Universities should tailor their academic offer to address the increasing ¡°millennialisation¡± of the prospective student body, a conference has heard.

Speaking on a panel at the International Partners¡¯ Conference 2017, Chaudhry Faisal Mushtaq, chief executive of Roots Millennium Schools in Pakistan, said that higher education in the future is ¡°going to be like [digital cab firm] Uber¡± because universities are faced with attracting a cohort of students armed with a ¡°new set of values and culture¡±. He added that institutions must alter their offer to accommodate this.

¡°If you can uber a cab, you will be able to uber a qualification [or] a university,¡± he told the audience at Regent¡¯s University London. ¡°When you uber, it¡¯s about reliability; it¡¯s about access, cost and security.

¡°Now when you look at higher education, you want reliability, access ¨C local access, international reliability ¨C and you want success [and] security in terms of job[s] and opportunity.¡±

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He said that the change the world was undergoing was about ¡°millennialisation¡± rather than globalisation. ¡°You¡¯re dealing with this new cohort of millennials: young people bound with a new set of values and culture. We learn in different styles and different ways.¡±

Asked by Times Higher Education to expand on the extent to which a university would have to adopt Uber¡¯s model to adjust to the demands of ¡°millennialisation¡±, Mr Mushtaq said that the world was ¡°already ubering¡± and that universities had to act now to adapt their ¡°constipated¡± learning delivery models.

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¡°Our students, I get them scholarships into Harvard, Stanford, MIT, Oxford and Cambridge. [One] good student refused to go to Harvard and started studying for a University of London international degree in Pakistan. How could a child in the world refuse to go to Harvard? [It¡¯s because] students¡¯ lifestyles are shaping learning styles.

¡°[The] saturated, scientific, constipated delivery models will [cease] to exist.¡±

While agreeing with some elements of Mr Mushtaq¡¯s arguments, Fernando Le¨®n-Garcia, president of the CETYS University system, said he believed that there was still a place for current models of academic delivery.

¡°I believe that the way you look on balance at developed countries and least developed countries, there will be a mixture of institutions. There will be the new institutions [that adapt to the demands of millennials],¡± he said.

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¡°There will also be a need for the more residential type of education. It might be for a diminishing percentage of the population, but there will be those who will value it. Then there will be those that provide a mixture."

john.elmes@tesglobal.com