Headquartered in New Delhi, What After College is an innovative Ed-Tech platform that services as a one-stop-solution for students to enhance their skills, connect with experts, and share their stories online.

Education industry has always been one of the earliest adopters of new technologies. Given the rapid pace of advancements in the technology and the changes they bring to the way students pursue the education; it would be unwise to think that the face of higher education will continue to be the way it has been for years. Furthermore the distressing stats regarding the employability of Indian graduates exhibit that change in higher education is the need of the hour rather than something that can be taken lightly.

As the students update themselves to the latest trends and employers become more focused on skills rather than degree with regards to hiring, higher education institutions also need to rework on their value proposition for the students as well as their teaching methods to avoid seeing a decline in their enrolments. .

From the decreasing value of degrees to the application of artificial intelligence in education, the higher education industry and the students who are being benefitted from it are up for a series of interesting changes. Although the face of higher education is altering in one way or the other, bit these 5 trends would be laying the largest impact on higher education in 2017

Personalisation would transform the higher education journey of a student

In the old Gurukul system of education, the educator use to modify his teachings according to each specific child, the same level of personalisation is reiterating. Although this time, students get to decide and personalize as to what they would learn; from single lessons to small course modules to content that would suit a student's learning style, students would also now be able to personalise their education journey in ways that each student's learning would be unique from one another and more relevant to their needs and interests.

Preference for online education will increase

India has one of the fastest growing internet user base and with the declining data costs; this is set to rise further.Majority of the college students already own a smartphone and are active users. From communication to content that supplements the class room lectures,internet is making the process of learning more efficient and engaging for the

current generation. Students have also started to prefer online professional courses over regular courses and an increase in this preference would lead to drive of the majority of change that internet would bring to the table. Many institutions have already started professional online course, hybrid courses to attract the new generation. Similarly,the use of online resources smartly in the classroom is going to be of major significance in the coming days to come.

From communication to content that supplements the classroom lectures, internet is making the process of learning more efficient and engaging for the current generation

Big data, artificial intelligence and machine learning; Boon for making of smart classroom

Big Data,artificial intelligence and machine learning are already making their way to our day to day processes. From shopping recommendations based on big data,to apps that smartly identify places and things in your photos, to bots that replace customer service agents, these particular fields are already in implementation around us. No doubt, advancements in these fields is certainly going to change the way we currently learn and educate. From bots that assist you in your learning process to content that adapts to your learning pace and style, higher education is about to become much smarter in the near future.

A shift from plain degree to skills-focused and research driven education is going to invade soon

The regular pedagogy involving class lectures, assignments, terms are about to see a gross change, mostly by a shifting focus on more research based and hands-on experience. Experiential learning, which essentially is the process of learning through experiences, through reflection on doing is the talk of the town. More and more institutes could be to make experiential learning as part of their pedagogy.

Furthermore, the employability of our current graduates is a key cause of concern. Employers have laid stress upon the fact that current graduates just don't have the skills that are requisite to for becoming a part of an efficient workforce. In the present time, the nature of work is dynamic and ever evolving, which further increases the appeal for skill - based courses among students. Many institutes have already started providing such courses to train the students.

Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality would lead to; enhancing the learning experience of students

Augmented reality has already started witnessing early adoption in the school classrooms. Major textbook publishers are already on the road of publishing A.R. enhanced books. This change is soon going to make its way to classrooms in higher education too, where the access to mobile devices and technology is much easy and convenient. Similarly with the increasing accessibility to virtual reality devices, especially with rise of devices like the low cost google cardboard, virtual reality is soon going to become one of the most dominant approaches to engage students in the classroom.

The changes need to take place in terms of pedagogy; the end value institutions aim to provide to the students, focussed & research based education, novel assessment styles etc. Furthermore, upgradation in terms of technology along with training of the staff to adopt that technology is ought to be done.

Institutions that would lead the change rather than following it would end up as the winners. While concluding it, it can be said that higher education industry and whole system is going to be changed drastically hence it is ideal for higher education institutions to start changing themselves now itself so that they can be way ahead of the competition in the ever hard-hitting battle for enrolments.