lol
so freaking laughable.
Anyone who can find the local library could get a college education for free, and it’s been that was for 100 years or more.
Exactly the opposite will happen. College will be even more important than ever with advanced degrees like Masters and Doctorate becoming the new minimum just as a high school diploma was decades ago and a bachelors is now.
But those degrees will be deliverable (and delivered) online.
That’s the difference.
That's true. But if you just study for yourself, there are problems: how do you know that you've covered all the bases? How do you demonstrate to anyone outside of the library that you know what you say you've studied and are qualified to do the job you want (let's say, as a researcher in particle physics at Batavia)?
You can learn a great deal in a library or online, but the element of interaction is missing. There's a lot to be gained from talking with your professors, taking exams and writing papers to make sure you really know what you think you do, having discussions with classmates, working in a lab, being directed to new authors and materials you hadn't heard of, etc. Just the discipline of knowing that an exam is coming up helps focus the mind.
So while the self-taught method is valid, an online curriculum offers a great deal, too. I've taken some for-credit online classes in a very intimate group (four or five student) and it was great. I learned a lot more than I would have had I just been studying on my own. At least there was someone of whom I could ask questions.