http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124562232014535347.html

The Jack Welch Mangement Institute at Chancellor University is the only online and on-campus MBA program that fully incorporates Jack Welch’s winning business practices and principles throughout the curriculum.  Students who are accepted and enroll in JWMI will gain a full understanding of Jack’s philosophy on leadership development, candor, team building and more. 

Also, the online aspect to the Institute has a truly global reach.  Online education has evolved to become a truly effective and academically sound way for people to earn their degrees and build their careers while maintaining the work/life balance they need.  Throuhg its online degree offering, The Jack Welch Management Institute has broad reach with content that really matters in today’s global economy.

These are exciting days at Chancellor University!

An important building block to these performance indicators is Student Services.  In today’s virtual space, those services include academic advising, orientations, resource and library services, tutorials, academic advising, and technical support.  These certainly are the most common Student Services but as this market becomes more competitive, these foundational services need to be consistently enhanced and improved.  It is also critical that additional, less common services be introduced that enhance that all important student experience. 

If you are a prospective online student, these services should be an integral part of what the school you are interested in is providing.  If you are currently a student, you need to take full advantage of any Student Services that your school offers, and even make suggestions for new ones.  If you curently work at an institution that has online offerings, you need to champion how to enhance what I call that all important “student experience.”

More to come …

While enrollment is up, former Myers University still must prove itself to accreditation commission

By SHANNON MORTLAND

4:30 am, May 18, 2009

Through name changes, financial turmoil, threats to close and cash infusions from new ownership, one question has remained for Chancellor University: Will the school survive?

The new owners of Chancellor, which was Myers University until last September, are trying to assure Northeast Ohioans that the answer to the question is, “Yes.” They maintain that the beleaguered institution now is a stable place for first-generation college students and adult learners to earn a degree.

“We have a new leadership team and mission,” said Shaun Redgate, Chancellor’s chief operating officer. “We have really bolstered our foundation.”

Significant Partners LLC of Solana Beach, Calif., bought the former Myers last September for $5.25 million and changed the school into a for-profit university. The company also owns Grand Canyon University in Arizona.

Though school officials would not disclose how much money has been put into Chancellor, the school has hired 60 people, created 30 online courses, boosted full-time faculty to 26 from 16, and now keeps about 300 part-time faculty members on call, up from 100, said Jennifer Scott, provost and chief academic officer.

Chancellor officials also lowered tuition in an effort to entice students, Mr. Redgate said. Undergraduate tuition was reduced to $250 per credit hour, down 30% from $360, and graduate tuition is now $395 per credit hour, 14% lower than the previous $460 per credit hour.

“We want to earn Cleveland’s business back and urge them to give it a try,” Mr. Redgate said.

The new leaders at Chancellor also have been on an extensive public relations tour around the city, attending 55 job and recruitment fairs since January, visiting local high schools and attending meetings of local business associations, Mr. Redgate said.

While educating business leaders on the changes already made, Chancellor officials also sought insight on what local business leaders need and want to see from Chancellor and the next generation of workers, he said.

“They were pleased we were making an effort and investing,” Mr. Redgate added. “They were really excited about the online component.”

With its focus on what students and employers need, Chancellor finally might be getting up to speed with other career colleges that have been catering to their constituents for years, said Harris Miller, CEO and president of the Career College Association in Washington, D.C.

The Myers University model was not working, so the new owners had to come in with a different strategy, and offering online courses and majors that cater to where the jobs are in this economy have worked well for other career colleges, Mr. Miller said.

As for the students, Chancellor officials have been trying to convince them that the university has a “road map” to fix the issues left behind by Myers University and that the school will survive, Mr. Redgate said.

The efforts might have worked. Chancellor now has 640 students, up 72% from 372 on Sept. 2. While that’s just shy of the university’s goal of 650 students by January, Mr. Redgate said, Chancellor is still on track to have 1,050 students by fall 2010, which is the enrollment needed for the school to break even.

But the school isn’t out of the woods yet. Mr. Redgate said Chancellor is running its expected deficit of between $3 million and $3.5 million, which it projected for the first 18 months and for which the owners set aside money.

Chancellor now has yet another hurdle to overcome. CEO Ronald Kennedy on May 8 resigned after only six months on the job. Mr. Kennedy was commuting from Virginia and his family was not ready to move to Cleveland, Mr. Redgate said. Chancellor already has launched a search for Mr. Kennedy’s replacement and hopes to hire a new CEO as soon as possible, but Mr. Redgate said he will assume the CEO’s job in the interim.

While searching for a new leader, university officials also still must convince the Higher Learning Commission that Chancellor is a viable institution. The Chicago commission accredits Chancellor and, last November, put the institution on probation, which means the school could lose its accreditation.

“They did come in the fall and they were going to withdraw our accreditation, but they saw the new leadership and all the great things we were doing,” said Dr. Scott, the provost. “They kept the school on probation until we had time with the new leadership.”

In the Nov. 3 public disclosure notice issued by the commission to warn of the possible loss of accreditation, Chancellor was told it was in danger of not fulfilling its mission and that it might not be able to provide “evidence of student learning and teaching effectiveness.”

In addition, the letter said Chancellor was at risk of not meeting a criterion in which its “allocation of resources and its processes for evaluation and planning demonstrate its capacity to fulfill its mission, improve the quality of its education and respond to future challenges and opportunities.”

The commission is scheduled to visit Chancellor on Oct. 5 for three days to determine whether the school should be on probation for another year, be given a lesser sanction of “on notice” that would not carry a possibility of losing accreditation, or have its accreditation withdrawn, said Robert Appleson, vice president of the commission.

Dr. Scott said she’s optimistic the commission will be pleased. “We’ve come a long way,” she added.

Personally, when I was going through school, I was the recepient of federal aid and I could not have attended otherwise.  I have also helped several of my children apply.   Although the process seems fairly daunting, to the well informed student should be fairly straightforward.  I have identified eight milestones that every student who is applying for financial aid should be aware of:

1.  Get a Federal Pin.

2. Completion of the Free Application For Federal Student Aid (FAFSA).

3.  Completing other aid applications.

4.  Complete the federal verification process, if required.

5.  Obtain loan assistance.

6.  Determine your financial aid package

7.  Complete any financial check in your school requires

8.  Expect payments or disbursements to your account.

National political correspondent and author, Juan Williams, is the keynote speaker at Chancellor University’s 160th graduation taking place Saturday, May 2, 2009. As senior correspondent for NPR’s Morning Edition, host of America’s Black Forum, a nationally syndicated weekly news program, and regular panelist on FoxNews Sunday, Williams is at the cutting edge of America’s culture and politics. In addition to prize-winning columns and editorial writing for The Washington Post, he has also authored six books.

Prior to writing bestsellers, Williams was a political columnist and national correspondent for The Washington Post. In a 21-year career at The Post he served as an editorial writer, op-ed columnist, and White House correspondent. He won several journalism awards for his writing and investigative reporting. He also won an Emmy Award for TV documentary writing. He was given widespread, critical acclaim for a series of documentaries including Politics-The New Black Power. His documentary on A. Phillip Randolph was featured on PBS. His articles have appeared in magazines such as Newsweek, Fortune, The Atlantic Monthly, Ebony, and The New Republic.

The Commencement is being held at the Masonic Auditorium and Performing Arts Center in Cleveland, Ohio.

• Economic Influence — Although the President’s Economic Stimulus Bill will not restrict non profit and market funded education, it’s specific provisions are not a huge help.  The online education industry has been helped by what I call an economic “tailwind” in recent months but the question is how much longer will that tailwind blow?  This vertical is somewhat acyclical so we will just have to play this one out.
• Student Funding — The Fed is stable, but private lenders are in flux.  As of the first of this year, 38 companies had suspended private student loans and the remaining have tightened credit standards.  However, the Stimulus Bill should allow students viable Title IV funding options for financing their education.
• Student Recruiting Costs — In the online, market funded space, much attention is given to student acquisition, enrollment, and start costs.  From 2002 - 2007, student acquisition costs rose about 100 bps per year.  We will probably see a leveling off of these costs as advertising demand weakens and Internet recruiting increases.  It is also critical in controlling costs that enrollment management personnel become smarter and deploy more robust reporting.
• Pricing –  Tuition costs for online universities have increased moderately but nothing like their traditional counterparts.  Is it possible that there might be significant tuition increases in the future?  It is possible.  I know at Chancellor University that we made a recent decision to reduce tuition to make our programs more affordable during these tough economic times.  As other universities have been increasing tuition and slashing programs, and with the cost of living rising, we wanted to limit, as much as possible, the financial burden of earning a degree, all the while improving our services.
• Default Rates — I attended a recent Credit Suisse conference in Phoenix where “default rates” was the hot topic.  The fear is that with an economy in turmoil, we might see an upward trend in cohort default rates.  Certainly we have seen a downward trend since the early 1990’s, but there are storm clouds on the horizon. 

If you are a prospective online student reading this post, it is imperative that you do your research as it relates to an online school’s curriculum delivery.  You, as on online student, will be the beneficiary of a virtual classroom that promotes rich interaction.  Remember, the assembling of online courseware does not equal a online course.  Curriculum presentation is only one facet to your learning experience.

What about cognitive exercise?  This is something, in my experience, that is lacking in online instruction and curriculum design.  What do I mean?  Some facets of our current education system, including online learning, plunge us into deep mental ruts.  They reward a regurgitation of facts or mastery of learning objectives rather than encouraging people to rekindle the creativity that many of us left behind some years ago. 

Human cognitive development actually peaks in the teen years, flattens out in our late thirties, and then begins a gradual decline that continues until we die.  True learning, especially for the adult student, must include mental pursuits capable of combating this decline.  The most fulfilled people I know are those who strive to “rewire” whether through new educational, religious, philanthropic, or recreational pursuits.  These people keep challenging themselves by attempting to master new skills.  If you are thinking about finishing your degree or are already doing so, you should be commended for “rewiring.”

Online courses must be rich in interaction and cognitive exercise.  They must be of no less quality than face to face courses.  Unfortunately, many are not.  Although learning still occurs in such settings, the lack of these two elements will not keep the learner agile and fit for life.  Lifelong learning must be rewarded not competencies that encourage “domain expertise.”

Those of us in online learning must think beyond the status quo.  A better virtual classroom, that combines rich interaction with cognitive exercise,  not only helps learning outcomes and keeps learners engaged, but transcends the negative connotations that some in traditional educational circles have leveled against online learning.

Higher education is overall a mature and highly inefficient industry. The instructional costs of a ground campus can be as high as 50% of total costs, according to Richard Vedder in his book, “Going Broke by Degree: Why College Costs So Much.” This contrasts starkly to online instructional costs of only around 15%.

While the difference in numbers can be stark, there may be little, if any, gap in the quality of education that can be administered over the Internet. In fact, a recent report by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, which surveyed 1,000 universities, found that three-fourths of academic leaders at public colleges and universities believe that online learning quality equals or surpasses face-to-face instruction. This is being reinforced by regulators, who are determined to ensure that online education is at least comparable to face-to-face instruction in exchange for sought-after accreditation and the student loans that come with it.

Traditional universities are caught up in a perfect storm. States are slashing subsidies, endowment returns have fallen–some more than 50%–and end-of-year donations for 2008 practically disappeared. Meanwhile, operating costs and other expenses continue to rise. Don’t miss the rally, but don’t lose more money!

Distressed turnaround situations are becoming increasingly common in higher education. Good schools, hit with financial stressors, are in need of serious outside help, and many are finding it from financial investors, like me and my firm.

Smart firms bring more than just financial aid to the schools. They institute financial discipline, increase marketing to build on schools’ historic missions. Academics are given resources to teach. Students become the center of attention rather than faculty. Investors know that they will lose their money if the quality of education isn’t the best available, so they focus tremendous resources on making sure quality is the highest priority.

Another impressive aspect of online education is that these entities do not require a lot of capital. Our experience is that $15 million invested over a three- to four-year period will generate a company that is worth $300 million to $500 million in the public marketplace.

Once an investment team gets the school profitable, larger private equity firms step in with growth capital and then finally comes the IPO, or the “endowment of the future.”

During this economic downturn and throughout the bear market, one pocket of market strength has been in the for-profit schools. One of our portfolio companies, Grand Canyon Education, is a bit of a rarity. It completed an initial public offering last fall on Nov. 20, 2008, breaking the longest IPO dry spell in 33 years on Nasdaq. The stock still trades 25% higher than its offering price. Grand Canyon earned $6.7 million on revenue of $161.3 million in 2008, up significantly from net income of $3 million on $99.3 million in sales in 2007.

There are a handful of online education-oriented companies that are currently doing a nice job holding their own in the stock markets, including Capella Education , Apollo Group and American Public Education. Recently, Bridgepoint Education has filed its S-1 to go public.

Fueling the bullish trend for online education is America’s need to retool its workforce in order to compete in the global marketplace. In the Great Depression, the government asked us to pick up shovels to rebuild America. Now, in this economic crisis, the Department of Education, headed by U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, is the key government agency to help people learn new skills so the U.S. can compete in the global marketplace.

Worldwide spending on education is estimated at $2.46 trillion, according to a 2004 UNESCO report; it is hard to find an industry this size that is growing so much faster than so many other market segments. The Internet has and will continue to facilitate this growth.

Saturation will not be an issue for at least 10 years because there are approximately 35 million working adults who haven’t completed their bachelor degrees and who could secure better employment with a degree. Many employers reimburse some tuition. Busy adults find the only way they can complete a degree is through the asynchronous convenience of online.

“(These companies) operate in an industry marked by strong secular demand trends as students seek to enhance their skills and thus future earnings prospects,” Britt Trukenbrod, principal at William Blair & Co., recently told me. “In general, investors view these characteristics favorably in addition to the sector’s legal, financial and regulatory barriers to entry. This foundation should help keep returns to education sector investors high in the years to come.”

Michael K. Clifford is chairman of SignificantFederation, LLC, a management firm that continues to invest in higher education. He was the founding/lead investor in Grand Canyon University and the predecessor to Bridgepoint Education, with several new niche offerings in his higher education pipeline.

Read the original article at http://www.forbes.com/2009/03/17/grand-canyon-university-personal-finance-investing-ideas-apollo-group.html