Noodle, which helps dozens of top US universities build and grow their online and hybrid programs, today acquired key assets of HotChalk, a leading online program manager (OPM), effective today, November 19, 2020. The industry leader will absorb HotChalk’s portfolio of programs and their acclaimed marketing, enrollment, and technology teams. HotChalk CEO Rob Wrubel joins Noodle as Chief Marketing Officer. 

There have been several good articles worth reading on the transaction:

* Inside Higher Ed: Noodle Swallows an OPM Competitor* Education Dive: Noodle snaps up HotChalk assets, growing marketing capacity* EdSurge: Noodle Acquires ‘Key Assets’ of HotChalk to Expand Online Program Services

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Now that we are most of the way through higher ed’s fall 2020 academic term, stakeholders of all shapes and sizes want to know how students have felt about the experience. I’ve written several blog posts analyzing individual student COVID surveys and quasi-meta-analyzing the overall set of roughly two dozen surveys from spring 2020. Top Hat was one of the first to survey students about their experience back in April 2020. Six months later they are one of the first out of the gate again with fresh results from their October 2020 COVID Student Survey. As was the case in the spring, MindWires has full access to the anonymized results and is conducting an independent analysis of the survey. 

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Today’s news of Blackboard winning the Alabama Community College system’s LMS evaluation reminds me of that game. On one hand, this is the most exciting win for Blackboard since 2015’s win with the University of Phoenix. On the other hand, thus ends the Canvas streak of not losing any higher education clients.

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Since 2015 there have been three major developments in this area: the College Board revised their reporting this year, Student Watch and Student Monitor have documented multi-year reductions in student spending, and the price of new textbooks has plateaued.

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Last year I gave an update on our latest descriptions of the Online Program Management (OPM) market based on an webinar provided in collaboration with WCET. As part of the webinar I released two updated graphics of the OPM landscape, taking a broader view of this growing but dynamic market. Since last year’s version, there have been several changes made to the Landscape graphic.

As before, please note that this view is intended to give a visual overview of the market landscape and is not comprehensive in terms of vendors represented. This is particularly true as you approach the bottom of the graphic.

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Overall, most campuses have chosen to continue their fall strategies in the spring. It may be too soon to have learned anything substantive enough to change strategies. A number of campuses that are open this fall described early COVID prevention and containment successes as indicators that support opening again in the spring. Several included the caveat emptor disclaimer that the institution would remain ready to shift completely online if necessary. In this post, I’ll outline some of the emerging trends.

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Late last month Jeanette Wiseman and I recorded a MindWires Musings podcast episode discussing Class for Zoom, a new education-specific product that sits on top of Zoom, from a co-founder of Blackboard. We shared that episode in public given the importance of what could be a new, or extended product category. Two weeks later there was another highly-funded company announcement, this time for Engageli. A product also designed for education, but in this case meant to replace Zoom.

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While I have done a number of EdTech conference keynotes and panel discussions, it has been difficult for me to directly participate in the LMS users’ conferences to avoid real or perceived conflicts of interest. At Instructure’s virtual CanvasCon this year – which replaced the onsite InstructureCon typically held in July – I had an opportunity to participate in a way that made sense. Specifically, I had the chance to interview Sal Khan for his conference keynote, about Khan Academy and not about the LMS. This was an enjoyable interview for me, as I could ask Sal what I wanted and to react to his answers on the fly.

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Like many observers, I’ve been trying to digest more information from the Mother of All Updates from the National Student Clearinghouse (NSC), which reported undergraduate enrollment dropping 4.0%, community college dropping 9.4%, graduate increasing 2.7%, and enrollment from first-time beginning students down 16.1%. The headline stories have mostly focused on the likely long-term impacts on community colleges and their target student population, but there are more lessons to be learned.

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Call this the Mother of All Updates from the National Student Clearinghouse (NSC). I reported last month on their initial Fall 2020 postsecondary enrollment estimates for the US, where the headlines showed a 2.5% decline among undergraduates, while community college enrollment dropped 7.5%, and graduate enrollment increased 3.9% – all from the same period in 2019. That data came from roughly 22% of the 3,600 schools that NSC covers, but yesterday’s update covers 54%.

In short, the numbers are worse than the September estimate, with undergraduate enrollment dropping 4.0%, community college dropping 9.4%, and graduate increasing 2.7%. But the much more significant news is that enrollment from first-time beginning students was down 16.1%.

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