I think they will. I'm not saying it will happen overnight, but it certainly will be in the future for the average person.
Right now, we have a bias against online learning since we think of it as a low-class experience or for people who didn't go to "real" colleges. But I think this is a lot like online dating. It used to be that people who met each other online were the exception. In 2000, if you told a friend that you met your significant other online, it carried a heavy social stigma. Nowadays it's still there, but it's less. In 20 years, there likely won't be one at all. The same applies to education.
I had some terrible professors in college (especially for intro classes). I'd go sit in class and we'd go over chapters in a book or we'd just be bored out of our minds. Imagine if the Dalai Lama was teaching your 30 hour class on Buddhism or Michael Chabon was teaching you creative writing, and Michael Beschloss taught you American History. Imagine if this caliber of teachers was available online. Would you think that this was a worse experience than a traditional college? If you only need one teacher to teach all your classes about a particular subject, you get the best you can get.
Maybe you'll still have to go sit in a classroom if you want an Ivy degree (Up until somewhat recently, they primarily functioned as a way for America's elites to meet one another and network. This would become their primary function once again.) But why wouldn't a top state school like the University of Virginia offer a world class online program of lectures created by only the very best professors to every student at a fraction of the cost online (especially if it saved the taxpayers money)? If one had to weigh the cost of getting a degree at the University of Virginia for 3k/year or 50k/year at Princeton, that would be a very easy decision for many many people.
I also wonder which lower "upper tier" college is going to break from the ratings game it wasn't going to win anyway and start selling their degrees online. They'd be the prestigious low cost alternative and claim a massive market share. It seems to me that there's a considerable first mover advantage for a school that jumped on it. There's also room for foreign schools that are already heavily subsidized by their governments to offer these programs abroad inexpensively.
Right now, we have a bias against online learning since we think of it as a low-class experience or for people who didn't go to "real" colleges. But I think this is a lot like online dating.
Umm... I want to point out that the actual dating still happens in person.
I'm not sure this is the best analogy. You could just as easily compare online dating to choosing your university or your courses online, which already happens. Or you could compare online learning with cyber relationships, which AFAIK is still far from the social norm.
That's because so much of the dating process actually requires you to be in the same place.
But really I wasn't making the point that taking online classes and dating were the same. I was making the point that people's perceptions and acceptance of a new technology encroaching on an old institution took some time to overcome.
Sorry but this is full of holes.
"Imagine if the Dalai Lama was teaching your 30 hour class on Buddhism or Michael Chabon was teaching you creative writing, and Michael Beschloss taught you American History. Imagine if this caliber of teachers was available online"
People of this caliber DO teach, and they teach at GOOD schools, not phoenix u.
Also, if the Ivy League started a low-cost online option, it wouldn't be the same. As it's been said many times, one of the reasons these schools are so good is that they are a meeting place for a. the rich and well connected and b. the extremely bright
First, I said this would be the experience of the average person. People that typically go to Ivy League schools are way above the average.
Yes, many of the very best, well known professors teach at good schools. But I think you'd be mistaken if you didn't think that many of these professors wouldn't jump on the idea of communicating their ideas to many thousands of people at once instead of a select few (especially if they were paid royalties for every student who took the class).
No one was saying it would be the same experience. You wouldn't be singing with the Tiger Tones in Nassau Hall or playing frisbee on the quad, but for many people that wasn't ever the choice. The choice for people that go online isn't going to be between a school like Princeton and the University of Phoenix. It's going to be a much smaller gap of prestige.
If schooling (like mine) had cost 12k instead of 160k, there would be many who see the opportunity in carrying no debt and using that money for another purpose. There will be tradeoffs, but an extra 100k would surely have paid for one hell of a semester abroad.
Right now, we have a bias against online learning since we think of it as a low-class experience or for people who didn't go to "real" colleges. But I think this is a lot like online dating. It used to be that people who met each other online were the exception. In 2000, if you told a friend that you met your significant other online, it carried a heavy social stigma. Nowadays it's still there, but it's less. In 20 years, there likely won't be one at all. The same applies to education.
I had some terrible professors in college (especially for intro classes). I'd go sit in class and we'd go over chapters in a book or we'd just be bored out of our minds. Imagine if the Dalai Lama was teaching your 30 hour class on Buddhism or Michael Chabon was teaching you creative writing, and Michael Beschloss taught you American History. Imagine if this caliber of teachers was available online. Would you think that this was a worse experience than a traditional college? If you only need one teacher to teach all your classes about a particular subject, you get the best you can get.
Maybe you'll still have to go sit in a classroom if you want an Ivy degree (Up until somewhat recently, they primarily functioned as a way for America's elites to meet one another and network. This would become their primary function once again.) But why wouldn't a top state school like the University of Virginia offer a world class online program of lectures created by only the very best professors to every student at a fraction of the cost online (especially if it saved the taxpayers money)? If one had to weigh the cost of getting a degree at the University of Virginia for 3k/year or 50k/year at Princeton, that would be a very easy decision for many many people.
I also wonder which lower "upper tier" college is going to break from the ratings game it wasn't going to win anyway and start selling their degrees online. They'd be the prestigious low cost alternative and claim a massive market share. It seems to me that there's a considerable first mover advantage for a school that jumped on it. There's also room for foreign schools that are already heavily subsidized by their governments to offer these programs abroad inexpensively.