Tyton Partners Releases 2026 Driving Toward a Degree Report, Student Supports Reinvented for ROI and AI
BOSTON, Oct. 06, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Today, Tyton Partners, a strategy consulting and investment banking firm
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BOSTON, Oct. 06, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Today, Tyton Partners, a strategy consulting and investment banking firm focused on the education sector, released Driving Toward a Degree 2026. This year’s study finds institutions under pressure on two fronts at once: increased demand to prove the return on investment of a degree, and flat budgets paired with record-high advising caseloads. These twin pressures are catalyzing new efforts by institutions to demonstrate student success.
On the value of the degree, the research establishes career readiness as the clearest link between a college education and its perceived worth. Yet institutions concentrate their effort on some practices (e.g., job fairs, resume reviews) but not all high-impact ones. The practices that rank highest for impact, real-world project-based learning and guaranteed internships, are the ones institutions have invested in the least. Guaranteed internships are offered at only 7% of institutions, and just 5% have a coordinated, centrally organized approach to employer partnerships. This lack of central strategy for career readiness through work integrated learning makes it difficult to scale high-impact programs and leaves faculty who are interested in bringing experiential learning into their courses under-resourced and student demand underserved.
On the capacity side, the squeeze is structural and advisors are pulling AI into that gap on their own. High caseloads have ranked as the top barrier to better academic advising for six consecutive years. About one in five academic advisors now use AI daily, and they are not the early adopters most convinced by the technology. They are the advisors carrying the heaviest caseloads. Preference is also consolidating around a blended human and automation/ AI model, up 10 percentage points from 2025.
“When Tyton Partners first published Driving Toward a Degree ten years ago, higher education looked very different, and the tools at our disposal to improve student success also are very different,” said Catherine Shaw, Associate Partner, Tyton Partners. “Today, institutions face two pressures at once: proving their return on investment and putting AI to work without losing human judgment. It’s exciting to see advisors leading the charge on the latter, piloting ways to use AI that hold face-to-face time sacred, such as preparing for and following up on those important advisor-advisee meetings.”
Driving Toward a Degree 2026 offers calls to action for administrators, advisors, and solution providers, with a focus on moving employer partnerships to an institution-wide model, broadening how workforce outcomes are measured, right-sizing caseloads before purchasing new tools, funding data quality and AI policy as preconditions rather than afterthoughts, and building AI tools for the blended model that practitioners are converging on.
Driving Toward a Degree 2026 is developed with support from Lumina Foundation and Riipen as Anchor Partners, with additional support from NACADA, PeopleGrove, Stellic, and UERU as Research Partners. It draws on responses from more than 1,200 administrators, advisors, and frontline support staff at 750+ U.S. colleges and universities.
Driving Toward a Degree is one of three annual research publications from Tyton Partners measuring trends in student success, alongside Time for Class and Listening to Learners. The full report is available now. To schedule time to discuss the findings with the Tyton Partners research team, visit the Driving Toward a Degree website.
Read Driving Toward a Degree 2026 here.
Media Contact
Catherine Shaw
Associate Partner
cshaw@tytonpartners.com
Tyton Partners
About Tyton Partners
Tyton Partners is the leading provider of strategy consulting and investment banking services to the global knowledge and information services sector. With offices in Boston and New York City, the firm has an experienced team of bankers and consultants who deliver a unique spectrum of services from mergers and acquisitions and capital markets access to strategy development that helps companies, organizations, and investors navigate the complexities of the education, media, and information markets. Tyton Partners leverages a deep foundation of transactional and advisory experience and an unparalleled level of global relationships to make its clients’ aspirations a reality and to catalyze innovation in the sector. Learn more at tytonpartners.com.
