Universities are ill-equipped to meet the burgeoning demand for lifelong education, one of their new-generation competitors has claimed.

Speaking at the Times Higher Education World Academic Summit in Singapore, Ben Nelson, founder of for-profit higher education provider Minerva, cited computer science academics as an example of universities¡¯ unsuitability to deliver continuing education.

¡°University professors do their PhD when computer science language x is prevalent. They do their early postdoc when y is prevalent, and z,¡± Mr Nelson said. ¡°By the time they¡¯re designing a curriculum, doing a syllabus, approving it and delivering it, those computer science languages are oftentimes ancient history.¡±

He claimed that the void was being filled by coding boot camps. ¡°Hundreds, if not thousands, of alternative education providers are stepping into that world because they design education programmes with content that is responsive to what the market wants,¡± he said.

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¡°They¡¯re much better positioned to respond to market needs. If universities want to compete with that, they have to adopt those types of approaches.¡±

Mr Nelson predicted that traditional institutions would come under pressure because of the demand for new types of course content. Employability was now ¡°overwhelmingly¡± the motivator of young university students, he said.

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¡°If you think that going to a university for four years and paying a quarter of a million dollars is the right path to a job, you¡¯re crazy. That¡¯s not why you should go to university. You should go to university for how it tools you for the rest of your life,¡± he said.

¡°The fact is that some of these continuing education providers are coming to the 18-year-old and saying: pay us a tenth as much as you pay a university, give us 20?per cent of the time you would give a university, and we¡¯ll give you a higher-paying job at the end. And they¡¯re right.¡±

Fellow panellist Sarah Springman, rector of ETH Zurich, disputed Mr Nelson¡¯s analysis. She said that some of her computer science professors were working at the ¡°forefront¡± of research by helping to develop an emerging internet protocol called Scion.

¡°Those guys are teaching on our cybersecurity courses,¡± she said, adding that ETH had recently launched a sabbatical-based programme?that allows people to undertake quick certificates. ¡°They come, say, for two months. They choose what they want to do. They select what it is they need to learn.

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¡°We have something we call a ¡®qualification profile¡¯ [which outlines] what people need to know at the end. They plan the content all the way through. It¡¯s not about the packaging; it¡¯s about what¡¯s in it.¡±

Professor Springman said that universities were applying similar flexibility to their teaching. She?cited?ETH¡¯s recently introduced Key Innovation in Teaching Excellence award, or Kite, which had inspired staff to conjure up dozens of fresh, evidence-based teaching approaches.

¡°It means there is a research core to what they¡¯re teaching. Each time you refresh [your] ideas and use your learning development group to help with your didactics, it¡¯s much more fun.¡±

But Mr Nelson scoffed at the idea of evidence-based teaching in universities, pointing to renowned Harvard educator Eric Mazur as an example of universities¡¯ failure to ¡°listen to the research¡±.

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He said that Professor Mazur¡¯s ¡°seminal¡± research into active learning had shown that its benefits, compared?with passive learning techniques, outweighed the advantages of penicillin over sugar pills. ¡°That research was done at Harvard more than two decades ago. How did Harvard respond? By thanking him very much,¡± Mr Nelson said.

¡°There has been no change in the way almost any university delivers its courses. They¡¯re still overwhelmingly passive. Even seminars are often delivered in passive ways.¡±

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john.ross@timeshighereducation.com