Massive open online courses are the way of the future.
The problem with online colleges is you don’t get to meet people as easily. I don’t think they’ll replace real colleges just yet. They’re not a good alternative right now. And an employer will not take an online degree very seriously.
Yeah it’ll happen sooner rather than later. Uni is expensive and over here in Oz a lot aren’t paying back their accumulated debt! It sux because I did and never had a chance of getting a degree because of mental illness.
Also. Universities in our cities are prime real estate. That doesn’t help in their cause for hanging around!
They’re free here and half the work is cooperative. So an online model wouldn’t really compare well.
Yeah it used to be free here too my friend. You are lucky to live where you are to get such good support. Sadly most of the rest of the west is struggling seriously.
It’s no slight mate but we are all dealing with these issues. Glad you feel safe because out here we certainly can’t!
I don’t feel safe just because we have free universities.
I really don’t feel safe at all the way the world is going.
I’m all for this. I can see it happening. You can get a Georgia Tech Master’s in CS for 7k right now as a MOC. To me, you’re getting a top 10 education for a fraction of the cost and you also get the convenience of working at the same time or doing it at home.
That’s the problem as I see it. The online classes could give us the knowledge, but there’s no way they could replace the social interaction of being in a classroom with other students and getting to know people outside of class. I only attend my local community college rather than the local university but I have made 4 really good friends that I would never have met otherwise. And it’s fun getting invited to parties. It does something for your self esteem.
Also, I don’t know if this exists in the US, but here you can take exams at universities without going to or signing up for classes. So you’re not in a course, you’re just doing exams. You can get pretty much any degree this way, and it’s basically the same as online courses, only more credible. Lectures aren’t really important anyway, they’re really just an addition to your books. And this system has existed for a long time without toppling universities. People still want to go to class and meet and work with other people.
If you go to college to socialize, I think something is wrong with you. You go to college for an education and to get a career, not to make friends. They have fraternities and sororities and clubs for that sort of thing, but most people I knew were serious about school.
Brick and mortar schools are offering online degrees that are indistinguishable from their traditional degrees meaning it doesn’t say that they’re online. This is the direction they are moving in. It’s also cheaper for them and they get to fulfill their mission of educating people on a mass scale. It also keeps them competitive.
I don’t need someone to hold my hand.
I don’t know how European universities work, but most of them are not even ranked high according to US news and other publications. Oxford and Cambridge are the exception. And those are not even 100% public, if I recall. So you can keep your low tuition and social activities.
I have no desire to meet and work with other people. I can do that online. The only time I can see this benefiting me is if I struggle with a problem set and/or I can explain ideas to others to get a better grasp of things. Other than that, I have no desire of having others copying my work or me not learning the material by myself. Because when it comes to test day, I need to make sure I understand the material myself otherwise I will fail the exam.
I think it’s a matter of European vs American mentality here. In America, online degrees are looked down upon too, but if the diploma doesn’t say online, an employer can’t tell.
I much rather get an online master’s (some day) from Georgia Tech in CS or Math for only 7k than go to an unknown state school or some expensive private school and take classes in house. I can get a superior education online this way for a fraction of the cost.
Yes, like k-12, higher education is a huge divide in the us. Sometimes its just a matter of availability and access. People can go through life without ever recieving quality education. A big missed high five.
Many universities and colleges feel less like places to learn and more like big, impersonal businesses bent on squeezing money out of people who haven’t got that much to begin with. Which is what they are. And they are ineffective.
Details like what background you come from, your age and social status are also huge factors in whether or not college is even a possibility. I’m not saying its not for these institutions to suddenly go bankrupt, but I do think this prediction is exciting. I like to imagine a future where technology makes transitions in the way we live easier. And we always hope for the best outcome.
The thing I would ask is how credible is a university education, conventional or online, anyway when university education has been opened up to far more people than in the 60s,70s and 80s ?
The only reason one should physically go to school is for information, usually delivered through an impersonal lecture explaining information from a textbook.
When we have a well programmed interactive computer based way of doing this, and it is cheap and widely available to everyone, as well as coded by people who care, I think that will be an enormous shift in the structure of education.
Something like D2L, Canvas, or Moodle. But available to a wider population of people interested in learning.
There are always serious issues with education when people (the faculty…those guys), become an issue. The other thing is scheduling. Brick and mortar structures your day, online forms of learning may be more flexible, allowing for more varied leatning experiences which can be interactive and even personalized.
I watch a lot of lectures online in youtube. I should be a bloody professor for all the hours I spend listening to podcasts.
I hope college football and basketball continue. They are going to have to pay the players. They already do, just under the table.
Hey mate…yeah it’s nuts over here. They are getting rid of Arts programs. It’s all about economics and economics is winning! Wasn’t being critical and your right. It’s a problem we all have!
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