College parents disappointed with rushed transition to online learning


Thursday, April 30, 2020

The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in social and economic upheaval on a global level. US colleges and universities have not been exempt—A hasty transition to online learning has resulted in the general disappointment of parents across the nation as their children complete the rest of their academic school years online. Read to find out more and see how some universities, such as Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU), were more prepared than others for this transition.



Traditional, in-person contact classes are now a thing of the past for the foreseeable future as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to leave its mark on life in the US on a social and economic level. The federal and state government has pushed Stay At Home orders that ask non-essential workers to stay at home and respect social distancing measures. Even before these orders were put into place, colleges and universities quickly shut down campuses and transitioned to online learning, online exams, and even pass-fail classes.

As businesses remain shut and workers stay at home, the US economy has also begun to take a hit. Universities are no exception to the current economic crisis. College students and their parents are seeking refunds for the closure of on-campus dorms and suspension of in-person classes. Students across the country have transitioned to online learning and not all higher education institutions were prepared for these last minute changes.

What do parents think of the current hasty transition to online learning?

It’s important to ask this question, as parents are typically financially responsible for paying for the majority of their children’s college education.

Tyton Partners, an investment banking and strategy-consulting firm, conducted a survey at the beginning of this month to observe how college parents are feeling with regard to current online learning.

Let’s take a look at the five “big takeaways” from Tyton Partners’ college parent survey.

#1. Parents’ primary concerns relate to their child’s well being, continued learning and progression. 

36% are most concerned with their children’s physical and mental well being
32% are most concerned with learning engagement and skill-acquisition
27% are most concerned with on-time degree completion

#2. Remote learning experiences do not meet college parent expectations.

Parents rate current remote learning classroom experiences a 5.6 out of 10. Online learning is not viewed as “high-quality” when compared with face to face experiences

#3. Parents are not sure how they feel about fall enrollment and 40% say their child is unlikely to go back in the Fall if learning continues online.

#4. Parents look for a drastic improvement of quality or price reductions if online learning continues in the fall. This is seen mostly in parents of students enrolled in private colleges and universities.

#5. Parents of high school seniors are incredibly apprehensive and worry about improvements and/or cost reductions.


Parent disappointment in remote learning experiences is not a good sign for colleges and universities as many struggle to keep afloat during the current social and economic global health crisis, but it does not have to spell the end. Institutions that have been caught by surprise are now being forced, for better or worse, to increase the quality and affordability of their online learning options. At this point, it may very well be a question of economic survival, as it appears that COVID-19 will keep colleges and universities from opening classes for the rest of the 2020 year.

What can institutions, that were taken by surprise, take away from these findings as institutions that were already ready for this massive transition find themselves largely unaffected?

Let’s take a look at how one university, Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU), provides quality online education for its students.

SNHU has been around since 1932 and has since become a school that offers over 200 programs for over 135,000 online students. Up until the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, SNHU provided on-campus classes for over 3,000 students. Looking at the numbers alone, it is no surprise that SNHU has become one of the top online learning education providers in the nation.

As a higher education provider, SNHU has always been ready for the turmoil that the novel coronavirus has brought into the US higher education sphere. SNHU began to craft its name as a top online education provider as far back as 1995. If anything, SNHU is one of the institutions least impacted by the transition to online learning.

Since 1995, SNHU’s online programs allow its students to earn their university degrees partially online or fully online. As such, the university has the proper infrastructure to burden a massive transition from in-person to online classes.

Public and private universities who were not ready for this online transition must now look to higher education institutions, such as SNHU, to figure out how to make their online learning accessible and achievable.

Administrative staff and teaching faculty must continue to hit the ground running in order to adapt to online learning methods and ensure that students and their parents are satisfied with the online education they are receiving. Failure to adequately do so spells loss of profit for several US colleges and universities. As the novel coronavirus continues to shape the every day lives of Americans in the US, colleges and universities will be playing a game of the survival of the fittest as their economic stability depends largely on their ability to deliver an affordable quality education to their students. 

Increasing the quality of online education is now a necessity for survival.




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