How They (Online Graduate Programs) Get You

"Finally, some schools are opting out of OPM partnerships altogether, instead choosing to develop online programs themselves. The University of Pennsylvania’s first fully online master’s degree, in health-care innovation, was created in-house. A small internal team manages all aspects of the program, including experimenting with outreach strategies ranging from information sessions to digital marketing. “We want to manage the content and the interactions ... so that [the program] is up to the Penn standards,” Heather Rosenbloom, the senior marketing manager at Penn’s Department of Medical Ethics and Health Policy, told me.

Rosenbloom’s enthusiasm for delivering a high-quality student experience was apparent. “We’re really passionate about the program, and we believe in what we’re doing,” she said. “We want to show that an online master’s can be as good as an on-campus program.” And as a prospective student, I noticed a major difference between Penn’s outreach and the phone calls I’d received from 2U’s programs, with interactions that seemed genuine, informational rather than salesy, and consistent with Penn’s reputation."