"My sense so far is that higher education has few genuine answers to the challenges that generative AI has presented. But if this challenge is going to be properly taken on, then I think it will require some creative experimentation"

"we should be making more noise about the role that online education is playing in career advancement and development rather than having endless vapid debates about the efficacy of modalities."

"there is a delicate balance between actions that increase the likelihood of remaining perpetually smaller and poorer, and those that enable you to grow income and pursue opportunities."

"some may need to break away from the idea that there is essentially one main way to do online course marketing and recruitment. There are other strategies, other approaches and other ideas of merit."

"when the way you approach identifying and justifying courses only ever leads you to the same place, and increasingly the exact same place as everyone else, you’re likely to have a problem, and one that will most probably compound."

"There are advantages to committing to online provision as a long-term business-as-usual strategy, but online education is still too often viewed as a diversification tap that can be turned on and off"

"The flip side of student mobility, moving between institutions, is student loyalty, returning to the same institution again and again, and it’s this very idea that is rarely discussed in relation to the LLE"

"when the way you approach identifying and justifying courses only ever leads you to the same place, and increasingly the exact same place as everyone else, you’re likely to have a problem, and one that will most probably compound." www.neilmosley.com/blog/is-data...

"for OPMs to continue to be valuable partners long into the future, they need to offer more than a standard set of capabilities that universities have historically lacked. Or, to put it another way, some new thinking and creativity is required."

"If we don’t take care to adopt more well-rounded approaches to course identification, selection and justification, we’ll be headed in the direction of highly comforting and reassuring convergence, greater competition and ultimately sameness"

"credit transfer is about facilitating student mobility across institutions. The flip side of student mobility, moving between institutions, is student loyalty, returning to the same institution again and again, and it’s this very idea that is rarely discussed."

"Only a small number of partnerships have lasted over five years, and more have ended before that. Given that these partnerships are typically entered into as long-term relationships, this is a concerning pattern that is worth examining in more detail."

"we are in a phase where developments are largely focused on efficiencies, ideation and generation within existing practices. I have seen only minimal evidence of more sophisticated features that reflect a deeper understanding of learning and teaching"

"I would strongly caution against thinking of the TNE online student landscape as a kind of homogeneous global B2C market. The student numbers presented here are not solely indicative of universities acting independently"

"What these developments highlight...is that universities developing shorter course provision face competition not only from each other but from a wider landscape of online provision, which in many cases is far more operationally mature and sophisticated."

"The current stronger focus on lifelong learning, has overall been one where the challenges presented and discussed, which certainly exist, have obscured thinking and creativity in relation to the opportunities."

"we are at risk of missing something significant if we are only asking ourselves, how do we reach new groups of people through lifelong learning? Instead of also asking, How do we become institutions where people return to study with us again and again?"

"there is a delicate balance between actions that increase the likelihood of remaining smaller and poorer, and those that enable you to grow and pursue opportunities. It's much harder to consider the opportunity costs of pursuing cost cutting exclusively."

"Overall, the data shows that a decline at the Open University is obscuring some growth, albeit modest in scale, across a number of universities, most notably those that are seriously invested in online undergraduate dprovision and have been for years."

"The first quarter of the year has seen partnerships announced between UK universities and online programme management (OPM) companies. However, this quarter has also provided a trail of evidence that points to several partnerships coming to an end."

"The 2024–25 HESA student data shows the most significant year-on-year increase in TNE distance learning undergraduate degree students over the past decade. The number of students increased by 6%, continuing a trend of year-on-year growth since 2019–20."

"This quarter reflects a number of trends currently shaping the online education landscape in UK higher education..and illustrate the mixed fortunes of UK universities, with some expanding and others making missteps into online education"

This is a really shameful episode, and whoever is in the wrong here, it is not the students who are being asked to repay significant sums of money. This episode lays bare many things, not least HE policies around distance and online learners. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

It’s been fantastic to be at the 20th Research in Distance Education (RIDE) conference these past couple of days. Lots of great sessions on what’s happening in online learning in the UK and across the world. Great to meet and catch-up with lots of people across the days, here’s to the next one.

Really looking forward to speaking at the CoSector Festival of Technology in Education and Research on the 5th May on the future of the digital learning ecosystem and short courses & microcredentials. You can sign up and register here, tickets are free - www.tickettailor.com/events/cosec...

"The changes caused by AI..may seduce people deeper into current marketing practices with the promise of greater effectiveness...which will increase the opportunity space for differentiated approaches to marketing for online courses."

"while the choices universities face around online course portfolios may lead down different paths, given current and projected needs, developing to better serve a mature student audience..would be a wise investment."

In the past couple of days we've had confirmation that Blackboard, the company behind the virtual learning environment (VLE) used by many UK universities, is now an independent company and will be led by returning founder Matthew Pittinsky.

"UK HE's focus on TNE in recent years has been significant, and several institutions have been increasing their student numbers, including those studying through online learning, who made up approx. 21% of total TNE students across all levels in 2024–25."

Check out our team's compendium of interesting things in our February Digital Practice Round Up - inspiringlearning.jiscinvolve.org/wp/2026/03/d... Featuring @neilmosley.bsky.social, @hopkinsdavid.bsky.social, @neilselwyn.bsky.social and @kate-molloy.net

"if it weren't for the substantial increase in international on-campus students...the rise in UK students choosing to study postgraduate degrees online would be a more prominent sector-wide story. This growth has continued in the current reporting cycle "

"Blackboard and Moodle continue to be the most widely used VLEs among large UK higher education providers, but this year has seen a continuation of UK universities selecting Canvas and Brightspace as their new virtual learning enviroments (VLEs)."

"the story of online student enrolment over the last ten years, outside of the pandemic years, has been one of steady, incremental growth. While both undergraduate and PGT student numbers have fluctuated, the trend line for each remains upwards"

Excellent analysis of the UK HE #VLE market by @neilmosley.bsky.social - always worth a read, comprehensive overview of developments through 2025 #Blackboard #Canvas #D2LBrightspace #Moodle www.neilmosley.com/blog/uk-high...

"One of the core financial viability challenges of online sub-degree provision is tight margins..If you’re not set up to offer courses on a regular or predictable basis, these challenges will only be exacerbated."

"the question at the front of my mind is whether online course marketing has become locked into an orthodoxy that is simply exacerbating the challenges of growing competition."

"in the last year there have been a number of developments closely aligned with longer-term trends and patterns, such as the fortunes of companies, and the profile of HE providers adopting particular VLEs"

"What’s clear is that even though there is a greater sense of prioritisation for forms of provision under the lifelong & flexible learning umbrella, universities still have some distance to travel in developing successful and sustainable operations to support it."

"there is a delicate balance between actions that increase the likelihood of remaining perpetually smaller and poorer, and those that enable you to grow income and pursue opportunities, and whatever you think about the LLE, it presents an opportunity." buff.ly/EGeFtWr

"the international online student market is one where the scale of the opportunity somewhat clouds the realities. It is an area that many in UK higher education do not always fully understand."

"Under the iceberg, so to speak...institutions are attempting to get their house in order to effectively support the delivery of shorter, flexible provision, adopting new platforms and seeking to better coordinate their existing portfolios of short courses."

"online education has had a couple of decades of being considered as a newer form of higher education, but this does not make it any less prone to developing rigid orthodoxies about how things should be done."

"For universities considering their online education strategies, it is important not to overlook the ways in which online education might support market penetration and not simply diversification. The two do not have to be mutually exclusive"

"there remains only a small number of institutions that can be said to have a significant portfolio of online undergraduate provision....but...there have been some small signals of an increasing number...willing to..launch online undergraduate degrees."

"some may need to break away from the idea that there is essentially one main way to do online course marketing and recruitment. There are other strategies, other approaches and other ideas of merit."

"on the surface the international online education market is very appealing...but the international online student market is one where the scale of the opportunity somewhat clouds the realities." www.neilmosley.com/blog/key-mis... #onlinelearning #onlineeducation #highereducation

"there has been a growing confluence between government priorities & wider narratives, leading to greater confidence to develop shorter forms of provision. Helpfully, this also offers a means of diversification in challenging financial times."

"I’ve begun to increasingly question whether the playbook for online student marketing and recruitment has become too formulaic...and whether this is limiting recruitment opportunities and constraining universities from being more competitive."

"Universities need to think of online learning as a long game, rather than a short-term opportunity, and insulate their efforts against another common source of waste..new leaders abandoning existing projects in favour of their own ideas or visions."

"one clear trend..is an increase in the number of OPM and university partnerships coming to an end...as we have progressed into the 2020s, the number has grown markedly." www.neilmosley.com/blog/2025-wr... #onlinelearning #onlineeducation #highereducation