

Because the future of the 90-credit bachelor’s may have less to do with whether institutions agree with the model and more to do with whether students embrace it.

When students see an option that is faster and less expensive, adoption doesn’t require universal agreement from higher education leaders.

It only requires enough institutions to offer it to shift the competitive conversation.

And we’re already seeing that innovation emerge.

At least one institution has taken a full portfolio-wide 90-credit transformation to market. And it almost certainly won’t be the last.

That’s an important distinction.

Higher education has a long history of isolated innovation. A new program here. A pilot there. An experiment that gains attention but never fundamentally changes the market.

This feels different.

When a single program adopts a new model, competitors can largely ignore it.

But when an institution transforms an entire portfolio? It signals something else.

It signals confidence.

It signals commitment.

And perhaps most importantly, it signals that the institution believes students will value the tradeoff.

Once that happens, the competitive conversation shifts.

The question stops being:

“Do we believe in 90-credit bachelor’s degrees?”

And becomes:

“Can we remain competitive without them?”

For highly selective institutions with powerful brands and more applicants than seats, the answer may still be yes.

Institutions with extraordinary brand strength can often resist market pressures that others cannot. They can charge more. They can move slower. They can maintain structures that would be difficult for competitors to defend.

But for tuition-dependent institutions already competing aggressively for enrollment, it’s much less certain.

Because eventually prospective students will have a choice:

• A program that gets them to graduation faster and costs less

• And a program that doesn’t

At that point, even if our institutions are still wrapped up debating the innovation, the reality is that market expectations will have already shifted.

This is what many leaders may be underestimating.

Markets don’t require unanimous adoption.

They don’t require consensus.

They don’t require every institution to participate.

They simply require enough participation to reset expectations.

And we’ve seen this happen before.

Online learning.

Test-optional admissions.

Subscription-based entertainment.

Direct-to-consumer retail.

In each case, the question wasn’t whether every organization embraced the change. The question was whether enough organizations did to permanently alter customer expectations.

Once expectations change, resisting the trend becomes much harder.

The burden shifts.

Instead of innovators having to explain why their approach is different, incumbents suddenly have to explain why their approach costs more, takes longer, or requires additional friction.

That is the strategic risk facing many institutions today.

They’re treating the model as a strategic choice.

But if the competitive set moves and the majority of the market embraces it, the choice was never really whether to adopt the model.

The choice was whether to evolve our portfolio to meet emerging market demands - or risk being left behind while our competitors do.

That’s why I keep coming back to the phrase forced migration.

Not because every institution will adopt 90-credit degrees.

And not because every 90-credit degree will succeed.

But because many institutions may eventually find themselves responding to a market that has already moved.

The institutions that move first will have the benefit of designing their future.

The institutions that move later may simply be reacting to a new reality.

And those are two very different positions from which to compete.

- Seth

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About The Author
Seth is the founder and CEO of Kanahoma, a San Diego-based education marketing agency on a mission to build a better agency for organizations building a better world.

You can learn more about who we are and what we do at www.Kanahoma.com.