The Apollo Group's founding vision and mission evolution over 35 years

Apollo Group is the leading name in for-profit education and adult education, with its stable of subsidiaries including Apollo Global, the College for Financial Planning, the Institute for Professional Development and, most notably, Phoenix University. The account hereafter offers an overview of the Apollo Group's general orientation, business strategy, structural components and a number of other defining organizational dimensions.

Vision and Mission:

Originally stated as a Vision and ultimately evolving into the company's overarching Mission, the Apollo Group states on its company website that "has established itself as a leading provider of higher education programs for working adults by focusing on servicing the needs of the working adult." (Apollo Group, p. 1) This underscores the identify of the privately held education company. This identity is outlined with greater specificity in the table here below.

Table 1: The Apollo Group: Vision and Mission

What?

Apollo Group was created with the intention of catering to the needs of adults in search of higher education opportunities.

Who?

The Apollo Group was founded by John Sperling, who surmised that the model balancing education and profession was shifting ever more toward lifelong commitment to the former and various career-shifts in the latter.

Why?

Beginning in 1973, Apollo group leaders recognized an increasing shift away from a higher education landscape strictly dominated by young learners to one where adult students, many with full time jobs, required support to pursue their educational goals.

Apollo's View of Higher Ed:

Apollo takes the basic position that Higher Education has increasingly become a province shared by young students and adults alike. According to its website, the company's Vision emerged from the finding that not only were 50% of all students adults but that of these, 80% also maintained full-time work responsibilities. (Apollo Group, p. 1) Apollo's perspective is that by targeting its structure, scheduling and marketing toward working adults, it could fill a void in the market for a demographic in need of such accommodation.

Key Elements of Business Strategy:

A key element of the Apollo business strategy has been diversification. Over the course of its development, Apollo has acquire a number of institutions aimed at varying its course offerings and producing an array of distinct brand identities. These are aimed at appealing to the needs of different subsections of the student population. A great example of this is the company's 2011 acquisition of established mathematics education and testing company Carnegie Learning. As to the acquisition, the company's co-chief executive Gregory W. Cappelli commented that "Math is a subject where we see a lot of students having difficulty. . . We think by adding the Carnegie Learning solution into our platform, we'll really help our students to have better outcomes in math.'" (Gabriel, p. 1)

Structural Components and Customer Needs:

These comments demonstrate that the core structural components of Apollo are actually an array of distinctly branded schools, which themselves are divided into an array of campuses. Also important in terms of understanding the company's structure, especially as it satisfies customer needs, it is of note that Apollo makes extensive use of distance learning, virtual classrooms and other technology-mediated teaching innovations. This is a critical way that the company succeeds in serving working adults who require the utmost of flexibility.

Driving Forces/Changes in Adult Education: