Peter Sachs asks the question of what the side-effects of online education can have on society. I applaud him for his efforts. Too often we make fundamental changes in in our economy or our culture without any real discussion of its side effects. Comprehensive welfare made possible a feral underclass that survives without work and aided the virtual destruction of the black family. Let’s change the definition of marriage; proponents tell us that all the results are going to be good. It’s taken Social Security about four generations before people woke up to the fact that it’s demographically unstable. Medicare is imploding faster. Let’s turn the nation’s health care system over to the government; what could possibly go wrong?
So looking at what can go wrong with our system of higher education if it’s transformed into a virtual system – online – as opposed to classroom instruction. Let’s first admit that higher ed has severe problems. One is cost. The other is the product. The third is its utility.
Higher ed costs have grown faster than inflation, faster than medical care, faster than virtually any other industry in the country and its growth simply unsustainable. Only the wealthy can afford a college degree without going into debt.
The second is the product. The education that students receive is ill-matched to the needs of either the student or our economy. Why do so many college graduates work in retail stores, call centers or the food industry? Because degrees in English Literature, for example, are not in great demand outside of academia. English Lit or History are fine fields of study and attracted people in the past who came from well-to-do families or who saw themselves as starving artists living in a garret in Paris. Other majors like the various grievance studies majors are only of use as a way of becoming a professor of grievance studies, getting a job at the Tides Foundation or becoming a politician.
The utility of a college education should be a subject for careful study and meaningful change. Several generations ago a high school student was asked what he wanted to be when he grew up; today he’s asked what college he plans to attend. College is the new high school. It’s an indication you’re trainable for something useful. Unless you’re a graduate of one of the hard sciences, you have not developed any useful skills in college. And even graduating engineers, chemists or physicists have to be trained to on the job once they are hired. Worse, if you are a graduate of one of our “elite” schools you come equipped with a sense of entitlement and hubris that’s been ingrained to an extend that it's obnoxious. You can hardly wait to fix all the obvious (to you) flaws in America.
Let me now turn to Mr. Sachs analysis of the issue of social stratification. He uses data from U.S. Department of Education from 2007-2008. This is the first problem and one that goes to the point that on-line education is not even in its infancy; it’s in the gestation phase. Data that’s 5-6 years out of date in a brand new industry is as useful as a similar study from 2005 on the popularity of Facebook. I’m frankly surprised that even then as many as 18% of students were enrolled in online programs exclusively.
•Test scores. Among the highest-scoring students on admissions tests, virtually all (95 percent) were enrolled in traditional education programs. Low-scoring students were more than twice as likely as high-scoring students to enroll in online programs.
Answer: Well, yes. High scorers were more likely to be accepted to the college of their choice and were willing to make the financial sacrifice to go to traditional colleges. There is also a correlation between high scores on admissions tests and family income, the educational attainments of parents and social expectations. I suspect this group is least likely to either need to seek alternative educational opportunities or wish to risk the chance that on-line education would be perceived as lacking in prestige or inadequate.
•Selectivity. Just 8 percent of students at colleges with very selective admissions criteria were enrolled in an online program. By contrast, 13 percent of students at moderately selective institutions, 16 percent of those at minimally selective colleges, and 23 percent of students at open admissions colleges, were enrolled in online programs.
Answer: I believe this criterion is directly linked to the Test Scores issue and my comments would be the same.
•Economic background. Students who enrolled in online programs were more likely to be first generation college students from lower income families than students enrolled in traditional settings. Some 20 percent of students considered low-income and first-generation college-goers were enrolled in online college programs. By comparison, just 14 percent of students considered not low-income and not first- generation college-goers were enrolled in such programs.
Answer: Of course. The issue of cost is by far the biggest driver for online education. Any other result on this measure would be absurd.
•Parental education. Students whose parents were relatively uneducated were more likely than students with highly educated parents to enroll in online college programs. About 21 percent of students whose fathers completed no more than a high school diploma were enrolled in online programs. That compares to just 9 percent and 12 percent of students whose fathers had attained a professional degree or a doctorate, respectively, going to college online.
Answer: Parental education and economic background are virtual synonyms for each other. That is why the statistics for both are almost identical.
The question is still valid: will graduates of online colleges be considered second class? That remains to be seen. However, as a small business owner I would have to evaluate each candidate who came before me in terms of their attitude, their intelligence and their desire to excel. I would also have to look within and see if my antipathy toward academia and its modern products would make me automatically prefer the graduate of Online U.
1 comment:
I think that most of conclusions you reached might have been similar 100 years ago when comparing well known (i.e. Ivy League level) universities and public universities (especially those in mostly rural states). Judgements about the quality of education received have always been based more on who you went to school with rather than what you were taught.
University is, and always has been, as much an opportunity to make connections with powerful people as scholarship.
Even if online classes are better learning experiences and it is difficult to see how they could be much worse than much of what passes for university classes today (with some obvious exceptions such as courses requiring hands on lab experience), they will never have the cachet of some universities.
If the world ever becomes about what you know instead of who you know, online learning may be successful. It may even be better for some students (probably worse for others).
One thing that is certain is that the current university system cannot last much longer.
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