Posted on 09/22/2020 5:42:46 AM PDT by karpov
The Covid-19 pandemic forced colleges to shift to online learning, often with disastrous results. Students are no fools and many of them are suing for a discount. They have realized what higher education is loath to admit: Instruction is not what they, their parents and the American taxpayer are paying full price for.
The most common discount on offer appears to be a 10% tuition reduction, but some students are pushing for far more. They claim that nonacademic activities, from school plays and concerts to networking and parties, represent a lot more than 10% of the price tag of college. Such discounts imply that students are still getting 90% of the value of higher education (about $45,000 worth, on average) from their Zoom lectures, but much of the educational content has become widely available for free. Students and parents can’t be faulted for suspecting that an online education should cost next to nothing.
At some institutions, it already does. Primarily online Southern New Hampshire University recently announced a free first year for incoming students in light of the pandemic. California-based National University—which offers an array of online classes—cut tuition by up to 25% for full-time students and says that new scholarships will make enrollment nearly free for Pell Grant-eligible students.
Can the pandemic finally bring the traditional college pricing model to its knees? Or will these examples remain outliers?
Insight into the future of higher education may come from an unlikely source: the brokerage industry. Like higher ed, stock trading is a highly regulated field with massive barriers to change. Recall the stereotypical stockbrokers of the 1980s: Tom Wolfe’s “Masters of the Universe” or Merrill Lynch’s “Thundering Herd.” For years, the traditional brokerage industry was considered too difficult to replicate with technology.
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
Doable, for close to free, online with free videos.
I don’t think it would count as getting a degree, but Coursera has tons of classes from prestigious Universities from around the world.
I’ve “enrolled” in quite a few free classes in subjects I wanted to learn about.
https://www.coursera.org/courses?query=free
with a computer and a library you can learn anything you want. An education has always been free. If you want someone else to review what you have learned and certify that you have indeed learned the information, you have to pay for it.
Pull one from the history section, one from the sciences, one from the biography and then choose an "elective" or two for yourself. Also don't ignore the classics. You don't have to read every page of every book but just exposing yourself to all this knowledge will get you a quality education over time.
That's a good way of putting it. Also, you are way overpaying for the textbooks.
And free K-12? Fast kids finish at age 14? Stay at home moms? You’re funnin’ me.
“But the cost of college tuition compared to the amount of personalized attention you get is absurd at many places.”
Without question! Imagine what kind of personal tutoring you could get for $50,000-$70,000/year instead of paying that in tuition, room and board at a non-state college.
If you are studying for a STEM degree, labs aren’t free and require a physical presence.
Fast forward 20 years and I doubt if the education system will be anything close to what we have now.
What we have now is garbage.
I was listening to Candace Owens the other day. It appears they couldn’t find many black high school kids in Baltimore inner city schools who were proficient in math or science. Meanwhile, the teachers keep getting a very nice salaries with early retirement options.
If the college can teach a class online, they can hit the record button...
My comments are more directed towards higher education - which is basically a ripoff - unless you are looking for a career in a highly technical field like engineering, medicine or law. Even those degrees are way overpriced but at least you have a shot at making some real money.
Not only college, but I’d say High School as well. Imagine having the best teachers in the country, instead of your whiny union slouch locally?
What my neighbor decided to do - instead of paying the exorbitant fees at the U of California his daughter was accepted into, she’s going to go to a local community college for two years to get her basic requirements at a fraction of the price and by then, hopefully, the UC will be open again and she can finish there.
The cats out of the bag. Calculus is the same at Harvard as it is at Northern Illinois. So is Physics. Maybe the courses are faster but. an integral is an integral. The speed of light, the force of gravity does not change from one college to another. The reality is that Google ans Youtube have replaced college and even high School years ago. The only thing valuable about school is the acceptance letter. It proves that if you are a white person without a athletic skill, you are very capable if you got into Duke. Like Zuckerberg or Gates, Harvard knew they were bright when they were accepted. Harvard did not teach them anything. The only reason for college is to fill the slot on a resume.
Defund the universities. Or at least the intersectionality departments.
That’s entirely because of racism. Please ignore that blacks have been running the schools for 30+/- years.
It costs as much as it does today, because only some students pay full tuition, while others get free tuition for writing “BLM” 100 times.
If college becomes “free” the tuition will go up to 300,000 a year. As long as it’s paid for by taxes, it will go up rapidly.
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