Dive Brief:
- Employers are increasingly seeing the promise of free schooling as a worthwhile benefit to offer employees.
- The New Hampshire Union Leader reports that Southern New Hampshire University is the latest to forge such a partnership, this time with health insurance company Anthem Inc., opening its online degree programs to 55,000 Anthem employees nationwide in the second stage of a pilot program that began in-state.
- According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, analysts see this move, along with other recent partnerships by Starbucks and Fiat Chrysler, as the beginning of a trend toward employer-directed degree attainment.
Dive Insight:
Starbucks joined with Arizona State University last year to offer subsidized online degree programs to about 135,000 employees who work at least 20 hours per week. Fiat Chrysler made a similar announcement for 100,000 of its dealership employees earlier this month with for-profit Strayer University. Employers continue to see the benefit as a way to decrease employee turnover and boost the educational attainment of their workforce. Colleges and universities would do well to note the trend and consider how to forge their own partnerships with local or regional employers.