Attracting & Serving Adult Learners: An Academic Leader Playbook

Statistics show that people aged 25 and over make up around 40% of all students in higher education in the U.S., amounting to nearly eight million learners. During the pandemic, the number of adults in education dropped due to financial issues, employment changes, and lack of access to programs.

However, the tide is turning, and there has been a renewed demand for online or digital adult learning courses post-pandemic. Adult learners often have a unique set of circumstances to work around, such as full-time or part-time employment or childcare responsibilities. 

MedCerts works with universities and colleges to tailor course content and marketing to better target adult learners. From stackable credentials and revenue sharing to alumni and Tallo campaigns, we offer everything you need to effectively attract and serve this key demographic. 

How to Attract Adult Learners

Address Pain Points

It’s important to recognize and appeal to adult learners’ circumstances and concerns. They may be worried about many things, including the price of courses, because they also have to pay rent and bills. To reassure students, marketing materials should highlight reasonable prices and flexible course payment options. MedCerts’ stackable credentials mean your students can build the skills they need more gradually over time, helping them maintain their work-life balance.

Utilize Emotions

Adult learners could have a range of deeply personal reasons for pursuing college and university qualifications, from wanting a career that feels more fulfilling to providing a better life for their children. Make sure to emphasize the positive emotional outcomes of completing a course, from improved personal satisfaction to more money for family holidays.

Highlight Practicalities

Inform potential students about your course's practical aspects, including content, structure, and length. Don’t shy away from showing off the unique features of your course, such as innovative educational platforms, digital or flexible learning options, high-quality teaching, and positive feedback from past students. MedCerts offers community colleges and private institutions a prebuilt marketing toolkit that makes highlighting practicalities much more straightforward.

Tailor Your Teaching

It's important for the instructors on your course to know how to teach adults with different learning styles. You should also offer a range of materials to cater to each learning style, from videos, charts, and diagrams for visual learners, lecture recordings for audio learners, and interactive activities and live demonstrations for kinesthetic learners.

Partner With MedCerts

Partnering with an online certification trainer like MedCerts can help you expand your student offerings and open your doors to a more diverse student body. We can help you create a credit for prior learning (CPL) program or custom co-learning experience while your students can take advantage of our apprenticeship schemes and support services to reach their goals faster.

What MedCerts Offers

MedCerts runs more than 50 online certification programs in the in-demand fields of healthcare and IT, which are a perfect extension to a higher education catalog. We’ve partnered with various academic institutions, from the University of Phoenix to Excelsior University, to help deliver curated courses.

Working with us comes with a whole host of benefits you won’t find elsewhere, including but not limited to:

1. Custom course development and marketing solutions.

2. Support with reselling to customers and businesses.

3. Joint calls on corporate and K12 outreach.

4. Options for revenue sharing and stackable credentials.

5. Alumni, Tallo, and Digital Ad campaigns.

6. Market research and technology integration services.

7. Assistance with grants and requests for proposals.

We do all the heavy lifting to ensure our partnerships are marketed professionally, meaning you get access to co-branded materials, specialized landing pages, and enrollment forms. This enables our partnerships to exceed on all fronts.

Click here to learn more about what MedCerts can do for you.