American demographics we've been discussing. Universities are combatting declining enrollment trends, which causes a cascade of consequences reshaping American education.
Why is college enrollment down? In part, because the national birth rate is down: 20% since the 2008 recession,6 actually. For millennials, it's not just a question of how to afford a home and a new car; this generation has no idea how they will pay for health care and childcare, much less a college education for their progeny.
In short, they can't afford to have kids. That's a big reason why fertility rates are at a record low. And if we look forward 18 years from that decision to forgo a pregnancy, we can expect to see a major decline in college admissions beginning in around 2026.7
It's not surprising, right? Fewer babies means fewer college freshman. But how will universities fill their enrollment quotas when their financial model is under stress? Perhaps with an increasing number of international students as many do now?
These kinds of demographic trends are already putting education on a collision course with the future as we know it. Traditional college markets—such as white students from economically privileged families in the Northeast—are being replaced by an increase in Hispanics in the Southwest who, for a variety of reasons, may be less sold on the value of a college education.8
For many white students from middle- and upper-class families, college has always been an important steppingstone to an enriching career or well-paying job. But the Hispanic college market is far softer. These students are less likely to enroll in a selective college in the first place, and if they do enroll at all, for a variety of reasons, they are less likely to attend full-time.9
Another reason there are fewer students heading to college: there are fewer kids graduating from high school. Illiteracy is becoming an increasing problem. In urban areas, where students frequently struggle with poverty and food security, a high school degree doesn't seem that compelling when it's easier to get a job in retail in order to earn money to live. So it may not surprise you to learn that forecasts suggest an 11% decrease in first-time college goers by the end of the 2020s.10
You might think universities would respond to this declining market by cutting prices, but that seems unlikely given that reducing revenue doesn't offer a net economic gain to compensate for fewer students. And here's another thing to consider as we wonder what the future of education will look like: how important is it to be a college graduate to succeed in tomorrow's workforce?
And if it's important, is a two-year community college degree enough? What's the best return on investment for students based on the considerable expense of an American college degree?
The answer to each of those questions is that it depends on where you live and what you want to do. It also depends on the ability of forward-thinking educational institutions to anticipate the needs of specific skill sets in local industries that are reinventing themselves again and again as new technologies accelerate the way they do business so they create true value for their students. In short, college as we know it is under tremendous pressure to flex.
For parents who are still hoping to send their student to college, the value proposition has changed, too. When they consider taking out a second mortgage on their home so their student can attend a top-tier university, they want to know that their child will be employable in a competitive industry. They want to know that university will graduate their child in four years instead of six because space in required courses is available.
Nontraditional students who do decide to pursue a college degree want to know that they are partnering with an educational institution that understands the challenges they face to make it to class every day. Many are juggling work commitments, a lengthy commute, or caregiving for parents to make their dream of a college degree a reality. They are hunting for flexibility.
In the same way, what will happen to blue-collar workers who have spent 30 years on the floor of a manufacturing facility doing unskilled work when the company retools into a high-tech environment? Will they face layoffs and be replaced with new college grads with an information technology degree?
Nontraditional students—older students considering retraining and younger students not completely sold on college—have no interest in a “well-rounded liberal arts degree.” Rather, they want to know there's a good return on investment for an actual employable skill set in exchange for their hard-earned dollars.
For just this reason, many nontraditional—and other—students will turn away from elite universities that seem out of touch in favor of pursuing online options or a degree from a trade school
There are 30 million jobs in America today that pay an average of $50,000 per year that don't require a degree from a four-year university. Despite the benefits and pensions these jobs offer, there's still a shortage of workers trained in such vocational schools.11
And it's the same situation when it comes to community college.
In the past, students and their parents saw them as a steppingstone into a four-year university. But expect them to take a more central role in creative partnering with local employers in the years to come.
So, yes, education simply must reinvent itself at every level—from K to 12 and prestigious colleges to trade schools and community colleges—to keep pace with the needs of students, the needs of employers, and the needs of society itself. No longer can we allow urban inner-city schools to decay leaving impoverished students ill-equipped to meet the needs of employers in their communities. We need them.
Language Is Changing: R U Up to Speed?
Not only are demographics and education changing but also the way we communicate is changing. Much like cells in biological evolution, which are constantly mutating according to their environment, so too is language ever evolving.
Linguists study this phenomenon,12 in fact, and talk about the concept of “drift,” the seeming random nature of how language changes over time, much like the concept of genetic drift in biology, which studies how existing genes vary in a population with random sampling. The idea here is that, whether we are talking about genes or language, you can study whether (and how) it survives and reproduces in the future.
When it comes to evolving language, it's typically a result of certain pressures that come to bear. Changing social norms, for example, signal which words are socially acceptable or not. Then there are technical innovations that make it more convenient to communicate within certain parameters.
Sometimes it's just the way that some verb conjugations are harder to remember than others, making some words used far less frequently until they fall out of our lexicon. When it comes to other words, they become favored by “insiders” or “outsiders” or are only used by those in power (such as corporate executives)—or those who feel disenfranchised (such as protesters).
As our world reshapes itself through changes in generational and racial demographics, the language we use—the way we communicate—is reshaping itself in some important ways. And it's critical to be aware and adept at navigating this change in the American workplace.
Communication
