2025 Q2 Review: Online learning developments in UK higher education
Photo by Edward Jenner
Another quarter has passed, but the mood music around the UK higher education sector has remained largely unchanged. This quarter saw the Office for Students publish its annual financial sustainability report, showing that the financial performance of universities is set to decline in 2024–25 for the third consecutive year. Their analysis spanned 270 institutions, with 43 per cent forecasting a deficit, and one of the main contributing factors being lower than anticipated recruitment of international students.
While financial pressure in the sector is becoming more pronounced, the UK government has also been making moves to shape the higher education landscape. One key announcement this quarter was the withdrawal of funding for Level 7 (master’s level) apprenticeships. The government’s rationale was that it is:
refocusing investment towards young people at the start of their working lives, rather than those already in work with higher levels of prior learning and qualifications.
This will undoubtedly impact the number of UK universities that have developed Level 7 apprenticeships in recent years, and highlights the risks inherent in aligning provision too closely with shifting government policy. I think Marina Hyde put it best when evaluating this government's first year and its record of staying on course:
“This government’s had more reboots than Batman. And, like that particular character’s screen incarnations, it all just seems to keep getting darker and grittier every time.”
Anyway, I digress. This quarter has also seen some interesting developments in the world of online education, continuing the longer-standing trends of more universities entering the online master’s degree market, private partnerships being established, and universities deepening and developing their online learning portfolios. Let’s dive in…
UK university and company partnership news
At the recent Online Learning Summit at the University of Leeds, I shared this chart based on my analysis of the number of private company and university partnerships that have been established or ended year on year. There is no doubt that the growing number of UK universities working with private companies has played a significant role in the increase in online postgraduate student numbers over the past five years.
The chart highlights how new partnerships are on the rise, while the number coming to an end has also increased. This trend continued last quarter, with two new partnerships established and one seemingly ending. All this activity centres on one company: Higher Ed Partners.
In April, it was announced that the company had partnered with Aberystwyth University, followed by a June announcement of a partnership with the University of Gloucestershire. As I highlighted in my OPM market review, Higher Ed Partners holds the most partnerships with UK universities, and these new additions strengthen that position. However, after years of growth, it appears the company has seen its first partnership come to an end. Although these changes are not usually announced publicly, the disappearance of the online degrees it managed for the University of Lincoln is a telltale sign.
Beyond these developments, two other things caught my eye last quarter. The first was the launch of an online undergraduate degree in Data Science from the University of Huddersfield in partnership with Coursera. This is notable, as most UK universities have focused solely on postgraduate provision. While this does not suggest a major shift towards online undergraduate degrees, it does show that universities are open to branching out selectively where it makes sense.
The second partnership of note was a progression agreement between Learndirect and the Open University. Learndirect has offered online degree pathways since 2023. These are very affordable undergraduate degrees in which students study Years 1 and 2 online through Learndirect, and, if they successfully complete those years, they can progress to Year 3 at one of its university progression partners. This quarter saw the Open University added to that small list. What links these two developments is a shared focus on accessibility and affordability, whether through Coursera’s performance-based admissions or Learndirect’s pricing and payment plan options.
Online education company news
The last quarter has seen a number of online education companies publish financial results. Time doesn’t allow for a deep dive here, but I plan to explore these more fully in a dedicated article in the coming weeks.
Inevitably, due to their size, reach, and the fact they report publicly on performance, 2U and Coursera tend to dominate online education company news. While this creates a risk of placing too much focus on just two companies, there have been developments of note, particularly at Coursera. In my Q1 analysis, I reported that the company had effectively decided to de-emphasise online degrees and was anticipating a decline in revenue. Following the release of their Q1 2025 results, the company announced it would be folding degrees into its consumer segment and would no longer report the number of degree students.
Clearly, under new leadership, this is a company that continues to evolve. It has moved a long way from its early days of being centred on university partnerships, shifting increasingly towards industry partnerships and its own content. Partnerships with platforms like Coursera have always carried a degree of risk for universities, especially when it comes to alignment of priorities. The key question for the small number of universities still partnered with Coursera is whether they remain sufficiently aligned with its new direction for those partnerships to continue being mutually beneficial, or whether they’ll find degrees moved metaphorically to the bottom shelf of aisle 34.
Sticking with Coursera, the company also released its Micro-Credentials Impact Report 2025. Unfortunately, these reports often feel like the equivalent of chickens reporting a rise in popularity for nut roasts.
The findings and survey data clearly align with Coursera’s agenda of encouraging universities to embed their industry certificates, such as the Google Cybersecurity professional certificate, into degrees and to leverage generative AI focussed courses. As they state in the bit no one reads:
“Both surveys were voluntary and conducted online, which may influence response patterns and introduce self-selection bias. The results are indicative of the viewpoints and experiences of participating respondents and institutions, and not as a complete portrayal of the higher education landscape worldwide.”
Read with care, but it adds to the growing drumbeat around the utility of shorter-form credentials (albeit in a narrow range of subjects) in supporting employment-focused outcomes. I also expect some of the report’s visual data will sit nicely in those “evangelical” keynotes, alongside favourites like McKinsey, the World Economic Forum and LinkedIn, that are delivered with the moral urgency of someone who’s discovered the future and is deeply disappointed you’re not there already.
University news
Alongside these developments, UK universities have continued to advance their online education activities. This quarter, one of the UK’s smaller institutions, Bishop Grosseteste University, launched a new online MA Education suite with five titles, including Early Years and SEND. These degrees add to what is already a crowded landscape for online MA Education, a course which, along with MBAs, has a significant presence in the market. However, this development highlights that it is not only medium and large universities investing in online provision. As a university with a long-standing focus and track record in teacher and education-focused provision, it may also offer an interesting case study in how smaller universities perform in areas of strength, and how that influences other market players.
Other developments of note include the University of London launching a new BSc in Professional Accountancy, which merges an ACCA (Association of Chartered Certified Accountants) qualification with a degree. This strikes me as a powerful combination of outcomes for online learners, for whom professional relevance and recognised qualifications are often highly valuable.
Another development to mention was the announcement from University of Aberdeen Online of a revamped website. Aberdeen has a substantial online portfolio of 170 short courses and 50 online degrees and is among a group of universities that, although largely unheralded, have a significant presence in online education. The new site also features a helpful degree scheduler tool, allowing students to customise and visualise their route through an online degree.
Other news
In other news, this past quarter I came across an announcement that, after their first attempt in 2024, Times Higher Education has decided to pause its Online Learning Ranking until further notice. A bit like an influencer after a brand collab goes south, THE has “listened to feedback” and doesn’t have a specific timeline in mind for revisiting or continuing with the ranking.
In more important news, this quarter also saw the release of the 2023/24 student data from the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA). This year’s release was more timely, following significant changes to reporting in recent years and the associated challenges. I’ve done a more detailed analysis of both UK student data and international student data, but the main headline is that the number of online students continues to trend upwards.
There were a couple of developments this quarter that underscore the growing focus on skills and employment-focused education. In June, Indeed announced a partnership with Udemy to combine a job site with online courses. One thing this highlights is that universities developing their professional and lifelong learning offers must face the reality that they are just one of several players competing for learners.
The other development was the launch of Skills Symphony, a consortium of 14 learning providers, seemingly brought together by KPMG, to offer a “range of learning and skills services across both the public and private sector”. These providers include, from the higher education sector, Cambridge Judge Business School, FutureLearn, and Hult Ashridge. We should get used to people talking about “skills” in the UK, what they actually mean by that is another question entirely, but this feels like a development that captures the zeitgeist, even if there’s a certain degree of ambiguity about what the consortium will actually do.
Summing up
This quarter doesn’t necessarily present anything new but reinforces some established trends. These include universities entering the online education market seriously for the first time, with most focused on postgraduate master’s degrees. Similarly, there is clearly still plenty of appetite for partnerships with private companies to support these aims, and alongside the partnerships established this quarter, a significant number of universities are either actively looking or already engaged in forming such partnerships.
Although this isn’t a topic I’ve explored in depth here, there is growing interest in sub-degree provision. This is, to some extent, driven by the rising momentum around lifelong learning and shorter forms of provision to support skills and employment outcomes, something I intend to explore separately. But it’s another trend that is increasingly coming to the fore.
All of this activity has largely been supported by mostly positive growth in online student numbers, as reported by HESA. However, it’s questionable whether the pie is growing large enough for all universities and companies to secure a significant share. This becomes even more critical given the financial challenges outlined at the beginning of this article. While those challenges might suggest a period of stasis, I see plenty of dynamism in the sector at the moment, driven by the existential nature of the challenge some universities face and the shifting sands of government priorities for higher education. All of this points to there being more interesting developments to come in the next couple of quarters.
