Yes! Adapt or perish. Online courses have disrupted higher education; academics are forced to consider adjusting their stale teaching style to compete for undergraduate students attention with Facebook, Google, Twitter, and Instagram. I think most of the well endowed ($$$) ivory towers and ivy leagues will survive the pending tsunami of higher education reform; however many traditional brick & mortar universities may need to simply need to adapt (i.e. create hybrid courses- online + in-class courses) or perish. Why would an undergrad who grew up with the internet and a smart phone in her/his pocket with access to more data accessible at a faster rate than ever before pay $50k a year in edu costs for 4-5 years ($250K racking up unsubsidized student loan debt many cant pay back in less than 20 years!) attend boring lectures taught in a format that has not changed in 1,000 years old; instead tech savvy youth can sit at home in their jammies learning the core concepts of most disciplines online for FREE!!! Or get a Bachelors, & Masters via online universities like University of Phoenix for more than $150K less....hmm. You the math. Employers will get savvy as more online degree alumni take positions with hiring authority, the trance with the branding and reputation of an institution will be broken. Instead employers will increasingly require demonstration of tangible skill sets (i.e. portfolio). Finally, many top ranked research universities fixate on serving the very top undergraduate students disregarding the needs and preferences of the bulk of the undergrads enrolled - the normal students. They also put all tenure and promotion decisions on a professors ability to do research tolerating poor teaching quality. The practice of teaching must evolve to meet the needs of todays undergrad leveraging current technology & instructional tools (not those who lived 1,000 years ago). I expect, the demand will shift from old school to a faster, cheaper, more efficient, user friendly, portal to learning- open access online.
Posted on: Thu, 21 Nov 2013 06:49:09 +0000
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