Education technology is a rapidly evolving field that is constantly innovating to create engaging and accessible learning experiences for more students. Yet many of these tech-driven educational solutions have not focused on adult and non-traditional learners.
For the past five years, Calbright College has been taking a leading role in changing that by collaborating across education and technology sectors to better understand how to meet adult learners where they are, while accelerating new technologies specifically aimed to support education and economic equity and better outcomes for students.
That’s because Calbright’s role extends beyond being a community college – it was designed by the state of California to also be a research engine dedicated to building and testing practices that help working-age adults achieve their higher education and career goals in flexible, self-paced ways.
Our approach applies student-centered research and design thinking to rapidly build and test innovative pilots to improve student outcomes. Some of the practices developed at Calbright address systemic challenges, like how much college costs and what kinds of programs we offer to meet students’ needs and labor market demands. Others involve getting students through our virtual doors,supporting them on their journey once they get here, and supporting their job searches and connecting them with employers once they’ve gained in-demand, durable skills.
Calbright’s data-driven research practices focus on serving California’s working-age adults with limited to no college experience that can be used by other institutions in the California Community Colleges System seeking to better support adult students.
Learning And Engineering, Education Technology
One significant initiative to develop better education technology for adults began in 2023, when Calbright sponsored an “Engaging Adult Learners in Higher Education” track of the annual Learning Engineering Tools Competition, attracting proposals that put adult learners first.
In particular the competition was looking for technologies that would:
- Boost persistence, retention, and completion among adults and non-traditional students in higher education
- Foster workforce readiness
- Facilitate community and belonging in online spaces
- Support self-directed learning
- Build scalable complements to human interaction
Calbright’s goal with the track had been to receive 100 proposals. Instead, we received 336 proposals, 81% of which were from first-time applicants – proving a significant pool of talent and interest in developing technology for adult higher education.
Competition Leads to New Ideas and 2025 Cycle
The competition in 2023 was a huge success, with six winning proposals selected – two of which are currently working directly with Calbright to test and iterate on their products and eventually benefit Calbright students and adult learners across the board.
- OATutor is developing an open-source, adaptive learning platform with a course-specific AI tutor that provides automated academic support whenever students need it.
- Wingspans is developing an “experience translator,” an inclusive, AI-driven platform career navigation platform that leverages storytelling to empower adult learners to design a career trajectory based on their experiences, skills, and interests, that leads to new career pathways.
With the overwhelming success and innovations from the first cycle, Calbright is participating in the Tools Competition for a second consecutive year, with 14 finalists recently named to compete. In particular, the 2024-2025 adult education track is focused on technologies that:
- Increase the quality and relevancy of content and instruction for adult and non-traditional students
- Broaden career pathways for improved mobility
- Enhance the impact of student advising and supports
- Develop a competitive and adaptive workforce
- Improve institutional/ administrative systems
- Affect outcomes for diverse learner populations and learning conditions
The emerging technologies, significant cross-sector collaboration, and strong interest in designing more and better tools, demonstrates that there is tremendous room for adult higher education technology to grow – and Calbright is proud to be leading the way forward with our partners and students.
