“Of course, colleges have absolutely no incentive to go online even though their product (education) is ideally suited (i.e. – a service, not a physical tangible product) to be sold over the internet. Because if they did start offering accredited degrees over the internet, nearly everyone in higher education would lose their jobs and have to go find real ones in the real world instead of teaching.“
Conrad Black has often argued that much of undergrad U could easily go online with minimal disruption.
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don’t forget the contribution of all
those scholarly journals
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I’ve been arguing this for years…including grade school. We’re still teaching kids the same way they were taught over 2000 years ago (except the content is in serious decline). Time to close down the buggy whip factories.
There is a very small contingent of kids that benefit from hands on teaching. The rest can learn better online. The key thing is that they can then learn at their own pace. Smart kids can finish grade school in 7 years or less and move on to higher education and the slower kids will no longer be holding back the brighter kids…and they won’t be getting lost when they miss a building block concept.
AND, the NDP will lose a large voting block. Ha.
All but the very top Universities have already had to drop their admission standards in order to pay their bills. And the top Universities continue to “specially admit” their tossed salad student body. And there has been a constant erosion in the veracity and scholarship behind … grades and testing standards. Colleges have had to remediate the education of an increasing number of students (hence … math is biased for white men … English skills are biased toward white men).
Bottom line is that FAR too many Unqualified students are being told that “college is their only way to success in America”. That is a massive statistical LIE. Yes … if you continue to work for McDonalds for your whole life … you will earn FAR LESS than the average college-educated counterpart. However, if you learn a skilled trade … you will likely earn FAR MORE than the average college graduate who never makes it past the cubicle pool. YOU are BEING LIED TO … by the so-called “smarter”, college “educated” intelligentsia.
PS … anyone who pays (takes out loans) to obtain a nebulous degree in nothing particularly marketable … can NEVER … be considered “smart”, or “educated”. Doing so is dumber than a box of rocks. My children made it through college with ZERO debt. It’s not that hard … not to be STUPID. However the cheerleaders on the left are bent on making everyone DUMB.
A great part of a university education has always been living within the academic atmosphere itself. I certainly enjoyed my time at university and would not have swopped it for distance learning.
But that was then; I’m not so sure university life is like that anymore. Yes, we had plenty of screeching student ideologues in my time too but I never had the sense that their madness had completely co-opted the administration as well.
They could be largely ignored, for there was no great permeation of their “correct-thinking” ideologies into the academic curriculum. Sure, the faculty was thick with left-leaning profs but – you weren’t required to close your mind down and accept certain orthodoxies as the only truths right from the start.
I had at least one professor who was an outright communist yet though he thumped away at the Marxist view of history, once shed of his course I was shed of his politics too: there was no university-wide “agreed truth” to adhere to, no “diversity” and “gender” committees waiting to interrogate me if my line of thinking wasn’t “progressive” enough.
All that to say: if the whole point of being at university is to be exposed to a broad spectrum of ideas, why attend if they are so actively engaged in limiting your access to those ideas?
College is for doing the things you can’t do on-line. You need laboratories and workshops so you can get hands-on experience.
50% of coursework could easily go on-line. Some majors could easily go on-line. For a lot of STEM courses, you need physical places, equipment, and materials.
This is what college is really for. We could fix things with a one-two punch. One, make as many courses on-line as possible. Two, wipe out government back student loans. Education is a bubble. If supply is increasing and price is increasing, it’s acredit fueled bubble.
I wonder if it would work. lets see, my fisrt 1/2 dozen or so university courses were done thru the Waterloo Univesity correspondence course offerings, suggested by a colleague where I was working at the time.
fast forward 13 years and moi has my fist degree in computer science. (aka STEM).
which led to another 15 years in the field.
which led to enough money to retire early and go back to school, this time tuitin free via senior citoyen exemption.
yep, it works!! speaking of work, there was a LOT of that involved. maybe that’s the key . . . .
Any lecture type environment can easily be replaced online with elimination of the need for all but a few of the best lecturers. In high school, because of acting up a little in class, I had to finish the last few months of a math course in the library on my own and another course by correspondence for similar reasons. In both situations, the atmosphere and organization was way more conducive for learning. I would estimate that online education could cut out years of wasted time and boredom while shielding people from the toxic environments now prevalent in the humanities.
I hate to be the bearer of bad tidings, but a lot of courses (especially 100/200) courses are indeed offered online.
They are not any more successful or inexpensive than regular courses.
For some people online works — I find that for some people (especially those who work and who don’t have a problem not being in a traditional classroom) they are a good option.
But it isn’t going to change education. Because somewhere there is an instructor (and a department) that is 1) building the syllabus; 2) gathering the materials; 3) conducting and guiding the class.
So…no ending leftist indoctrination or for that matter sh&&&y teaching. In fact, since it favors younger, more tech-savvy instructors (I know this, because I’m an old dinosaur, and don’t do well at all handling the online stuff) it actually encourages more leftist indoctrination and certainly doesn’t do anything for teaching critical thinking skills *classes usually have online discussion in a forum/board…because it is online, it is actually easier to squelch dissent believe it or not…I personally think it has something to do with lack of physical proximity — you can be much more dismissive of someone if you don’t have to look them in the face.
But the colleges actually love these things because they can cram more sections in, and with that more money.
Nope, bring back trade schools; encourage employers to hire the person with JUST a certificate or associates. Get people thinking TRULY outside the box about certificates, degrees, etc. (people are now brainwashed into believing that a bachelor’s is a must, a master’s maybe…when a tech certificate would serve them better) and cut the university racket off at the knees. I say this as a college instructor. And start talking back to the colleges…I can’t think of many parents who even like what’s going on at them, and they are the ones ultimately footing the bill (this includes taxpayers)…yet they have come to buy into the idea that they can 1) do nothing about the colleges; 2) college is an absolute must (which has driven the cost up and the quality down). Maybe if the colleges were challenged a little, then they might finally change — but they are not being challenged at all.
Online won’t fix that — it is, to be frank, not half revolutionary enough.
PS. there would be more support for this in society and within the student body itself than many realize (like I said, college instructor here…I know what goes down on campus…only the loudmouths get attention, and they are not in the majority; the campus is ripe for a change of direction).
Lots of institutions of “higher” learning have staff who have obtained their advanced degrees through correspondence or on-line courses. Do a search at your local institution and see who has a degree from say Capella?
Once you are in the system you can get the raises by buying these degrees.
If you like on-line universities, you’re gonna love this:
https://www.truthrevolt.org/news/online-feminist-business-school-seeks-overcome-toxic-masculine-capitalism
Considering the context in which the words are being used, but aren’t “toxic” and “masculine” redundant?
If you like on-line universities, you’re gonna love this:
https://preview.tinyurl.com/y8lubny9
Why wait?
Given the “quality” of most university graduates today, one may as well create their own On Line Uni and issue your own credentials.
Be what ever gender you wish, married to whatever you need and credentialed as anything you want.some fee may apply.
Now some sarcasm for sure, but have you read modern resumes?
They read like the writers,invented the trades, built Noah’s Ark and designed Stonehenge..
They get the poor employers attention alright, file in bin 13, the round one.
Now some sarcasm for sure, but have you read modern resumes?
They read like the writers,invented the trades, built Noah’s Ark and designed Stonehenge..
It seemed to work for them because they were the ones that got the jobs I applied for after I quit my teaching position. Then again, I’m sure that the employers shamelessly engaged in age discrimination.
I’m not convinced that online is enough to fix higher education. I think the fix will come when we separate teaching from accreditation.
There is no reason for one institution to do both. It is even counter productive. Students want a good education, but businesses want good accreditation. The current model gives blanket accreditation to all students who pass, which encourages freeloaders. (And grade inflation and all the -studies have exacerbated the problem.)
I don’t know exactly what the future business model will look like, but you can get an idea by looking at college entrance exams like the SAT, or professional school exams like LSAT or MCAT. There are prep courses you can purchase for any of those exams. And I’ll bet none of those courses water any time with social justice.
Jenny R. is correct. Most universities offer online versions of the courses and sometimes entire degrees. It still takes a lot of professors’ time to structure, grade, and give feedback.
The problem is the students have much more difficulty interacting with each other in online courses. They always have online forums for each course where they can do that to some extent. But its not as good as interacting with each other in person. The students themselves have a significant input to the education process. Thats why attempts to structure it as a business usually fail. For most businesses, their customers’ only obligation is to pay their bills when due.
And I agree, many students would be better off with some type of vocational training. At the universities where I have taught, approximately 50% of the undergraduate students are either unwilling or unable to learn the course subjects properly. This leads to a huge misallocation of resources.