I think that we should be looking at an investment in education as even more important certainly than buying car, and in today’s economy, probably more important than buying a house, because it is the kind of investment that is going to keep paying you back, and gaining in value. I think that the revolutionary thing here is that what we are about is to provide those people who are adults, who want to find the best university to fit what they want to accomplish with enough information that they can do that in an intelligent way, and when we have done our work here at Capella University getting to a point that we are really ready to be as open with all of this as we are, we sort of looked at the old way of doing it, and said, this is a black box.
You come into a university, and we say, if you take this many credits, and you come out the other side of that black box, we will give you a degree, good luck, we hope you do well. But we are about to remove that black box and open it up, do not have it be a mystery. Have it available to the student, this person who is making a decision to be a student, so that you can make a good decision, and then as you come in, you know exactly what is expected of you, how you are going to progress through your degree? And when we open it up, it is better not only for the students, but for us, because then we can see where things are working well, not working well, and we can do things to make sure it is getting better all the time. So to some extent I think this is revolutionary because that is a new way of thinking about delivering information about higher education, and delivering the education itself.
This really goes back several years, and it is rooted in the definition that we firmly believe and are passionate about in terms of what is quality, and interestingly enough that is a big question in higher ed and you hear people talk about it a lot. We believe that quality has two elements: a) that you have superior learning outcomes, and b) that you have a superior experience while you are accomplishing those outcomes.
Now what we did with that idea, was to sort of change the way that we approach the development of programs, and said, historically programs have come together, because you had a group of faculty. Those faculty had things that they wanted to teach, and you sort of aggregated a group of courses, and after you finished the X number credits, we will give you a degree as a bachelor or a master. What we said is, look, if we are really going to be focused on outcomes, we should build our programs from the back to the front. What are those outcomes you are going to have, how do we build to those in the most efficient, get you through the most quickly, to having achieved those outcomes, and to do it in a way that makes sense.
So we really, I think, turned program development on its head, and said, what is the experience going to be not necessarily for the faculty member, but what is it going to be like for the student? And what does that student need to do: what learning activities to lead to, what competencies to lead to, what outcomes, and that is a very, very different approach, and it begins to change the way that you think about delivering education.
So once you make that sort of switch, and you are saying this is all focused on making sure that when learners, students leave Capella, they leave here ready to lead in their professions, ready to succeed in their jobs, and we are here in every piece of energy we put into what we are doing goes to making that happen. That begins to change the very nature of what you do, and the way you go about it. So for us the idea of being transparent, being able to share those outcomes, being able to measure the outcomes, being able to ask the alums to tell us what their experience is about, and then to provide that to people who are trying to make a decision, is just a natural part of what we do now, and it has been very powerful, and it has created I think in my mind a wonderful educational experience and opportunity.
We are really making a big effort to identify the outcomes that you will achieve. And what do I mean by that? What is it that you are going to learn? What is it that you are going know? What is it that you are going to be able to do when you complete the program that you are considering? And that is very important I think for adult students to consider as they are trying to make that decision.
So what we have done, is to define outcomes by working with people outside the university, as well as inside. We are going to make every effort to make sure that what we are assessing are the competencies that have been identified as required for you to succeed, and ultimately those outcomes that you can use to tell employers, this is what I learned at Capella University, this is what I can show you that I can do because of having finished this program.
I think that we and the other institutions involved in transparency by design are leading the way, and I think that we have done so much work at Capella that I would say that we are probably just ahead at this point. I think if you go out 10, 15 years, the kind of information that we are giving today will become more generally available at all colleges and universities, but it is going to take them a long time to get there. We have been working on our efforts to be able to deliver this kind of information now for four or five years.
You want to make sure that your degree is recognized, is having value, and I know that is always a question I get, will employers recognize the online degree? The answer is, absolutely. If we can establish that in fact we are delivering to the outcomes we said we would, we are measuring it, we have got matrix, we are using the information, and we have got to continuously improve what we are doing, and to make sure that what we are teaching you, and what you are going to be able to do when you leave here, is state of the art, and it is what the employer needs. That is the way that we create greater value for the degree, and the reason that happens is because employers eat it up.
What I want to say to those adults who are looking at Capella University is, I hope you choose us, but I hope you choose for the right reasons. And the right reasons are that you understand what it is that we say you are going to learn in the program that you are looking at, and that you get some evidence from us, that the students who have gone before you have shown that we actually did teach them what we said we would do, that the students have gone before and completed their program have fed back information to us that say, was it the right stuff to learn, did it help me in my career? Look for that kind of information, then be sure that the program that you are looking at Capella University fits what you need.
Now I happen to think that the most important thing that we can provide you, is enough information for you to make a wise decision about where you are going to go to school, because that is a big decision. It is a big decision, and I would suggest you that knowing what you are going to be able to do, and what you can show your current or future employers, is probably the most important thing you need to know about what degree program, or what university to choose. And what we want to do at Capella University, and there are others working with us on the transparency by design, is to make sure you have that kind of information, so that once you decide you are coming to Capella University, you know why you are coming, you know what you want to get out of it. You know you are working in partnership with us to make sure you get it, and that we are going to be able to demonstrate to you that you did actually learn what we said, and can demonstrate that you are able to do what it is that you are going to take out there to an employer and say, I am ready, I am better, this is what I got from Capella University.