Student-Centric Higher Education Means Designing Around Today’s Learners
Student success begins with understanding who today’s students are.
For many colleges and universities, the traditional image of a full-time student attending classes on a residential campus no longer reflects reality. Today’s learners are working adults, parents, first-generation students, military-connected learners, and others balancing education alongside careers, families, and financial responsibilities.
That reality is shaping the Presidents Forum’s work this July.
Student centricity is more than access
Improving access remains an important goal, but enrolling students is only the beginning.
A truly student-centered institution helps learners persist, complete a credential, and translate that education into meaningful opportunity.
That requires institutions to design around the realities students face rather than expecting students to adapt to institutional structures.
Flexible learning options, responsive student services, clear academic pathways, and strong career connections all contribute to student success.
Designing institutions around students
Across the Presidents Forum, member institutions are demonstrating what student-centered innovation looks like in practice.
That includes expanding online and hybrid learning, strengthening student support services, improving transfer pathways, adopting technology that reduces barriers, and building closer connections between education and workforce opportunity.
While each institution approaches the work differently, the goal is the same: creating systems that help more students succeed.
Policy shapes what institutions can achieve
Student-centered innovation also depends on a policy environment that supports new approaches while maintaining accountability for outcomes.
This month, the Presidents Forum continues to monitor two important federal developments.
The Department of Education is expected to release its proposed Accreditation, Innovation, and Modernization (AIM) rule, which could influence accreditation, institutional flexibility, and accountability across higher education.
The Forum is also tracking ongoing discussions surrounding the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), recognizing its importance for military-connected students and institutions that serve them.
As these developments unfold, the Forum will continue helping members understand what changes may mean for their institutions and their students.
The bottom line
Student centricity is not a single initiative. It is a commitment to designing higher education around the lives students actually lead.
Whether through institutional innovation or public policy, the goal remains the same: helping more students access opportunity, complete their education, and achieve lasting success.
Transcript
In July, the Presidents Forum is focusing on student centricity — what it means to design higher education around the realities, needs, and goals of today’s learners.
That includes working adults, parents, first-generation students, military-connected learners, and others who need flexible, high-quality pathways that connect learning to opportunity.
Across the Forum, this theme is central to our work. Student centricity is not just about access. It is about whether students can persist, complete, and see real value from their education.
That means stronger support systems, clearer pathways, more responsive delivery models, and policy environments that make innovation possible while keeping student outcomes at the center.
On the policy front, we are continuing to follow two major developments. First, the Department of Education’s upcoming AIM proposed rule on accreditation, innovation, and modernization. Second, ongoing activity around the NDAA.
The Forum is tracking the AIM proposed rule closely and preparing to help members understand its implications. The NDAA remains more uncertain, so we will continue monitoring developments there and keep members informed as there is more clarity.
As always, our focus remains: advancing policies and practices that help institutions better serve students and strengthen the future of higher education.