<p>For those of you who still doubt the coming transformational change in higher education, I highly recommend this excellent piece arguing the inevitability of an overhaul of the four-year college model and the resulting financial collapse of many institutions.</p>
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Very few have been able to exercise their imaginations to the point that they can perceive the systemic and structural changes ahead, and what they portend for the business models and social scripts that sustain the status quo. That is partly because the changes are threatening to many vested interests, but also partly because the human mind resists surrender to upheaval and the anxiety that tends to go with it. But resist or not, major change is coming. The live lecture will be replaced by streaming video. The administration of exams and exchange of coursework over the internet will become the norm.
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The higher-ed business is in for a lot of pain as a new era of creative destruction produces a merciless shakeout of those institutions that adapt and prosper from those that stall and die. Meanwhile, students themselves are in for a golden age, characterized by near-universal access to the highest quality teaching and scholarship at a minimal cost. The changes ahead will ultimately bring about the most beneficial, most efficient and most equitable access to education that the world has ever seen. There is much to be gained. We may lose the gothic arches, the bespectacled lecturers, dusty books lining the walls of labyrinthine librarieswonderful images from higher educations past. But nostalgia wont stop the unsentimental beast of progress from wreaking havoc on old ways of doing things.
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<p>These are general quotes decribing his predictions, if you're interested, read the article for a detailed analysis of the how and why behind his vision.</p>
<p>The analogy that most struck me was how universities are like albums - you have to buy all the pieces in one package – and his vision that in the future you could buy courses the way we buy music (a math course from Yale, an engineering course from Purdue, etc.). Interesting article. Thanks for posting it.</p>
<p>Yes, PG, it was a good analogy and here’s another one also referencing the changing music industry when talking about the physical expansion plans at many institutions:</p>
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<p>I’ve always thought the expansion plans of NYU (D1’s alma mater) are crazy just for this reason.</p>
<p>I like the flexibility of taking courses at different universities, but to get a BA in history or math at Yale you need to fulfill distribution requirement within a major. Maybe Yale math majors are required to take at least one course in real analysis and number theory. To preserve the integrity of college majors, there would need to be cross-university articulation agreements. To meet the Yale real analysis requirement for math majors one could take specified courses from other universities. It would take time and therefore money for professors to judge the offerings of other schools.</p>
<p>Or will the concept of majoring in X at school Y be abandoned?</p>
<p>Great article. I don’t know that I agree entirely with the author, but education as we know it now is going to change and universities that don’t adapt will indeed suffer.</p>
<p>I have a friend that has taken two of the Coursera MOOCs. Her experience was really interesting, especially the discussion and peer interaction aspects of the course. She found it really intriguing. My son’s university offers several courses through Coursera and I’m tempted to try one out based on her experience. I agree poetgrl, lifelong learning will be available on an entirely new level.</p>
<p>My high school student in AP Psych watches a lot of online lectures already. I’m sure more online education is coming. I think there will still need to be science labs with equipment no one has in the basement at home. There may be fewer colleges, but they won’t go away all together. Those that exist will still have dorms, athletic teams, performing arts. The younger generation is used to this technology. I don’t even like to read books online, so it would not appeal to me.</p>
<p>I recently received my masters using a combo of traditional and online courses.</p>
<p>As a former mid-level staff person at a regional university, and as someone who loves the campus environment, this article scares the hell outta me b.c. I sense it is not far off the mark…guess I’d better start rethinking my long-term career goals!</p>
<p>Fascinating, I recently told my wife and Ds that they would likely be the last generation of our family to have a traditional four year college education. I was basing my observation on the unsustainability of college costs. It looks to me like I may be right and technology will be the driver.</p>
<p>The article is heavy on the hype. I’ve taken several MOOCs from Coursera. Overall, I have enjoyed them. However, with an attrition rate of 90% or so, there are still a few bugs to be worked out. From my point of view, they teach the material at a pace and a level that are beyond the vast majority of students I teach. [I’m a CS instructor at a directional state univ., so I have been padding Coursera’s pass rate :).] </p>
<p>I agree that online or hybrid courses will eventually cause havoc with our current college system. However, the current set of online courses don’t have the right formula yet.</p>
<p>Impressive! This means we should advise all those disappointed applicants rejected by Harvard to just take a gap decade. Simply bum around Europe or take it easy for 10 years and then just waltz right in with no questions asked.</p>
<p>This’ll be quick, because I’m writing this from my flying car, on my way to the space shuttle to get to Moonbase Alpha, but if the university of the future (in ten years) has 10 million students, and thousands of professors will lose their jobs, whose gonna grade all those papers? Sure, I know that there are some computer programs that can do some pretty sophisticated ‘grading’ beyond just surface errors, but in ten years will we be at the point where a computer can assess the originality/appropriateness of a thesis?</p>
<p>Some MOOC advocates have suggested that students will grade each other – search “peer grading moocs” for discussion. I am skeptical of this – it sounds like the blind leading the blind. I am willing to pay experts to teach my children how to play the piano, play tennis, swim, etc. Why wouldn’t I want an expert to grade my child’s term paper and help him improve his thinking and writing? My gripe with many universities is that only a fraction of the money being charged is actually spent teaching students.</p>
<p>While 10 years from now, Harvard may be enrolling 10 million students in online courses, the author gives a more distant time frame for his full vision to be realized: “50 years, if not much sooner,” in the opening sentence. I happen to think 20 to 30 years is a good estimate for the scenario he describes.</p>
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<p>While many tenured teaching positions will be eliminated, there will certainly be a market for qualified full-time instructors or “faciltators” to grade papers, lead discussion groups and respond to student queries–it’s just that most of them will be working out of their own homes and be responsible for grading a couple of hundred papers a semester rather than 40. </p>
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<p>The heavy attrition rate is why certificates from these types of courses will eventually have real value. It will be the most prepared, disciplined and capable students that complete and do well in these courses–open access but with real meritocracy built in. Not that wealth won’t still give some students an advantage, but it will be a much more level playing field. Of course, students by then will hopefully have grown up with a lot more experience in online instruction and self-paced learning from primary school on up.</p>
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<p>Right now the universities involved readily tell you that this is in an experimental phase, in which they are trying many new things that will shape future techniques and standards. I looked into a Coursera course with Princeton and was surprised to find that it actually followed the semester programming (i.e. I was way too late to start it). I imagine that eventually, lectures and test-taking will be on demand, rather than with a set schedule, much like the inevitable future of TV programming.</p>
<p>Its pretty obvious that computers will be set up to grade all those papers looking for key phrases etc. much like computers now pick out which resumes to sent forward to HR for hiring.</p>
<p>I’m very skeptical of the “free” or greatly reduced cost the author claims. Has anyone noticed that online books are often not much cheaper now than the printed variety? Is “full service” available at gas stations anywhere now, for any price? And then there are the airlines. :rolleyes:
What would worry me is cost creep, where we wind up getting much less value for very close to the same price, eventually. </p>
<p>And this: What made my kids’ educations special to them was not only rubbing elbows with the other students, many of whom are still very important in their lives, but also the personal relationship they each had with their professors in the fields they chose, which proved very helpful in their careers. There will always be people willing to pay for the intangibles that a full service university offers, and therefore there will always be the “elite” educational model. I doubt very much that someone getting their entire education online will be “on a level playing field” with students who get to know the big names in their fields on a personal basis. I could see the gap between the rich and not-so-rich becoming even larger, not smaller, with this new model.</p>
<p>Ebooks cost so much because publishers still control the rights and have not allowed Amazon, etc. to sell them for less–that should change following the DOJ settlement with publishers. Also, as more authors are moving to self-publishing (50 Shades of Grey anyone?) the average price of books will continue to fall over time. A similar thing is happening in the music industry where new models such as Spotify are completely shifting the economics of music. In all industries where the product can be digitalized or transferred over the internet, old models will be replaced by more cost efficient and inherently more competitive ones. This digitizalization won’t affect the cost of gasoline and air travel other than that it will somewhat reduce the need for people to drive to work or travel great distances for schooling. Unfortunately, this means a lot of job displacement, but it is great on the consumer side.</p>
<p>As for the personal relationship with professors, I do believe that there will always be students that will pay (or have grants) to spend some time on a campus working with a mentor in a particular field, but that won’t be for four years, maybe one or two.</p>
<p>Right. I got curious about this after you posted, and it seems that they call some of these programs “distance learning,” and the students do spend some time on campus, in person, a couple of times a year, or once a year. So, maybe it will be some sort of hybrid of this?</p>
<p>Whatever the outcome, it is a very interesting development, imho.</p>